A JUNGIAN FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING

PSYCHEDELIC-INDUCED PSYCHOTIC STATES

by

Scott J. Hill

A Dissertation Submitted to

the Faculty of the California Institute of Integral Studies

in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy and Religion

with a concentration in Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness

California Institute of Integral Studies

San Francisco, CA

2009
 CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL

I certify that I have read A JUNGIAN FRAMEWORK FOR

UNDERSTANDING PSYCHEDELIC-INDUCED PSYCHOTIC STATES by

Scott Hill, and that in my opinion this work meets the criteria for approving a

dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of

Philosophy in Philosophy and Religion with a concentration in Philosophy,

Cosmology, and Consciousness at the California Institute of Integral Studies.

_________________________________________________
Sean Kelly, Ph.D., Chair
Professor, Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness

_________________________________________________
Richard Tarnas, Ph.D.
Professor, Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness

_________________________________________________
David Lukoff, Ph.D.
Professor, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology
© 2009 Scott J. Hill
Scott J. Hill
California Institute of Integral Studies, 2009
Sean Kelly, Ph.D., Committee Chair

A JUNGIAN FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING

PSYCHEDELIC-INDUCED PSYCHOTIC STATES

ABSTRACT

Given the notable references to Jungian psychology in the psychedelic

literature, on the one hand, and the small number of in-depth treatments of

psychedelic experience from a Jungian perspective, on the other, there is a clear

need to develop a Jungian framework for elucidating the nature of psychedelic

experience. The framework I envision would highlight the nature of short-term

psychotic reactions to psychedelic experience. This framework would also

indicate implications for psychedelic psychotherapy as well as the treatment of

short-term psychotic reactions to psychedelic experiences.

The paucity of in-depth theoretical treatments of the relationship between

Jungian psychology and psychedelics can be attributed to a variety of reasons,

most notably Jung’s own criticism of the use of psychedelics. Although the

problems Jung identifies should be taken seriously, I see the value of looking

beyond Jung’s dismissive critique to his psychology in order to take advantage of

its penetrating insights into the nature of psychedelic experience. The relationship

of Jung’s psychology to psychedelic experience and psychedelic psychotherapy

are therefore subjects ripe for scholarly investigation and theoretical development.

iv
 This dissertation is based on an in-depth examination of Jung’s theoretical

and clinical approach to the structure and dynamics of the psyche in general and

his approach to trauma, psychosis, psychotherapy, and integration in particular.

This dissertation could make a significant contribution to transpersonal

psychology and Jungian psychology by employing a Jungian interpretation, or

Jungian hermeneutics, of psychedelic experience. This study could also improve

the practice of psychedelic psychotherapy and the treatment of

psychedelic-induced disorders.

v
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I could never have imagined that working to understand the recurring

effects of psychedelic-induced psychotic states, which I endured in solitude for so

many years, would bring me into relationship with so many goodhearted people.

The pleasure of this unexpected good fortune is reflected ironically in a diary

entry by J. D. Salinger’s character Seymour Glass, who wrote that he was “a kind

of paranoiac in reverse” because he suspected people of plotting to make him

happy (Salinger, 1955, p. 88).

By teaching me to be compassionately conscious of who I am, by gently

pushing me to say out loud that I want to be a writer, by telling me of Stanislav

Grof’s work, and by getting me to appreciate the natural need to manifest oneself

in the world, Tom Cushing helped me develop the ability and confidence to take

on this work in the first place. Richard Speakes, poet and English teacher and dear

friend, taught me most of what I know about good writing. Later, at an especially

difficult time, he and his wife, Karen Walker, sympathetically nudged me toward

writing this dissertation.

Reading Stanislav Grof’s LSD Psychotherapy in 1995, I realized for the

first time that someone really understood what I had experienced on LSD in 1967.

Grof’s books, and the publication of other new books, like Huston Smith’s

Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogenic

Plants and Chemicals (2000), opened my eyes to the fact that highly qualified

people were taking a serious look at the kinds of experiences that had changed my

life. Smith had written one of my favorite books, The World’s Religions: Our

vi
Great Wisdom Traditions (1991), and hearing him talk about his new book on

psychedelics inspired me to devote myself to understanding these experiences

more deeply.

When I discovered that Stanislav Grof taught with Richard Tarnas, the

author of another of my favorite books, The Passion of the Western Mind:

Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World View (1991), I was drawn

to the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) to attend one of their courses.

I found there a new home. All the courses I took at CIIS helped me develop

rigorous ways to investigate matters of personal importance from various

theoretical perspectives. I acquired valuable knowledge about psychedelic

experience from courses with Ralph Metzner, who had done pioneering research

on psychedelics with Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert at Harvard University in

the 1960s. Steven Goodman’s Trauma, Terror, and Transformation workshop

increased my appreciation for the compatibility between Jung’s psychology and

Tibetan Buddhism.

I am especially grateful to the faculty of the Philosophy, Cosmology, and

Consciousness (PCC) program for creating the rich, imaginative, and rigorous

intellectual environment that has given me the opportunity to delve into matters of

both personal and collective significance. And I thank particularly Sean Kelly.

Sean thoughtfully advised me from the day we met in 2002, generously read and

commented on many of my papers, gently suggested that I consider entering the

doctoral program, and encouraged me all the way.

vii
 Robert McDermott and Sean Kelly’s History of Western World Views

course was a wonderful introduction to seven of the most rewarding years of my

life. The Jungian-related papers I wrote for David Ulansey’s Jung and Myth

course, Sean Kelly’s Hegel and Jung seminar, and Jorge Ferrer’s Theoretical

Research seminar gave me the opportunity to explore the relationship between

Jung’s psychology and psychedelic experience, and to build a foundation for this

dissertation. Richard Tarnas and Brian Swimme’s seminar on Whitehead, Jung,

and Hillman, with Jorge Ferrer’s Transpersonal Theory seminar, increased my

appreciation for the philosophical issues underlying Jung’s psychology.

I was particularly fortunate to have been able to work with a first-rate

dissertation committee. The combined expertise of Sean Kelly, my chair, Richard

Tarnas, and my external member, David Lukoff, perfectly matched my inquiry

into the relevance of Jung’s psychology to understanding psychedelic-induced

psychotic states. Furthermore, their knowledgeable and thoughtful comments,

insights, and suggestions gently but surely pushed my dissertation to a level that I

could not have reached on my own.

Midway through my research I discovered “Analytic Work with LSD-25,”

a paper offering a rare Jungian interpretation of psychedelic psychotherapy by the

late analyst Margot Cutner (1959). I greatly admire Dr. Cutner’s work as reflected

in that important paper, and I am sorry that I did not have the opportunity to

communicate with her. Her article led me to Ronald Sandison’s equally important

publications, however; and I was quite fortunate to be able to talk with him on

several occasions. I thank Ben Sessa for publishing an interview with Dr.

viii
Sandison in the MAPS Bulletin (Sessa, 2008), and for encouraging me to contact

Dr. Sandison, who warmly received my letters and telephone calls and graciously

answered my questions.

An equally gratifying consequence of my research has been the many

meaningful conversations about this work that I have shared with friends,

teachers, fellow students, and acquaintances. I am especially thankful to those

who, having had their own difficult psychedelic experiences, expressed

appreciation to me for shedding light on them. These people inspired and taught

me in turn by their own investigations and insights. And they showed me that my

inquiry has more than personal significance. There were many others who

encouraged me by simply listening with an open mind and heart as I talked about

my investigation.

Collectively, these conversations formed the soul of this inquiry. Grateful

thanks to all of you, including Allen Noren, Glenn Harden, Laura Adair, Simone

Paddock, Pam Bjork, Karen Cochran, Byron Foster, Jack Krebs, Robin Setchko,

John Palmerlee, Katheryne Stoural, Moses Geller, Catt Tripoli, Dick Beers, Lev

Woolf, Gary Bobroff, Robyn Pierce, Stacy Simons, Gary Moring, Sarah Cordova,

Ted Esser, Nancy Hart, Christina Hardy, Chris Bache, Anne Shulgin, Myron

Stolaroff, Andrew Sewell, Michael Mithoefer, Kate Sorensen, Janis Phelps,

Matthew Stelzner, Chad Harris, Christopher Becker, Adrian Villasenor-Galarza,

Walter Tanner, Collin Eyre, Erin Reading, Tom Purton, Mary Fonte, and Mary

Donaldson. Special thanks to Travis Cox, for helping me learn to speak in real

time, as it were, and to Rick Doblin, who with conviction, passion, and integrity

ix
made it possible for me to talk about what it was like to be in Hell while I was

there.

I am deeply grateful to Ragnhild Gatu, my wife, whose experience with

altered states of consciousness does not go beyond her brilliant artistic creativity

and an occasional alcohol-induced giddiness. She unfailingly supported an inquiry

whose foreignness occasionally frightened and unnerved her. I am equally

grateful to Doug Hill, my brother, for his enthusiastic reading of a late draft. His

editing skills and thoughtful suggestions are reflected throughout this dissertation.

No doctoral student could ask for more capable and friendly guidance

through the dissertation labyrinth than I have received from Jessica Kostosky,

PCC program coordinator. Candice Chase, my technical editor, guided me

expertly through the intricate requirements of American Psychological

Association publication.

I am grateful to Robert Barnhart for establishing the Robert Joseph and

Wilhelmina Ann Kranzke Scholarship for Psychedelic/Entheogenic Research at

the Californian Institute of Integral Studies. And I thank the Kranzke committee

for awarding me that scholarship to support my research.

For general encouragement, I would like to extend a warm thanks to Scott

Byram and Beth Piatote, Tammy Montgomery, Kelleen Nicholson, Eahr Joan,

Steve Martin and Kim Bella, Deanne Thompson, Larry Williams and Pat O’Hara,

Greer Geiger, Rod O'Neal, Caroline Webb, Linda Kaplan, and Laurie Williams.

And, finally, I was sustained throughout by the memory and spirit of my

parents, Robert J. Hill and Duva Kennedy Hill.

x
 DEDICATION

To Dr. Ronald Sandison, Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists,

and

the late Dr. Margot Cutner, Analyst, British Society of Analytical Psychology,

for their pioneering work with

Jungian-oriented LSD psychotherapy in the early 1950s,

and for their papers, which became the recovered treasure of this investigation.

xi
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT........................................................................................................... iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS................................................................................... vi

DEDICATION....................................................................................................... xi

CHAPTER 1: JUNG, JUNGIANS, AND PSYCHEDELICS ................................ 2

Historical Background ........................................................................................ 2

Early Reference to Jung’s Psychology in the Psychedelic Literature............. 2

Contemporary Reference to Jung’s Psychology

in the Psychedelic Literature........................................................................... 4

Papers Relating Jungian Psychology to Psychedelic Experience ................... 7

The Need for a Jungian Framework

for Understanding Psychedelic Experience ...................................................... 10

Research Objectives.......................................................................................... 13

Scope and Limitations ...................................................................................... 15

The Range of Psychedelic Experiences and Substances Treated ................. 15

The Psychological Nature of Psychedelic Experience.................................. 16

The Tentative Nature of This Jungian Framework ....................................... 16

The Hypothetical Nature of the Proposed Jungian Guidelines ..................... 17

The Limited Scope of the Proposed Jungian Guidelines .............................. 17

This Study’s Approach to Trauma ................................................................ 17

The Scope of Jung’s Work Treated .............................................................. 18

Significance ...................................................................................................... 18

Potential Significance for Transpersonal and Jungian Psychology .............. 18

Personal Significance.................................................................................... 20

Theoretical Perspective and Methodology ....................................................... 22

Hermeneutics and Hermeneutic Attitude...................................................... 23

xii
 Jungian Hermeneutics ................................................................................... 25

Understanding and Explanation................................................................ 26

Three Basic Elements of This Investigation ............................................. 28

Chapter Overview ............................................................................................. 29

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................. 31

Psychedelics...................................................................................................... 31

On Terminology............................................................................................ 31

Psychedelics Defined .................................................................................... 35

Recent Historical and Cultural Background ................................................. 37

New Research ............................................................................................... 41

Psychedelics and Trauma.................................................................................. 45

Difficult Psychedelic Experiences as Potentially Traumatic ........................ 46

Psychedelic-Induced Trauma........................................................................ 50

Psychedelic Therapy as Treatment for Past Trauma..................................... 54

Psychedelics and Psychosis .............................................................................. 56

Psychosis and Psychotic States ..................................................................... 56

Psychedelics as Psychosis-Inducing Drugs .................................................. 63

From the Psychotomimetic to the Psychedelic Paradigm............................. 70

The Psychotomimetic Model Reconsidered ................................................. 71

How Are Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States Explained? ....................... 74

Psychedelics and Transformation ..................................................................... 80

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelics.............................................. 83

The Transformative Potential of Psychotic States ........................................ 87

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States...... 90

Psychedelic Psychotherapy ........................................................................... 94

xiii
 The Psycholytic and Psychedelic Models................................................. 95

Existing Therapeutic Frameworks .......................................................... 102

Psychoanalytic. ................................................................................... 104

Grofian. ............................................................................................... 105

Shamanic............................................................................................. 106

Hybrid. ................................................................................................ 106

Early Jungian Approaches to Psychedelic Psychotherapy...................... 107

CHAPTER 3: BASIC JUNGIAN CONCEPTS AND PRINCIPLES................. 112

Consciousness and the Unconscious............................................................... 113

Consciousness ............................................................................................. 114

The Unconscious......................................................................................... 116

The Relationship Between Consciousness and the Unconscious ............... 117

Individuation................................................................................................... 120

Archetypes and Their Manifestation in the Psyche ........................................ 122

Dreams and Other Symbolic Products of the Unconscious............................ 127

CHAPTER 4: JUNG’S EXPLANATION OF

PSYCHEDELIC EXPERIENCE ........................................................................ 135

Lowering of the Threshold of Consciousness................................................. 137

Abaissement du Niveau Mental in Psychedelic Experience........................... 140

Enriched Apperception and the Limits of Integration .................................... 141

CHAPTER 5: THE NATURE OF PSYCHEDELIC-INDUCED

PSYCHOTIC STATES....................................................................................... 148

Trauma in Jungian Psychology....................................................................... 148

Kalsched’s Theory of Trauma and the Self’s Archetypal Defenses ........... 148

Kalsched’s Model of the Psyche’s Archetypal Self-Care System .............. 151

Trauma and Dissociation in Jung’s Psychology ......................................... 154

xiv
 Trauma and Jung’s Theory of the Complex ............................................... 161

The Affective Foundation of Jung’s Psychology.................................... 165

Jung’s Concept of Possession by Complexes and

Its Relation to Kalsched’s Archaic Defenses.......................................... 166

The Shadow in Jung’s Psychology ................................................................. 170

Personal and Archetypal Levels of the Shadow ......................................... 171

The Overwhelmingly Numinous Nature of the Archetypal Psyche ........... 174

Resistance to and Projection of the Shadow ............................................... 177

The Self’s Defense Against Overwhelming Affect .................................... 180

Reflections on the Shadow.......................................................................... 181

Psychosis in Jung’s Psychology ..................................................................... 185

Jung’s Focus on Schizophrenic Forms of Psychosis .................................. 189

Commonalities Between Schizophrenia and Other Conditions.................. 192

Neurosis, Latent Psychosis, and Manifest Psychosis.................................. 195

Abaissement du Niveau Mental and

Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States ........................................................ 199

CHAPTER SIX: TRAUMA, SHADOW, AND PSYCHOSIS:

THE TRANSFORMATIVE POTENTIAL ........................................................ 205

The Healing Potential of Psychotic Experiences............................................ 206

The Painful Passage Through the Shadow Towards Wholeness.................... 211

Treating Trauma: Integration Versus Abreaction in Jung’s Psychology........ 215

Jung’s Definition of Trauma and Abreaction ............................................. 216

Grof’s View of Abreaction ......................................................................... 217

Jung’s Critique of Abreaction ..................................................................... 220

Drawing From Both Grof and Jung ............................................................ 223

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelic Psychotherapy:

Two Case Studies............................................................................................ 224

xv
 Dr. Rick Strassman’s Report....................................................................... 224

Dr. Margot Cutner’s Report ........................................................................ 226

CHAPTER 7: JUNG'S APPROACH TO INTEGRATION ............................... 229

CHAPTER 8: JUNGIAN PSYCHOTHERAPY................................................. 238

The Method and Purpose of Psychotherapy ................................................... 238

Gaining Access to the Unconscious............................................................ 239

Coming to Terms With the Unconscious.................................................... 240

The Relationship Between Analyst and Analysand........................................ 245

The Analyst ................................................................................................. 245

The Dialectical Relationship....................................................................... 247

The Transference ........................................................................................ 247

Dreams and Their Interpretation..................................................................... 251

The Sphere of the Irrational ........................................................................ 251

The Purpose and Value of Dreams ............................................................. 253

The Compensatory Function of Dreams ..................................................... 253

CHAPTER 9: IMPLICATIONS FOR

PSYCHEDELIC-RELATED TREATMENT..................................................... 256

Subject Readiness ........................................................................................... 257

The Therapist and the Dialectical Relationship.............................................. 263

The Compensatory Function........................................................................... 266

The Significance of the Archetypal Unconscious........................................... 267

Integration and the Role of Ego-Consciousness ............................................. 270

CHAPTER TEN: CONCLUSION...................................................................... 281

REFERENCES ................................................................................................... 288

xvi
 It is just the most unexpected, the most terrifyingly
chaotic things which reveal a deeper meaning.

The Archetypes and

the Collective Unconscious
Carl Jung
(1969a, p. 31, para. 64)

Something empirically demonstrable comes to our aid

from the depths of our unconscious nature. It is the
task of the conscious mind to understand these hints. . . .
to understand in time the meaning of the numina that cross our path.
Answer to Job
Carl Jung
(1952/1969w, p. 460, para. 746)

1
 CHAPTER 1: JUNG, JUNGIANS, AND PSYCHEDELICS

Historical Background

Early Reference to Jung’s Psychology in the Psychedelic Literature

The fact that Carl Jung’s psychology has long been appreciated for the

penetrating insights it provides into the nature of psychedelic experience is well

illustrated by the tribute that Leary, Metzner, and Alpert (1964/1995) paid to Jung

in their seminal manual, The Psychedelic Experience, published in 1964 during

the advent of widespread psychedelic use among laypeople. Their guidebook to

“the new realities of the expanded consciousness” (p. 11) was based on The

Tibetan Book of the Dead, to which Jung (1935/1969l) 1 had written an

appreciative psychological commentary. Leary et al. characterize Jung as a

“psychiatrist cum mystic” (p. 23), who had credited The Tibetan Book of the Dead

for stimulating many of his own ideas, discoveries, and fundamental insights (p.

21; see also Jung, 1935/1969l, p. 510, para. 833). In their eyes, by the later part of

his life, Jung had committed himself wholly “to the inner vision and to the

wisdom and superior reality of internal perceptions” (p. 23).

We can see why they would say this when we consider the following

observations that Jung (1939/1954/1969p) made in his “Psychological

Commentary on The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation.” “Usually—i.e., in the

West—the conscious standpoint arbitrarily decides against the unconscious, since

1
Unless otherwise noted, all references to The Collected Works of C.G. Jung
have the same translator, editors, and publisher: R. Hull (Trans.), W. McGuire, H. Read,
M. Fordham, & G. Adler (Eds.), Princeton: Princeton University Press.
2
anything coming from inside suffers from the prejudice of being regarded as

inferior or somehow wrong” (p. 489, para. 780). The conscious mind, Jung says,

naturally resists the emergence of what it experiences as “the intrusion of

apparently incompatible and extraneous tendencies, thoughts, feelings” (p. 489,

para. 779). In Jung’s view, this alien intrusion arises from the material of the

collective, or archetypal, unconscious, and he finds the most startling instances of

such intrusions in patients suffering from schizophrenia (p. 489, para. 779). But,

Jung adds, in cases such as those illuminated in The Tibetan Book of the Great

Liberation, where paradoxically the gods are illusory and yet exist (p. 480, para.

768), “it is tacitly agreed that the apparently incompatible contents shall not be

suppressed again, and that the conflict shall be accepted and suffered. At first no

solution appears possible, and this fact, too, has to be borne with patience”

(p. 489, para. 780). 2 In his “Psychological Commentary on The Tibetan Book of

the Dead, ” Jung (1935/1969l) discusses this process of ego violation and ultimate

surrender in terms of individuation, an individual’s development toward

psychological wholeness.

Fear of self-sacrifice lurks deep in every ego, and this fear is often only
the precariously controlled demand of the unconscious forces to burst out
in full strength. No one who strives for selfhood (individuation) is spared
this dangerous passage, for that which is feared also belongs to the
wholeness of the self. (p. 521, para. 849)

Jung’s observations on the Tibetan model of death and liberation suggest

the thesis of this dissertation, which can be summarized initially as follows:

Jung’s treatment of the conscious mind’s often terrifying confrontation with the

2
Jung alludes here to what he calls the transcendent function, which he
conceives as a method as well as a process of psychological integration. I discuss this
concept in Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the Therapeutic Process of Integration.”
3
archetypal unconscious provides a valuable theoretical framework for

understanding psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness. Jung’s

model of psychotherapeutic integration also suggests a potentially effective

treatment for adverse reactions to psychedelic experience, as well as useful

implications for psychedelic psychotherapy.

Contemporary Reference to Jung’s Psychology in the Psychedelic Literature

Following the lead of Timothy Leary and his colleagues, notable

contemporary theorists of psychedelic psychotherapy continue to draw from

Jung’s penetrating psychological insights. In her discussion of psychedelic-

enhanced therapy, “The New Psychotherapy: MDMA and the Shadow,” Ann

Shulgin (2001) addresses ways to work with the difficult process of facing the

shadow, Jung’s term for the dark side of one’s personality. Shulgin says that the

degree of insight one achieves in any psychedelic session depends primarily upon

the individual’s willingness to face and acknowledge “long-denied aspects of his

nature” (p. 200). Drawing from the Buddhist analogy of confronting demon

guardians at the gate, Shulgin says that “the prospect of seeing what he

unconsciously believes to be the core—the essence—of himself as a series of

horrendous, malignant, totally unacceptable entities, can bring about a state of

fear that has no parallel in ordinary life” (p. 200).

Myron Stolaroff (2002) also observes that deep shadow areas of the

unconscious mind, which can become opened by psychedelics, can overwhelm

the psychic defenses of those who are not prepared for such an encounter

(pp. 94-103). Resisting challenging shadow content, Stolaroff says, intensifies the

4
painfulness of the psychedelic session and leads to “disturbing, unsatisfactory

experiences, or even psychotic attempts to escape” (p. 97). It is not easy to accept

radical insights into our shadow nature, the immense potential of our being, and

the profound responsibility that these impose upon each of us, he says (p. 96).

Shulgin’s and Stolaroff’s views on encountering and integrating

problematic unconscious material in psychedelic psychotherapy provide

invaluable perspectives on working through difficult psychedelic experiences.

However, their references to Jungian concepts such as shadow and integration

lack direct reference to Jungian sources, let alone thorough theoretical

articulation. Shulgin and Stolaroff were both influenced by underground

psychedelic therapist Leo Zeff, who was a Jungian analyst. But the only public

record Zeff seems to have left of his psychedelic psychotherapy practice is an

interview Stolaroff (2004) conducted with him, which lacks discussion of the

relationship between his Jungian foundation and his practice of psychedelic

psychotherapy. 3

Among contemporary theorists of psychedelic psychotherapy who draw

from Jung’s psychology, Ralph Metzner and Stanislav Grof have most carefully

documented the correspondence between their own work and Jung’s. Although

quite understandably neither Metzner nor Grof attempts to establish the kind of

Jungian framework I am proposing, both draw generously from Jung’s theories

and clinical experience to support their own extensive theoretical frameworks.

3
I use the generic term psychedelic psychotherapy to refer to any use of
psychedelic substances for psychotherapeutic purposes. I discuss two distinct forms of
psychedelic psychotherapy, psycholytic therapy and psychedelic therapy, in “Psychedelic
Psychotherapy,” below (see p. 94).
5
 Metzner, coauthor with Leary and Alpert of The Psychedelic Experience

(Leary et al., 1964/1995) and author of numerous contemporary publications on

psychedelics (e.g., 1998a, 1999, 2002b, 2004), illuminates many of his own

concepts of psychospiritual transformation in Jungian terms. His treatment of the

inner enemy in The Unfolding Self: Varieties of Transformative Experience

(1998b, pp. 114-135), for instance, draws heavily from Jung’s concepts of

shadow, individuation, and the coincidentia oppositorum, “the ‘coming together

of opposites,’ the acceptance and reconciliation of antagonistic aspects of our

nature” (p. 114).

Despite numerous departures from Jung’s theories, Grof’s own

comprehensive framework for psychedelic psychotherapy shares a far-reaching

correspondence with Jung’s theories (Grof, 1985, pp. 191-192). One common

theme, which is central to my thesis, is the ego’s problematic and yet ultimately

transformative relationship with the collective, or archetypal, unconscious. In

Spiritual Emergency: When Personal Transformation Becomes a Crisis, Stanislav

and Christina Grof (1989) affirm that Jung’s concept of the collective

unconscious and his respect for the spiritual dimensions of psychological

development are foundations for the alternative view of the psychotic

characteristics of spiritual emergency represented in their anthology (pp. 5, 237;

see also Grof, 1985, p.174).

Whether working with individuals in the throes of spiritual emergency or

conducting psychedelic psychotherapy, Grof encourages therapists to facilitate the

free flow of energy and the completion of experiential gestalts—no matter how

6
difficult, dark, or even demonic is the content of those experiences. In Grof’s

view, this difficult process is inherently healing, which he accounts for in terms of

a wide range of theoretical frameworks. His spectrum approach to explaining the

nature of various realms, or levels, of psychological experience draws from many

major psychotherapeutic orientations, including the work of Freud, Rank, Reich,

Assagioli, and Maslow. Grof finds in Jung’s psychology, however, the deepest

and most far-reaching correspondence to the domains of psychic experience he

has mapped in his own extensive explorations (Grof, 1985, pp. 190-192). Grof

draws most heavily from Jung’s concept of the collective unconscious to explain

what Grof refers to as the transpersonal level (or at times the Jungian level) of

those states of consciousness manifested in the complex processes mapped in his

own theoretical framework (Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 296-297; Grof, 1985, p. 131;

see also Tarnas, 1976).

Papers Relating Jungian Psychology to Psychedelic Experience

A number of notable papers relate Jung’s psychology to psychedelic

experience. Sandison (1954), Cutner (1959), and Fordham (1963) discuss from a

Jungian standpoint clinical studies of psychedelic psychotherapy conducted in the

1950s. Sandison and Cutner write positively of their experiences using

LSD-assisted psychotherapy with patients. 4 Fordham is more circumspect.

Reviewing case studies of LSD-assisted psychotherapy, he cautions that the

relatively passive process of psychedelic psychotherapy must be distinguished

4
LSD stands for lysergic acid diethylamide, “a crystalline compound . . . derived
from lysergic acid and used as a powerful hallucinogenic drug” (American Heritage
Dictionary of the English Language, 1996).
7
from the active process of analysis. Fordham concludes that the lasting

therapeutic value of the LSD experience is slight, and that the strongest

therapeutic agent in the cases he reviewed was the transference (p. 129). 5 I

discuss these rare and important Jungian papers in “Early Jungian Approaches to

Psychedelic Psychotherapy” (p. 107, below), and I return to them in later

chapters. These papers, especially those by Cutner and Sandison, provide

invaluable insight into a Jungian approach to psychedelic psychotherapy. They

therefore confirm my thesis regarding the relevance of Jungian psychology to

understanding psychedelic experience. These papers also imply a Jungian

framework for understanding psychedelic experience. However, they do not

establish such a framework.

More recently, four doctoral candidates have written dissertations that

analyze various aspects of psychedelic experience from a Jungian perspective.

Gurnick (1990) analyzes variations in individuals’ subjective psychedelic

experience in terms of Jung’s psychological types in order to advance

understanding of the relationship between subjective psychedelic experience and

the individual user’s personality makeup. Albert (1993) draws from Jung’s

concepts of the archetypal unconscious, constellation, and synchronicity to

support specific aspects of his (Albert's) broad metaphysical theory of

consciousness. Albert argues that Jung’s psychology can account for the role that

psychic dynamics play in psychedelic-induced experiences of spiritual,

5
I discuss the concept of transference in Chapter Eight, “Jungian
Psychotherapy.” For now, transference can be defined generally as the projection of
unconscious content, and more specifically as the projection of unconscious content onto
the therapist (Jung, 1917/1966b, p. 62, para. 94). I discuss the concept of projection in
Chapter Five, “ The Nature of Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States.”
8
non-spatiotemporal realities. Heuser (2006) analyzes reports of “entity

visitations” (p. 4) by ayahuasca users and relates his analysis to Jung’s

psychology as well as Grof’s transpersonal model. He proposes that Jung’s

archetypal perspective provides useful metaphorical amplification of the symbolic

content reflected in these ayahuasca reports (p. 38) and that such symbolic content

may reflect stages in the individuation process (pp. 77-78). To support this

interpretation, Heuser briefly reviews the Jungian concepts of ego and Self,

archetypes, complexes, the unity of opposites, integration, abaissement du niveau

mental, participation mystique, the shadow, psychoid processes, the hero’s

journey, and ego defenses such as projection. Oxford (2004) uses the Jungian

concept of individuation as a theoretical framework for understanding modern,

non-indigenous women’s experience of spiritual awakening induced by

entheogenic, or psychedelic, plant substances. Oxford, like Heuser, contributes to

a dialogue between Jungian and transpersonal psychology by also drawing from

Grof’s treatment of nonordinary states of consciousness.

Although all these dissertations interpret specific aspects of psychedelic

experience from a Jungian perspective, none of them investigate in depth how

Jung’s psychology elucidates the fundamental nature of psychedelic experience or

the potential of psychedelics to induce psychotic reactions. Only Heuser (2006)

draws even moderately from Jung’s actual writings, and his 22-page analysis of

psychedelic experience vis-à-vis Jung’s psychology, though broad, lacks the

depth necessary to establish a Jungian framework for understanding the nature of

psychedelic experience.

9
 Howe’s (2006) dissertation, Integrating Theories of Stanislav Grof and

C.G. Jung, deepens the dialogue between Jungian and transpersonal psychology

by, first, comparing Grofian systems of condensed experience (COEX) and

various Jungian understandings of feeling-toned complexes; second, comparing

Grofian and Jungian interpretations of the death-rebirth process; and third,

comparing Grofian and Jungian approaches to psychotherapy. Even though Howe

draws much more thoroughly from Jung’s actual writings than the other

dissertation authors mentioned here, and even though he discusses Jung’s theory

in terms of Grof’s psychedelic research, his treatment of psychedelic experience

per se is extremely limited. Rather, his analysis compares Grof’s and Jung’s

theories of the psyche’s structure and dynamics and therefore only implicitly

elucidates the nature of psychedelic experience.

As valuable as each of these dissertations is regarding various aspects of

the relationship between Jung’s psychology and psychedelic experience, none of

them provide a foundation for building a Jungian framework for understanding

the fundamental nature of psychedelic experience in general or of

psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness in particular.

The Need for a Jungian Framework for Understanding Psychedelic Experience

Given the notable references to Jungian psychology in the psychedelic

literature, the lack of in-depth scholarly treatment of Jungian psychology vis-à-vis

the nature of psychedelic experience is somewhat surprising. Although Cutner,

Sandison, Metzner, Grof, and the dissertation authors mentioned above have

made important contributions to a Jungian understanding of psychedelic

10
experience, there is no explicit Jungian framework for understanding psychedelic

experience, psychedelic-induced psychotic states, and psychedelic psychotherapy.

A variety of conditions may have contributed to this gap in the literature.

Very few Jungians were active in psychedelic research in the 1950s and 1960s.

(Sandison and Cutner were notable exceptions.) Most first-generation psychedelic

researchers, like Grof at that time, had a psychoanalytic orientation (Grinspoon &

Bakalar, 1979/1997, pp. 194-195; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 116). This psychoanalytic

legacy is reflected in the most recent authoritative work on psychedelic

psychotherapy, Psychedelic Medicine: New Evidence for Hallucinogenic

Substances as Treatments (Winkelman & Roberts, 2007), which includes a

psychoanalytic framework (as well as shamanic and Grofian frameworks) but no

Jungian framework.

Thorough study of the implications of Jung's theories for psychedelic

research may also have been impeded by the complexity of Jung's extensive body

of work. The ban imposed on psychedelic research in the mid-1960s was another

likely factor. Whatever the reasons, the lack of in-depth treatment of psychedelic

experience—or even reference to psychedelic-induced images or visions—in the

Jungian literature is remarkable. The main reason for this curious lacuna is surely

the distance Jungians have traditionally adopted to psychedelics (Singer, 1994,

pp. 408-410; von Franz, 1993, pp. 297-305), a distance that stems from Jung’s

early criticism of psychedelics (von Franz, pp. 297-305).

An excellent reflection of Jung’s attitude toward psychedelics can be

found in his letters (e.g., Jung, 1975a, 1975b), several of which reflect his view

11
that psychedelics have the potential to open the collective unconscious to those

who use them. He is quite critical of their use for that reason, explaining that

psychedelics are a shortcut into realms of the unconscious for which the user is

inevitably unprepared (Jung, 1975b, p. 222). Among these letters is one written in

1955 to A.M. Hubbard, one of the originators of psychedelic psychotherapy

(Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 194). Jung (1975b) writes to Hubbard,

When it comes to the practical and more or less general application of

mescaline, I have certain doubts and hesitations. The analytical method of
psychotherapy (e.g., “active imagination”) yields very similar results, viz.
full realization of complexes and numinous dreams and visions. These
phenomena occur at their proper time and place in the course of the
treatment. Mescaline, however, uncovers such psychic facts at any time
and place when and where it is by no means certain that the individual is
mature enough to integrate them. (p. 222)

Jung also conveys to Hubbard that he does not know from experience but can

suppose that psychedelics could “release a latent, potential psychosis” (p. 224).

“It would be a highly interesting though equally disagreeable experience,” he adds

(p. 224).

The contentiousness toward psychedelic therapy in Jung’s letter to

Hubbard is more explicit in his 1954 letter to Father Victor White. White had

written to Jung about White’s own visit to a psychiatric hospital where LSD was

being administered to patients, who were producing religious-archetypal material

under its influence. Jung (1975a) responded,

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 [psychiatrists] 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 learned further
than to cut open his patient’s belly and to leave things there. (p. 173)

12
 The problems that Jung identifies are real and need to be taken seriously.

At the same time, however, it is possible to take advantage of the insights that the

greater body of Jung’s work can offer into the nature of psychedelic experience. I

will do this by investigating and discussing the concepts and principles in Jung’s

psychology that are most relevant to understanding the fundamental nature of

psychedelic experience (Chapters Three, Four, and Seven), especially

psychedelic-induced psychotic states (Chapters Five and Six). From there, I

examine the applicability of Jung’s psychology to treating psychedelic-induced

psychotic states and to conducting psychedelic therapy (Chapters Eight and Nine).

Considering the exceptional relevance of Jung’s psychology to

understanding psychedelic experience, and considering the lack of in-depth

scholarly treatment of this relevance, the relationship of Jung’s psychology to the

nature of psychedelic experience is a subject ripe for scholarly investigation.

Research Objectives

Given my goals to delineate a Jungian interpretation of the nature of

psychedelic experience, to construct a Jungian framework for understanding

psychedelic experience, and to propose basic considerations for a Jungian

approach to psychedelic-related treatment (i.e., psychedelic psychotherapy and

the treatment of psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness)—this

dissertation’s specific research objectives are to elucidate the following from a

Jungian perspective:

13
 1. the fundamental psychological nature of psychedelic experience

2. the nature of psychedelic-induced psychotic states of

consciousness

3. the consequent implications of the above for psychedelic-related

treatment

Before going further, I would like briefly to define two basic terms I have

used so far without qualification. I will return to the second, psychedelic-induced

psychotic states of consciousness, in Chapter Two.

When I use the term framework, I mean a system of concepts and

principles used as a basis for interpreting, understanding, and explaining

phenomena and for guiding research and practice. The Jungian framework I

envision would provide an initial basis for interpreting, understanding, and

explaining the nature of psychedelic experience, for guiding related research, and

for guiding the practice of psychedelic-related treatment. This framework is

formulated in Chapters Three through Nine in this dissertation’s Jungian

interpretation of the nature of psychedelic experience and in the application of this

interpretation to the practical problems of psychedelic-related treatment.

When I speak of psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness, I

refer to short-term, or acute, psychotic reactions to psychedelic substances. Such

psychotic reactions are a subset of the conditions that Grof (1980/1994) identifies

as potential adverse reactions to psychedelic psychotherapy. These include the

intensification of preexisting psychiatric disorders, the occurrence of new

symptoms, and the subsequent recurrence of these problematic states (p. 153).

Furthermore, Grof (1985) characterizes the psychotic style of confronting a

14
psychedelic experience as “exteriorization of the process, excessive use of the

mechanism of projection, and indiscriminate acting out” (p. 303).

Psychedelic-induced psychotic states, as I conceive them, also correspond

to several categories within the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental

Disorders (DSM-IV), published by the American Psychiatric Association (APA)

(1994), which is the standard classification of mental disorders used by mental

health professionals in the United States. The corresponding categories include

Hallucinogen-Induced Psychotic Disorder, Brief Psychotic Disorder, and

Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (Flashbacks).

Scope and Limitations

The Range of Psychedelic Experiences and Substances Treated

Considering its astonishing variability, Grinspoon and Bakalar

(1979/1997) observe that psychedelic experience is as difficult to describe and

classify as human experience itself (p. 89). Such classic volumes as The Varieties

of Psychedelic Experience (Masters & Houston, 1966), LSD Psychotherapy (Grof,

1980/1994), and Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered (Grinspoon & Bakalar)

admirably attempt to describe psychedelic experience comprehensively.

The present study will be limited, however, to a Jungian interpretation of

the most fundamental characteristics of psychedelic experience. Within his

treatment of the conscious mind’s relationship to the unconscious, Jung offers an

insightful understanding of the fundamental effects that psychedelics have on the

psyche, including their potential to induce psychotic reactions. More specifically,

15
Jung (1958/1972j) explains the fundamental effect of psychedelics as an

abaissement du niveau mental, or a lowering of the threshold of consciousness,

which allows unconscious material to enter consciousness and potentially

overwhelm it (p. 263, para. 569). From this basic principle, Jung’s work implicitly

accounts for psychedelic experience in terms of related fundamental concepts,

most notably complexes, the shadow, trauma, psychosis, and integration. These

concepts and principles are the focus of my inquiry.

The range of psychedelic substances is also vast; and even within the more

limited range represented in psychedelic research, a wide variety has been used

(Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies [MAPS], n.d.b.,

Psychedelic Research Around the World). Although different psychedelic

substances vary in their specific effects, as a class they affect the mind in similar

ways (Nelson, 1994, pp. 149-150). I focus on the common psychological effects

that psychedelics share rather than addressing their distinctive effects.

The Psychological Nature of Psychedelic Experience

Jung’s approach to the psyche is essentially psychological rather than

physiological (Jung, 1928/1972g, pp. 226-227, paras. 497-498; see also Jung,

1958/1972j, p. 263, para. 570), and my inquiry is likewise limited to the

psychological basis of psychedelic experience.

The Tentative Nature of This Jungian Framework

Considering the original nature of this investigation and the vastness and

complexity of Jung’s psychology, I can only hope that the framework I construct

16
here will provide a solid basis for ongoing refinements and improvements by

myself and others. It would be unrealistic and indeed undesirable to view the

results of my present efforts as complete, much less conclusive.

The Hypothetical Nature of the Proposed Jungian Guidelines

Even though I think I have accomplished a useful Jungian interpretation of

psychedelic experience in this dissertation, verification of the proposed treatment

implications of this study will surely require revision if they are adopted by

others. Even in that case, the treatment implications proposed here must await

formal clinical trials and, as Merkur (2007) points out in relation to his

psychoanalytic framework, must be fine-tuned through application in

psychotherapy with individuals (p. 198).

The Limited Scope of the Proposed Jungian Guidelines

I do not intend to propose a comprehensive set of guidelines for Jungian

psychedelic psychotherapy. I will only supplement existing guidelines, such as

those found in Winkelman and Roberts’ (2007) Psychedelic Medicine and in the

MAPS (n.d.a.) Rites of Passage Project, by proposing treatment implications that

specifically stem from a Jungian interpretation of psychedelic experience.

This Study’s Approach to Trauma

The body of work on the nature and treatment of trauma is voluminous.

Beyond very briefly establishing a context for my discussion of trauma in the

literature review, I discuss trauma entirely in Jungian terms. Within these limits, I

discuss trauma in relation to psychedelics by considering, first, difficult

17
psychedelic experiences as potentially traumatic experiences in their own right,

and second, the therapeutic potential psychedelics have to bring past trauma to

consciousness and to thereby heal past trauma.

The Scope of Jung’s Work Treated

I focus on the core of Jung’s treatment of the structure and dynamics of

the psyche, trauma, psychosis, integration, and psychotherapy. Although I

occasionally refer incidentally to other topics within Jung’s extensive body of

work, my investigation of Jung’s psychology does not address in any significant

way his amplification of these central themes through his extensive inquiry into

religion, mythology, alchemy, or astrology, all of which I see as important

subjects for further inquiry.

Significance

Potential Significance for Transpersonal and Jungian Psychology

In the Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology, Bravo and

Grob (1996a) close their review of psychedelic psychotherapy by stressing the

need for new paradigms (p. 340). There are, as I have already indicated, many

reasons to develop a Jungian framework. Others in the field of psychedelic

psychotherapy have also indicated the usefulness of a Jungian framework. House

(2007), who recently examined psychedelic experience in relation to various

psychotherapeutic approaches, says that Jung’s concepts of the collective

unconscious and its archetypal symbols “provide a useful framework for

understanding the powerful symbolic imagery commonly experienced in

18
psychedelic sessions” (p. 185). Masters and Houston, authors of The Varieties of

Psychedelic Experience (1966), view what they call the “Symbolic level” of

consciousness in psychedelic experience as having exceptional therapeutic

potential (1970, p. 335). At this level of psychedelic experience, they say,

individuals participate in mythic dramas that represent the essentials of their

condition and that can effect deep and sweeping personality changes (p. 335). A

Jungian framework would more clearly elucidate this important level of

psychedelic experience.

Throughout my study of the relationship of Jung’s psychology to

psychedelic experience and psychedelic psychotherapy, it has become

increasingly clear to me that Jung’s approach to the therapeutic process of

integrating challenging unconscious material provides a unique and valuable

framework for understanding the nature of psychedelic experience, for guiding

psychedelic psychotherapy, and for treating psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

I hope that this investigation, by enriching the future practice of

psychedelic psychotherapy, can also contribute to the field of transpersonal

psychology. I can imagine, for instance, that a fully developed Jungian framework

for integrating psychedelic experiences could become a useful element within

Grof’s more comprehensive framework, just as Grof’s framework could one day

find its place in an even more comprehensive therapeutic system. Bridging Jung’s

approach to trauma and integration with the practice of psychedelic

psychotherapy could also contribute to the growing effort to treat post-traumatic

19
stress disorder (PTSD), within which interest in psychedelic-assisted

psychotherapy is growing (Mithoefer, 2007).

This investigation could, in addition, contribute to the field of Jungian

psychology. Psychedelic experiences, like dreams, fantasies, and myths, include

manifestations of the archetypal unconscious (Jung, 1975b). In The Archetypes

and the Collective Unconscious, Jung (1969a) says that he had for years

investigated “the products of the unconscious in the widest sense of the word,

namely dreams, fantasies, visions, and delusions of the insane” (p. 183, para.

309). It seems therefore that Jungian psychology today would benefit by widening

the scope of unconscious material that it investigates to include the rich material

manifested in psychedelic-induced images, visions, and delusions. Merkur (1998)

maintains that psychedelic experience provides “a wealth of neglected data on

whose basis to expand the psychoanalytic model” (pp. xiii-xiv). Surely this is true

for Jungian psychology as well.

Personal Significance

Beyond potential contributions to these fields, this inquiry has already

proved to have great personal value. I came to California Institute of Integral

Studies in 2002 with the goal of understanding as deeply as possible the

life-changing and still haunting psychedelic-induced psychotic states that I

experienced some 40 years ago. After an initial series of ecstatic psychedelic

episodes in 1967, at the age of 20, my carefree adventures carried me into states

of madness that I could previously never have imagined. I endured four terrifying

experiences that year that were pervaded by what I perceived as a divine calling to

20
end my life in this absurd and evil world. Even though I had no previous religious

beliefs, this vision of redemption through death unfolded within a pervasive,

sustained, and overpowering sense of another dimension of reality, a terrifyingly

immense stillness that was inexplicably yet undeniably sacred. The deep,

absolute, and seemingly transcendent nature of this stillness implicitly and

mysteriously called my entire earthly life into question and challenged me to

redeem myself by sacrificing my life in order to be with God in his heavenly

realm.

Throughout each of these four experiences, I struggled with the dilemma

of whether I had gone completely insane or had instead discovered something

deeply, disturbingly true about the profoundly spiritual nature of my existence.

These two perceptions were often bewilderingly conflated, and I struggled to

resolve them in what felt like an eternal hell of confusion. On the third of these

four trips, however, I attempted with conviction if not clarity to kill myself to get

to the right world and to God.

After each one of these four LSD experiences ended, I soon forgot the

“insight” (though not the events) I had experienced. Each subsequent LSD

experience therefore brought me into a state of “remembering” the same terrifying

truth about my existence: my worldly life is only an absurd game, my normal

consciousness is illusory, and the current LSD trip is another opening—and

challenge—to get out of this world.

After I stopped using psychedelics in 1968, I continued to experience

momentary, spontaneous recurrences of this shift in consciousness. Each time this

21
happens I always momentarily have the same terrifying sense of remembering

that my normal consciousness is an illusion and that I am being challenged once

again to free myself in some tortuous way.

Since 2002 I have written many papers analyzing my past psychedelic

experiences from a wide range of theoretical perspectives, and all of them have

been personally valuable. I have, however, acquired especially profound insights

into my experiences from a Jungian perspective. David Lukoff (1996) suggests

that discovering and articulating the mythic dimensions of one’s own past

psychotic experiences can transform a psychotic episode into a constructive part

of one’s personal narrative (pp. 275-276). I found that writing about the parallels

between my own psychedelic-induced psychotic states and Jungian interpretations

of myths of death and rebirth had a similar effect. The first Jungian paper that I

wrote, Manifestations of the Archetypal Unconscious: Parallels in Myth and

Personal Experience (Hill, 2003), launched an extended inquiry into Jungian

psychology that became more deeply and joyously significant with each

additional Jungian-related paper I wrote (Hill, 2007a, 2007b, 2008). This

integrative process has now reached an especially significant milestone with this

dissertation.

Theoretical Perspective and Methodology

As I have indicated, in this dissertation I interpret the nature of

psychedelic experience from the theoretical perspective of Jungian psychology for

the purpose of constructing a tentative Jungian framework for understanding

psychedelic experience. This Jungian framework can be used in turn for guiding
22
research on psychedelics and for guiding the practice of psychedelic

psychotherapy and the treatment of psychedelic-induced psychotic states. My

fundamental method of investigation can be characterized therefore as a Jungian

interpretation of the nature of psychedelic experience, or a Jungian hermeneutics.

Hermeneutics and Hermeneutic Attitude

When I speak of hermeneutics, I mean a method of interpretation of a text

or anything broadly considered as text. Text understood in a broad sense refers to

anything that carries meaning, including manifestations of psychological states of

mind, such as accounts of dreams (Palmer, 1969, p. 43). The subject of this

study’s interpretation will be psychedelic experience, or more specifically

accounts of psychedelic-induced images, visions, and psychotic states that have

been reported and characterized by medical and allied healthcare professionals

based on their observation of individuals who have used psychedelic substances. I

will also draw from accounts of psychedelic-induced images, visions, and

psychotic states by individuals who have used psychedelic substances themselves.

Having already looked at the nature and significance of my own

psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness from a variety of

theoretical perspectives, I have discovered that psychedelic experience can be

understood quite differently when analyzed from various theoretical perspectives.

Although this sounds patently obvious when stated here, the actual process of

uncovering distinct aspects or properties of the same psychedelic experiences

through the application of different theoretical perspectives has been enlightening

for me. Given the lack of thorough treatment of the nature of psychedelic

23
experience from a Jungian perspective, and given the value of analyzing

psychedelic experience from different theoretical perspectives, I have good reason

to think that a Jungian interpretation of the nature of psychedelic experience will

provide new and significant insights to others investigating the nature of

psychedelic experience.

My ongoing effort to understand the nature of psychedelic experience

through the application of different theoretical perspectives is consistent with the

conception of hermeneutics as an understanding that arises out of an ongoing

dialogue or interaction with a text, where again text can be understood broadly to

include descriptions of psychological experiences. Such an inquiry pursues a kind

of truth altogether different from that defined by such criteria of scientific

methodology as experimental verification and replication (Ferrer, 2002, p. 58).

Such an inquiry involves a transformative engagement with one’s subject of study

(Ferrer, p. 58) and a participation in and an openness to the meanings and truths

conveyed in what one is trying to understand (Bernstein, 1983, p. 137).

I do not consider all interpretations as equally valid, however. In The

Hermeneutics of Postmodernity, Madison (1988) outlines a set of methodological

principles that include coherence, comprehensiveness, and penetration (pp. 29-

35). These are useful criteria for evaluating the quality of an interpretation. And in

Entering the Circle: Hermeneutic Investigation in Psychology, Packer and

Addison (1989) outline another set of guidelines for evaluating an interpretation.

Two of these, an interpretation’s pragmatic value and emancipatory potential, are

especially appropriate for this study (pp. 286-287).

24
 For Hans-Georg Gadamer, “a consciousness formed by the authentic

hermeneutical attitude will be receptive to origins and entirely foreign features of

that which comes to it from outside its own horizons” (quoted in Bernstein, 1983,

pp. 137-138). I find this an appropriate attitude for the challenge of interpreting

the nature of psychedelic experience, especially psychedelic-induced psychotic

states of consciousness. This challenge is also reflected in Bernstein’s statement

that “the problem . . . is how to understand and do justice to something that at

once strikes us as so strange and alien and yet has sufficient affinity with us that

we can come to understand it” (p. 141).

Jungian Hermeneutics

Jungian hermeneutics can be characterized broadly as the interpretation of

the nature and significance of psychological experience from a Jungian

perspective. Jung was not so much concerned with the empirical quantification of

psychological experience as he was with understanding and explaining its

meaning (J. Clarke, 1992, p. 42). Jung frequently claimed to be an empiricist, but

in spite of his early association experiments, it would be more accurate to

characterize his method as a radical empiricism as William James conceived it.

Jung, like James, rejected the positivism and reductionism of his field and

pioneered psychological and even religious experience as a legitimate subject of

scientific study (Tarnas, 2002, p. viii). The vast body of Jung’s work reflects this

attitude, as exemplified by the following statement.

Something empirically demonstrable comes to our aid from the depths of

our unconscious nature. It is the task of the conscious mind to understand

25
 these hints. . . . to understand in time the meaning of the numina that cross
our path. (Jung, 1952/1969w, p. 460 , para. 746)

As this quote illustrates, Jung’s approach to psychological life was

fundamentally interpretative and explanatory, and thus hermeneutic. From his

early writing on schizophrenia, Jung claimed that careful interpretation can reveal

coherent meaning even in apparently absurd manifestations from psychotic

patients (1907/1972b, p. 20, para. 35; 1914/1972d, pp. 183-187, paras. 399-412).

In “The Synthetic or Constructive Method,” Jung (1917/1966c) explicitly equates

what he calls his “synthetic or constructive process of interpretation” with “the

‘hermeneutic’ method” (p. 85, para. 131n). Jung (1914/1972d) felt that this

hermeneutic method does more justice to “the almost overpowering profusion of

fantastic symbolization” manifested in schizophrenia than does an analytical-

reductive approach (pp. 179-180, paras. 389-390).

Understanding and Explanation

Given the centrality of understanding and explanation in this study, and

given the implicit assumption that these two approaches to knowledge are

complementary, I would like to discuss briefly, first, their historical separation in

the philosophy of science into what Strasser (1985) characterizes as “contrasting

epistemological attitudes” (p. viii), and second, Jung’s use of both understanding

and explanation.

Traditionally, the term explanation has been reserved for the empirical

sciences and associated with the formation of general laws. As Strasser (1985)

says, “whenever we can subsume the individual case under a universal law, we

26
say that we have ‘explained’ it” (p. 2). The term understanding, on the other hand,

has been set apart traditionally for the humanities and has been associated with

the interpretation of meaning in texts or other expressions of human life,

including ideas, emotions, and thoughts (pp. 4- 6; see also J. Clarke, 1992,

pp. 42-45). Understanding human beings implies more than observation, as one

would observe particles in physics, say; understanding human beings implies

“grasping the meaning and significance of their words and actions” (J. Clarke,

p. 43). Understanding also implies a concern for particular persons (p. 43). Jung

(1957/1964) articulates this explicitly in a passage on knowledge versus

understanding:

The statistical method shows the facts in the light of the ideal average but
does not give us a picture of their empirical reality. . . . The distinctive
thing about real facts, however, is their individuality. . . . Hence it is not
the universal and the regular that characterize the individual, but rather the
unique. (p. 250, paras. 494-495)

Jung of course developed generalizations about psychic structures and

processes based on his association experiments, his psychotherapeutic practice,

and his own self-analysis (Fordham, 1978, p. 3), but these generalizations have

not so much the character of explanatory empirical laws as a provisional attempt

to understand the meanings of manifestations of the human psyche (J. Clarke,

1992, chap. 3). Jung adopted both epistemological attitudes in a way that was

complementary rather than contradictory. This adoption was shaped no doubt by

his dual role as scientist and psychotherapist, and as he continues arguing for the

importance of the individual, we can hear the voice of both speaking.

At the same time man, as member of a species, can and must be described
as a statistical unit; otherwise nothing general can be said about him. . . .
This results in a universally valid anthropology or psychology, as the case
27
 may be, with an abstract picture of man as an average unit from which all
individual features have been removed. But it is precisely these features
which are of paramount importance for understanding man. If I want to
understand an individual human being, I must lay aside all scientific
knowledge of the average man. (Jung, 1957/1964, p. 250, para. 495)

The complexity and nuance of Jung’s methodology is consistent with the

contemporary hermeneutic attitude reflected in Strasser’s concept of the “spiral of

understanding” (1985, pp. 31-33), which rejects an epistemological dichotomy

between understanding and explanation and sees them in a dialectical

relationship, wherein understanding interacts with explanation to refine, enrich,

and broaden knowledge (pp. 31-33).

Three Basic Elements of This Investigation

I have said that this study investigates the concepts and principles in

Jung’s psychology that are most relevant to elucidating the fundamental nature of

psychedelic experience. I would now like to clarify the way in which my

hermeneutic analysis relates to this investigation by outlining its three basic

elements.

My investigation is based primarily on authoritative statements from

relevant literature about the nature of psychedelic experience. Here are two very

abbreviated examples of the kind of definitions, descriptions, and

characterizations I use: In Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered, Grinspoon and

Bakalar (1979/1997) state that a psychedelic drug “more or less reliably produces

thought, mood, and perceptual changes otherwise rarely experienced except in

dreams, contemplative and religious exaltation, flashes of vivid involuntary

memory, and acute psychoses” (p. 9). And in LSD Psychotherapy, Grof

28
(1980/1994) characterizes psychedelics as “nonspecific catalysts and amplifiers of

the psyche” (p. 11).

To support and illustrate the authoritative statements, which are inevitably

rather abstract, I use occasional case-study accounts of specific psychedelic

experiences by researchers and therapists working with individuals who have used

psychedelic substances. I also use first-person accounts by individuals who have

used psychedelic substances themselves. Although I rely primarily on first-person

accounts by other individuals, I supplement those accounts with my own where I

think that my personal experiences help elucidate the concepts and principles I am

discussing.

And, finally, I interpret and discuss the authoritative statements and

descriptive accounts in terms of Jung's psychology. This hermeneutic element

naturally makes up the major portion of this investigation.

I do not mean to suggest that these three elements appear in the regular

order I have outlined here, or that all parts of this investigation contain all three

elements. I only want to clarify the underlying structure of this investigation: a

Jungian interpretation of authoritative statements about and descriptive accounts

of psychedelic experience.

Chapter Overview

Following this introductory chapter, the literature review in Chapter Two

lays a foundation for a Jungian interpretation of psychedelic experience by giving

an overview of psychedelic-related concepts, principles, and issues in the relevant

literature. Chapter Two includes a review of literature discussing Jungian

29
approaches taken to psychedelic psychotherapy in the 1950s. Chapter Three

introduces central Jungian concepts that are essential to understanding the nature

of psychedelic experience from a Jungian perspective. After a review of Jung’s

explicit and regrettably brief treatment of psychedelic experience in Chapter Four,

Chapter Five elucidates the nature of psychedelic-induced psychotic states

through an in-depth investigation of trauma, the shadow, psychosis, and related

Jungian concepts. Chapter Six discusses the transformative potential of trauma,

the shadow, and psychosis from a Jungian standpoint, and introduces Jung’s

approach to integration. Chapter Seven examines Jung’s approach to integration

in depth, with an emphasis on his concept of the transcendent function. Chapters

Eight and Nine outline the most important implications of a Jungian approach to

psychotherapy for psychedelic psychotherapy and the treatment of psychedelic-

induced psychotic states. Chapter Ten concludes with reflections on the

complexity inherent in a Jungian framework for understanding psychedelic

experience and on the value of a Jungian framework for further inquiry into the

nature of psychedelic experience and psychedelic-related treatment.

30
 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

Psychedelics

On Terminology

In 1954 Dr. Humphry Osmond and Aldous Huxley were corresponding

about the word psychotomimetic, which was the term commonly used at the time

for the class of mind-altering drugs that includes LSD. By way of proposing a less

biased word, Osmond sent Huxley a little verse with the lines “To fathom Hell or

soar angelic/Just take a pinch of psychedelic” (Huxley, 1999, p. 107). Years after

Osmond had coined the term psychedelic, which is derived “from the Greek

psyche (mind) and delos (clear or visible)” 6 and means “mind manifesting,”

“mind-revealing,” or “mind-opening” (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 8; see

also Grof, 1980/1994, p. 24; Metzner, 1998a), the term was popularized in the

early 1960s by Timothy Leary. Leary and his Harvard University associates were

conducting experiments with psychedelics that became intensely controversial

(Stevens, 1987, chaps. 12 & 13); and the controversy surrounding these drugs

inevitably spilled over into the question of what they should be called and, once

named, what substances should properly be included in the class (Grinspoon &

Bakalar, p. 5).

Many scholarly treatments of these substances still begin with a discussion

of the relative merits of terms such as psychedelics, hallucinogens, entheogens,

6
Grinspoon and Bakalar (1997) point out that the rules for combining Greek
roots more correctly lead to psychodelic (p. 8), a term that implies psychopathic and thus
hardly improves on psychotomimetic.
31
and psychoactive substances or sacraments. Although these terms are often

employed interchangeably in general usage, the question of their relative merit is

nonetheless currently an open question in scholarly and professional circles.

Because by the early 1950s drugs such as LSD and mescaline were valued

primarily as chemical agents that induced a temporary psychosis, researchers

utilizing them at that time adopted the term psychotomimetic, indicating that the

effects of these substances mimicked, or resembled, natural forms of psychosis.

As I discuss in the next section, “Psychedelics and Psychosis,” researchers soon

learned that these substances were capable of far more than mimicking madness;

and thus arose Osmond and Huxley’s desire to find a neutral term, which

eventually lead to the widespread adoption of the term psychedelic. And despite

its widespread association with dismissive stereotypes of the 1960s

counterculture, the term psychedelic has retained currency among professionals as

well as laypeople, as evidenced by such authoritative works as Psychedelic Drugs

Reconsidered, by Lester Grinspoon and James Bakalar (1979/1997), professors at

Harvard Medical School, and Psychedelic Medicines: New Evidence for

Hallucinogenic Substances as Treatments (Winkelman & Roberts, 2007).

Hallucinogenic, the term currently used for medical research and legal

practice, emphasizes the striking potential many of these substances have to

enhance and distort perception (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 6). The

objection to this emphasis, Metzner (1998a) explains, is that these substances do

not inherently induce hallucinations in the sense of “illusory perceptions”

(p. 334). Metzner argues, nevertheless, that the term hallucinogen deserves to be

32
rehabilitated because its Latin root, alucinare, means to "wander in one's mind"

(p. 334), and the term therefore connotes the psychological journeying typical of

experiences that are often spoken of informally as “trips.”

Despite the fact that hallucinogen and hallucinogenic are the common

terms used in psychiatric research, and despite the significance of their Latin root,

these terms remain problematic for many in the field of psychedelic studies. By

emphasizing perceptual distortions and delusions, and by implying inherently

deleterious effects, these terms carry more limiting and negative connotations

than the term psychedelic (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, pp. 6-7; Winkelman,

2007b, p. 6). And although the term psychedelic has its own limitations (its

emphasis on the mental aspects of the experience, for instance), its most

outstanding problem is its association with the counterculture excesses of the

1960s. Used objectively, say Grinspoon and Bakalar, “as Osmond intended,

without assuming anything about the value of what is manifested or revealed”

(p. 8), the term psychedelic seems the best choice of the two. 7

The term entheogen was proposed in the late 1970s by Carl Ruck,

Jonathan Ott, Gordon Wasson and others as more appropriately describing the

shamanic or sacramental use of these substances by peoples in traditional cultures

to evoke “transcendent and beatific states of communion with deity” (Ruck,

Bigwood, Staples, Ott, & Wasson, 1979, p. 145). Drawing on the term’s ancient

Greek reference to “the condition that follows when one is inspired and possessed

by the god that has entered one’s body” (p. 146), entheogen denotes the action of

7
See Grinspoon and Bakalar (1997, pp. 6-7) for a more nuanced argument
against the terms hallucinogen and hallucinogenic.
33
becoming god within and means "releasing or expressing the divine within" (Ott,

quoted in Metzner, 1998a, p. 334) or “God-enabling” (Smith, 2000, p. xvii).

I sympathize with all the various arguments for preferring one term over

another, and for this reason, depending on the context of the discussion, I use

most of these terms somewhat interchangeably. However, I avoid terms such as

entheogens, sacred medicines, and sacraments in scholarly writing because they

tend to beg the question regarding the metaphysical nature of the realities revealed

to those using these substances. I prefer the term psychedelic because it conveys

the most straightforward and neutral stance toward the nature of these

experiences.

Having said this, I acknowledge that Lukoff, Zanger, and Lu (1990) make

a strong case for using the term psychoactive. That term has always seemed

overly broad to me, including as it does substances used primarily to merely

stimulate the senses or dull the mind. I distinguish psychedelic from psychoactive

substances in the way that Grof (1998) distinguishes holotropic states of

consciousness from the broader class of nonordinary states of consciousness

(p. 5). 8 Holotropic means “oriented toward wholeness” or “moving in the

direction of wholeness” (Grof, 2000, p. 2), and holotropic states, Grof says, have

“remarkable therapeutic and transformative potential” (p. 2), which is not true of

all nonordinary states of consciousness, some of which are pathological or trivial

(p. 1). Lukoff et al. point out convincingly, nevertheless, that a “wide range of

8
“Nonordinary states of consciousness” is a concept often referred to as “altered
states of consciousness” in the literature of transpersonal psychology. Both phrases are
often understood as describing changes in consciousness that occur in psychedelic
experiences and, to varying degrees, in mystical experiences, peak experiences, and other
transpersonal experiences.
34
psychoactive substances have been employed to induce transpersonal states,”

including deliriants, narcotics, stimulants, and alcohol (pp. 109-110). They

therefore use “the most general term, psychoactive, to refer to substances which

affect the central nervous system and have the capacity to facilitate the induction

of transpersonal states, particularly when used in ceremonial or psychotherapeutic

context” (p. 110). In the end, however, I agree with Grinspoon and Bakalar

(1979/1997) on this point; they argue that “some compromise between

comprehensiveness and precision is necessary” (p. 9).

Psychedelics Defined

In their definitive survey of psychedelics, Psychedelic Drugs

Reconsidered, Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) define a psychedelic drug as

one that

without causing physical addiction, craving, major physiological

disturbances, delirium, disorientation, or amnesia, more or less reliably
produces thought, mood, and perceptual changes otherwise rarely
experienced except in dreams, contemplative and religious exaltation,
flashes of vivid involuntary memory, and acute psychoses. (p. 9) 9

They are quick to add, however, that such a definition is only a rough guide

because “psychedelic drugs have a vague family resemblance rather than an easily

described set of common features” (p. 9). Because LSD can produce most of the

effects that other psychedelic substances produce, Grinspoon and Bakalar propose

9
In the literature on psychedelic-induced psychotic states, the term acute, or
short-term (versus chronic, or long-term), arises frequently in discussions of psychosis,
and schizophrenia in particular. Most of the sources I review here precede the publication
of DSM-IV (APA, 1994), which no longer classifies schizophrenia in terms of acute and
chronic. Even Grinspoon and Bakalar’s Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered (1997) was
originally published in 1979. These terms nevertheless accurately reflect the historical
development of thinking in the field.
35
that any discussion of various psychedelics be referenced to LSD as the central or

prototypical psychedelic drug (p. 9).

Stanislav Grof (1980/1994), the leading researcher of LSD and an

international authority on psychedelic substances in general, characterizes

psychedelics as “nonspecific catalysts and amplifiers of the psyche” (p. 11). Grof

thereby imposes a critical qualification on Grinspoon and Bakalar’s definition:

rather than produce psychological effects, psychedelic substances release content

from the depths of the psyche (Grof, 2001, p. 32). That is, Grof maintains that

psychedelics such as LSD, psilocybin, and mescaline have no universally

consistent pharmacological effects (1980/1994, p. 11); and they do not “produce a

drug-specific state with certain stereotypical characteristics” (p. 309). Rather,

psychedelics increase energy levels that activate psychological processes that

consequently enable the individual to experience unconscious content directly

(pp. 11, 309). Put somewhat differently, Grof says that LSD “can best be

described as a catalyst or amplifier of mental processes that mediates access to

hidden recesses of the human mind” (p. 309).

Metzner (2002b) defines psychedelics in relation to Leary’s

set-and-setting hypothesis, which

states that the content of a psychedelic experience is a function of the set

(intention, attitude, personality, mood) and the setting (interpersonal,
social, and environmental) and that the drug functions as a kind of trigger,
or catalyst, or nonspecific amplifier or sensitizer. (p. 29)

Psychedelics can be understood, then, as “one class of triggers within a whole

range of possible catalysts of altered states” (p. 29) that transform perception and

worldview (pp. 25). And psychedelic substances act “by altering the chemical

36
composition of the cerebro-sensory information processing medium, temporarily

[inactivating] the screening programs, the genetic and cultural filters, which

dominate in a completely unnoticed way our usual perceptions of the world”

(p. 29).

References to the capacity of psychedelics to inactivate the brain’s

filtering and screening functions likely have their origin in Huxley’s seminal

essay on psychedelic experience, “The Doors of Perception.” Huxley (1956)

described mescaline as “having the power to impair the efficiency of the cerebral

reducing valve” and thereby allowing “Mind at Large” to seep into the

individual’s consciousness, whereupon “all kinds of biologically useless things

start to happen” (p. 26). Huxley (1999) attributes this image to Henri Bergson’s

model, “in which the brain with its associated normal self, acts as a utilitarian

device for limiting, and making selections from, the enormous possible world of

consciousness and for canalizing experience into biologically profitable channels”

(p. 29). Mescaline, disease, emotional shock, and mystical experiences, says

Huxley, all “have the power, each in its different way and in varying degrees, to

inhibit the functions of the normal self and its ordinary brain activity, thus

permitting the ‘other world’ to rise into consciousness” (p. 29).

Recent Historical and Cultural Background

Despite abundant experimental, historical, and anthropological evidence to

the contrary, mainstream science continues to see the states of consciousness

induced by psychedelics as pathological (Grof, 2000, p. 16; Walsh & Vaughan,

1993, p. 2). Following the unregulated and often irresponsible use of psychedelics

37
in the 1960s, together with the exaggerated and sensational portrayal by

politicians and the press of their abuse, the topic of psychedelics has taken on

negative associations extrinsic to the substances themselves, at least within

mainstream Western culture. This has prevented serious public discussion of

psychedelics (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. xxii; Grob, 2002c; p. 2, Grof,

2000, p. 16; Lee & Shlain, 1985) and has limited legitimate research into their

therapeutic potential (Grob, 2002a, p. 17; 2002c, p. 5). Even though there are

encouraging signs of an ongoing shift in attitude (see “New Research,” below),

this remains the prevailing view.

In Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream, Jay Stevens (1987)

writes that a Kafkaesque atmosphere descended on the field of psychology

following the media and congressional backlash against psychedelics in the

1960s. “Those who knew the most about psychedelics were relegated to the

sidelines of the debate, while those who knew the least were elevated to the status

of ‘expert’” (pp. 370-371). Psychedelic research was duly pronounced bad

science, and psychedelic researchers were denounced as charlatans. Psychiatrist

and psychedelic researcher Charles Grob (2002c) points out that despite the fact

that research on psychedelics was once in the vanguard of psychiatric

investigation, reference to psychedelics in medical training programs has been

virtually nonexistent since the early 1980s (p. 5).

Even though the harshest critics no doubt came from more conventional

schools of thought, tensions also surfaced around this issue within the field of

humanistic psychology. In his 1974 Journal of Transpersonal Psychology article,

38
“Religious-Type Experience in the Context of Humanistic and Transpersonal

Psychology,” Peter Campbell claims that some humanistic psychologists were

critical of colleagues who investigated religious experience. Their criticism, he

said, appeared to stem from prejudices concerning religious experience,

prejudices based upon religion’s historical association with anti-scientific and

anti-humanistic views (p. 13). Lingering distaste from past historical conflicts

between science and religion, Campbell asserts, “is hardly sufficient reason to

hinder psychological research [with] intramural bickering and name-calling”

(p. 15).

With their research terminated and their professional careers marginalized,

many investigators turned to alternative methodologies and disciplines such as

breathwork and meditation in order to continue studying nonordinary states of

consciousness and their psychospiritual potential. According to Stevens (1987),

psychedelic research was “resurrected in the guise of a new branch of psychology,

transpersonal psychology” (p. 371; see also Grob, 2002d, pp. 278-279).

More and more researchers and scholars in the fields of psychiatry,

psychology, medicine, anthropology, and comparative religion seem to agree with

Grob (2002c), however, that it is time for "a fair and objective inquiry into the

potential risks and benefits of hallucinogens" (pp. 2-3; see also Sessa, 2005).

Pointing to the safe and healthful use of psychedelics in ancient and indigenous

cultures, they maintain that these substances have an unrealized potential for

healing, growth, and transformation within contemporary Western culture (Grob,

2002c, p, 5; see also Fadiman, Grob, Bravo, Agar, & Walsh, 2003; Forte, 1997;

39
Grof, 2000; Harner, 1973; Metzner, 1999; Roberts, 2001; Smith, 2000; Weil,

1986). The current challenge, Grob concludes in Hallucinogens: A Reader, “is to

determine if and how these substances would have a healing role in our society”

(p. 5).

There are good reasons at this time for a fair and objective inquiry into

psychedelics and specifically into their potential for healing and transformation.

To begin with, some current researchers think that many investigations using

psychedelics through the 1970s, as extensive and as useful as they were, do not

provide adequate evidence by current research standards for the effectiveness of

psychedelic-assisted treatments (Passie, 2007, p. 64). Reflecting typical criticisms

of past investigations, Grob (2002d) finds “notable flaws in their design,

including primitive and by today’s standards deficient measures designed to

evaluate therapeutic change, lack of outcome follow-up and unwillingness to

utilize appropriate control subjects” (p. 281).

It is beyond the scope of this literature review to evaluate the fairness of

these criticisms by current researchers. However, when Fadiman (2008) reviewed

the criticisms of early psychedelic research presented in Psychedelic Medicines:

New Evidence for Hallucinogenic Substances as Treatments (Winkelman &

Roberts, 2007), he observed an almost “boiler plate repudiation” of the 700 prior

studies that reflected positive effects of psychedelic drugs (p. 126). Fadiman goes

on to assert that—even though early psychedelic research was unreasonably

tainted for social and political reasons quite independent of its scientific

40
value—current researchers are taking extraordinary care to distance themselves

from it so as to protect their own research from biased attacks (p. 126).

We can anticipate in any case a range of scientific benefits from renewed

research. These benefits include insights into the function of the brain that are

made possible by state-of-the-art techniques (e.g., brain-image scans and

receptor-binding studies) as well as innovative psychedelic-facilitated treatment

programs for substance abuse, post-traumatic stress disorder, and terminal-illness

therapy (Grob, 2002c, p. 6; 2002d, p. 280). There would undoubtedly also be

educational benefits of increased knowledge about psychedelics for the millions

of people who are still using psychedelics, despite legal prohibitions (Fadiman,

Grob, Bravo, Agar, & Walsh, 2003, p. 111). A common quip heard by

marginalized psychedelic researchers reflects the unfortunate state of affairs in

contemporary drug policy: The only place psychedelics are not being taken is

under the supervision of knowledgeable and experienced professionals. With such

reckless misuse of psychedelics, unwary trippers risk what Grob (2002c) refers to

as “ever increasing chaos, confusion and terror [and] persistent states of

existential anxiety and despair” (p. 10). This sounds all too much like what Albert

Hofmann, the discoverer of LSD, calls “the great tragedy” of the 1960s, when the

careless use of psychedelics caused so much harm, both psychologically for

individual users and medically for psychedelic research (Grob, 2002a, p. 22).

New Research

Despite a long ban on research with human subjects, there was a major

resurgence of other kinds of research on psychoactive substances in the 1980s;

41
and new discoveries have been made in fields ranging from neurochemistry to

transpersonal psychology (Lukoff, Zanger, & Lu, 1990, p. 107). With support

from private foundations such as the Heffter Research Institute (HRI) and public

policy organizations such as the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic

Studies (MAPS), further progress has been made since the 1980s in building the

basis for a new generation of psychedelic research. The Multidisciplinary

Association for Psychedelic Studies, which tirelessly advocates for

government-approved research, documents this international research on its Web

site (http://www.maps.org).

Currently, there is an especially strong resurgence of empirical research

into the psychotherapeutic effectiveness of psychedelics. Numerous studies have

been initiated using a variety of psychedelic compounds in Europe, South

America, and the United States (Grob, 2002c, pp. 6-9; 2002d, p. 263). Some of

the most notable of the current empirical studies include psilocybin treatment of

obsessive-compulsive disorder (Moreno & Delgado, 2007), MDMA-assisted

psychotherapy for the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (Mithoefer,

2007), the use of psilocybin by terminal cancer patients with existential anxiety

(Grob, 2007), and LSD-assisted psychotherapy with persons suffering anxiety

associated with advanced stage life-threatening disease (Gaser, 2008). A recent

Scientific American Mind review of current research reports that studies are also

looking at psychedelic-enhanced treatments for cluster headaches, depression,

alcoholism, and opiate addiction (Brown, 2007/2008, p. 68).

42
 A model study indicating the significant therapeutic as well as

psychospiritual potential of psychedelics was conducted at the Johns Hopkins

School of Medicine between 2001 and 2005 (Griffiths, Richards, McCann, &

Jesse, 2006). This was a double-blind study evaluating the psychological effects

of high doses of psilocybin with a 14-month follow-up (Griffiths, Richards,

Johnson, McCann, & Jesse, 2008), which demonstrated that

when administered under supportive conditions, psilocybin occasioned

experiences similar to spontaneously occurring mystical experiences that,
over a year later, were considered by volunteers to be among the most
personally meaningful and spiritually significant experiences of their lives
and to have produced positive changes in attitudes, mood, altruism,
behavior and life satisfaction. (p. 231)

Reflecting the praise of multiple expert commentators in the journal

Psychopharmacology, David Nichols (2006) observes that “one would be hard-

pressed to find a single study of psychedelics from any earlier era that was as

well-done or as meaningful” (p. 284).

These are the kinds of psychiatric studies needed at this time to effectively

demonstrate the therapeutic value of psychedelics, and to show that the

psychiatric study of psychedelics is a relevant and reputable discipline, says Grob

(2002d, p. 280). As important as these developments are for the advancement of

scientific knowledge of psychedelics, severe governmental restrictions on

psychedelic research still prevent in-depth studies with human subjects like those

carried out before the ban imposed in the mid-1960s, says Grof (2004).

These restrictions on in-depth psychological and psychiatric research with

psychedelics increase the importance of other kinds of research on the nature and

healing potential of psychedelics. One important form of research is the

43
cross-cultural study of psychedelic use by indigenous peoples throughout the

world who have long used psychoactive plants for spiritual and healing purposes

(Grob, 2002d, pp. 282, 285; Grof, 1984, p. 17). Such studies have also been

motivated to some extent by observations of the uninformed use of psychedelics

by young people in contemporary Western cultures (Dombrowe, 2005; see also

Dobkin de Rios & Grob, 1993; Grob & Dobkin de Rios, 1992). Studies that

illuminate indigenous peoples’ experienced and respectful use of psychedelics, or

sacred medicines, will hopefully contribute to their appropriate and beneficial use

within contemporary cultures lacking such knowledge and experience

(Dombrowe, 2005; see also Grob, Greer, & Mangini, 1998; Metzner, 1999,

2002a, 2002b). And cross-cultural studies of the successful use of psychedelics by

shamans to treat serious illness could provide valuable insights to modern

Western healers. Indeed, the synthesis of ancient wisdom and modern science

could even have far-reaching consequences for the health of our planet, which is

currently threatened by the misguided application of technological advances

(Grof, 1984, pp. 10, 21).

I think that the theoretical study of the nature and therapeutic potential of

psychedelic substances is another important form of ongoing research. “If we are

to develop optimal research designs for evaluating the therapeutic utility of

hallucinogens,” says Grob (2002d), “it will not be sufficient to adhere to strict

standards of scientific methodology alone” (p. 285). Although Grob is referring to

what we can learn from the application of traditional shamanic paradigms to our

contemporary culture, and not to the kind of theoretical research I conduct in this

44
dissertation, I think his logic supports any serious research that contributes to our

knowledge of the nature, risks, and healing potential of psychedelic substances. In

their 1990 review of research methods and designs employed to investigate the

relationship between psychoactive substances and transpersonal states, Lukoff,

Zanger, and Lu maintain that the complex nature of these substances and the

states of consciousness they induce requires a cross-disciplinary approach,

ranging from laboratory research and field work in traditional cultures to

self-experimentation (p. 108), the last of which can be documented in the form of

first-person accounts that “add phenomenological depth to the neurological and

psychological research” (p. 136). As chaotic as such a diverse range of methods

could seem, Lukoff et al. assert that any comprehensive understanding of these

matters “requires an integration of the perspectives from a wide range of

disciplines” (p. 143). Surely all this is as true today as it was when Lukoff et al.

came to this conclusion in 1990.

Psychedelics and Trauma

The relationship between psychedelics and trauma is an intriguingly

complex one that brings to mind the proverbial power of fire to create as well as

destroy. Psychedelic substances have damaged many a naive and careless user.

When used respectfully and responsibly, however, psychedelic substances have

for centuries been uniquely effective agents for healing and psychospiritual

transformation (Grob, 2002b; Winkelman & Roberts, 2007). After clarifying the

relationship between difficult psychedelic experiences and trauma, I review the

45
relationship between psychedelics and trauma in terms of psychedelic-induced

trauma and psychedelic-assisted treatments for trauma.

Difficult Psychedelic Experiences as Potentially Traumatic

When I speak of difficult psychedelic experiences, I refer to psychedelic

experiences in which one confronts extremely challenging and painful

perceptions, insights, or unconscious material. Encounters with difficult material,

says Grof (1980/1994), can be “characterized by intense physical and emotional

suffering or confusion” (p. 90; see also p. 156). Such encounters usually occur

unexpectedly and involve inconceivably strange, confusing, and terrifying

thoughts, feelings, and images. Individuals undergoing an especially difficult

psychedelic experience are often overcome with a conviction that they are going

insane.

A difficult psychedelic experience is commonly referred to as a “bad trip,”

and Strassman (1984) observes that this is the most common adverse reaction to

psychedelic experience (p. 581). Strassman describes the difficult psychedelic

experience as a temporary episode of panic lasting less than 24 hours with

symptoms that include “frightening illusions/ hallucinations (usually visual and/or

auditory); overwhelming anxiety to the point of panic; aggression with possible

violent acting-out behavior; depression with suicidal ideations, gestures, or

attempts; confusion; and fearfulness to the point of paranoid delusions” (p. 581)

The extreme intensity of a difficult psychedelic experience is illustrated in

Grof’s (1980/1994) description of psychedelic-induced ego death, which can

involve
46
 an experience of the destruction of everything that the subject is,
possesses, or is attached to. Its essential characteristics are a sense of
total annihilation on all imaginable levels. . . . Subjects face agonizing
tension increasing to fantastic proportions and develop a conviction
that they will explode and the entire world will be destroyed. (p. 158)

Whether a difficult psychedelic experience becomes traumatic in its

own right (as opposed to the extremely painful experience of confronting and

working through previous trauma) depends on a complex combination of

extrapharmacological factors that can be generally described as “set and setting.”

These factors include the environment in which the experience occurs and

available interpersonal support as well as the individual’s attitude, personality,

and mood. In “The Acute Side Effects From LSD,” Ungerleider (1968) says that

difficult psychedelic experiences involve more than the altered perceptions and

intensification of sensation that are inherent to psychedelic experience. It must be

emphasized, Ungerleider says, that difficult psychedelic experiences also involve

the individual’s reaction to those altered perceptions and intensified sensations

(p. 61). Clearly, then, the conditions under which a psychedelic experience occurs

will have a great deal to do with how one reacts to a difficult psychedelic

experience and whether or not a difficult psychedelic experience becomes a

traumatic experience.

At the risk of oversimplifying this matter, the potential a difficult

psychedelic experience has to become traumatic, or in extreme cases to lead to a

psychotic reaction (Grof, 1980/1994, p. 209), generally comes down to whether

or not the individual using the substance is properly screened for existing or

previous psychological problems, is prepared for the experience, and is in a safe

and supportive environment. These understandably are the same general

47
conditions commonly recommended for safe and effective psychedelic

psychotherapy (Frecska, 2007, pp. 86-87; Goldsmith, 2007, pp. 117-125; Grof,

1980/1994, p. 151, chap. 4). Beyond the following section on

psychedelic-induced trauma, I most explicitly discuss the importance of these

conditions in Chapters Eight and Nine, which deal with the implications of

Jungian psychology for psychedelic psychotherapy.

In a sense, however, this dissertation as a whole is concerned with the

factors that determine whether a difficult psychedelic experience becomes

traumatic, and if so, whether a traumatic psychedelic experience leads to a

psychotic reaction. The extent to which a psychedelic experience can be

considered traumatic should be judged in terms of the kinds of symptoms outlined

in the next section on psychedelic-induced trauma. The extent to which a

traumatic psychedelic experience leads to a psychotic reaction should be judged

in terms of the kinds of symptoms discussed in later chapters of this study. 10

Despite their potential to become traumatic or lead to psychotic reactions,

difficult psychedelic experiences often have beneficial effects. As the saying goes,

bad trips can be the best trips. Current psychedelic literature tends to view

difficult psychedelic experiences as opportunities for psychological insight and

growth rather than intrinsically traumatic experiences. “Acute adverse reactions

occurring during [psychedelic] therapy,” say Bravo and Grob (1996a, p. 340),

“are generally seen as part of the uncovering process; the goal is for them to be

contained in the therapy session and worked through” (p. 340). “A positive
10
Psychotic reactions to difficult psychedelic experiences are discussed
specifically in “Psychedelics and Psychosis” in this literature review and in Chapter Five,
“The Nature of Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States.”
48
framework should be offered for the difficult LSD experience” says Grof

(1980/1994, p. 316). “It is essential to present it as an opportunity to face and

work through certain traumatic aspects of one's unconscious rather than as an

unfortunate and tragic accident” (p. 316). Even difficult sessions involving

paranoid states and hellish experiences can be deeply therapeutic if they are

resolved well, says Grof (p. 144; see also pp. 129, 309-318).

Such optimistic views are primarily a reflection of the great number of

successfully resolved psychedelic emergencies (Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 314-316;

Mojeiko, 2007, p. 15). There is, however, a certain defensiveness within the

psychedelic community regarding adverse reactions to psychedelics. Reacting to a

barrage of sensationalized reports of bad trips in the mainstream media, some

accounts of psychedelic experience tend to emphasize the benefits of psychedelics

and minimize if not ignore their risks. For instance, Hofmann’s Potion: The

Pioneers of LSD, a generally excellent documentary film produced by the

National Film Board of Canada (Littlefield & Martin, 2002), emphasizes the

healing and transformative potential of psychedelic substances. The film’s only

emphatic point addressing their risks is made by Stanislav Grof, who criticizes

Timothy Leary. Leary, Grof says, “didn’t tell people about the dangers, [didn’t

tell people] that before you go to Heaven, you might go to Hell, or if you don’t do

it right, you might stay there.”

Given the potential for psychedelics to induce extraordinary degrees of

emotional stress and even psychotic reactions of varying intensity and duration,

there should be no question that psychedelic experiences can be truly traumatic

49
(Blewett & Chwelos, 1959; Cohen, 1967, pp. 266-277; Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 151,

160, 308-311). In discussing the nature and dynamics of psychedelic crisis, Grof

summarizes the difficult psychedelic experience’s potential for trauma as well as

transformation. A difficult psychedelic experience, Grof says,

represents an exteriorization of a potentially pathogenic matrix in the

subject’s unconscious. If properly handled, a psychedelic crisis has great
positive potential and can result in profound personality transformation.
Conversely, an insensitive and ignorant approach can cause psychological
damage and lead to chronic psychotic states and years of psychiatric
hospitalization. (p. 309)

Psychedelic-Induced Trauma

I became convinced of the importance of trauma in my investigation of

psychedelic-induced psychotic states after discovering Jungian psychologist

Donald Kalsched’s (1996) pioneering work with victims of early childhood

trauma. The dreams of Kalsched’s clients consistently revealed frighteningly

disturbing symbolic content (such as powerfully demonic figures) remarkably

similar to imagery encountered by some individuals undergoing difficult

psychedelic experiences. Drawing on a range of theorists, from Freud and Jung to

object-relations and self-psychology theorists such as Winnicott and Kohut,

Kalsched defines trauma as any experience that causes “unbearable psychic pain

or anxiety” (p. 1). Even though trauma occurs under a wide variety of conditions,

from serious physical injury and sexual abuse to the developmentally destructive

effects of unmet dependency needs, the distinguishing feature of trauma as

Kalsched conceives it is what Heinz Kohut calls “disintegration anxiety,”

50
which stems from an event that threatens to dissolve the personality’s coherence

(p. 1) and is, Kohut says, “the deepest anxiety man can experience” (quoted in

Kalsched, p. 34). I discuss Kalsched’s work further in Chapter Five, “The Nature

of Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States.”

With its orientation toward events that threaten serious physical injury and

literal death as opposed to serious psychic injury and ego, or psychological, death,

DSM-IV’s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder category (APA, 1994, pp. 424-429)

seems at first to have limited applicability to psychedelic-induced trauma. By

articulating characteristic psychological responses to traumatic events, however,

this category establishes an excellent context for discussing the nature of adverse

reactions to psychedelic experience.

The DSM-IV Guidebook (Frances, First, & Pincus, 1995) emphasizes that

the symptom pattern for PTSD is remarkably uniform despite great variations in

the psychological history and cultural background of those who have experienced

trauma (p. 258). Although the authors do not say so explicitly, clearly the PTSD

symptom pattern is also remarkably uniform despite great variations in the nature

of the trauma experienced. 11 This uniformity, I believe, helps account for the

strong parallels between DSM-IV’s PTSD symptoms and adverse reactions to

psychedelic experience. I outline here some of the symptoms of PTSD that

parallel adverse reactions to psychedelic experience.

To begin with, PTSD involves a response to a traumatic event in which a

person experiences “intense fear, helplessness, or horror” (APA, 1994, p. 424), all

11
Frances et al. say there is “a very characteristic human pattern of response to
an extreme stressor” (p. 258).
51
of which are common emotions in difficult psychedelic experience. Characteristic

symptoms resulting from the experience of trauma include “persistent

reexperiencing of the traumatic event” (p. 424), which can involve “a sense of

reliving the experience, illusions, hallucinations, and dissociative flashback

episodes” (p. 428) as well as “intense psychological distress at exposure to

internal or external cues that symbolize or resemble an aspect of the traumatic

event” (p. 428). Frances et al. (1995) note that such reexperiencing of a traumatic

event can be triggered by a wide range of stimuli or can occur spontaneously.

They also observe that reexperiencing a traumatic event can be terrifying in its

own right and that such intense reexperiencing can lead individuals to fear that

they are losing their minds (p. 262). This brings to mind the concern over

retraumatization that can be brought about by psychedelics, an issue I return to in

Chapter Six. And, again, all these symptoms of PTSD are characteristic of

adverse psychedelic flashback episodes, which are commonly referred to simply

as “flashbacks.” Grof (1980/1994) describes flashbacks as later recurrences of

LSD-like states (p. 45). Strassman (1984) classifies them as one kind of

intermittent adverse reaction (p. 581), and he defines them as “transient,

spontaneous recurrences of the psychedelic drug effect appearing after a period of

normalcy following a psychedelic drug experience” (p. 588). (It should be noted

that, as spontaneous recurrences of previous psychedelic experiences, psychedelic

flashbacks are not always negative experiences.)

Other characteristic symptoms of PTSD, and I suggest of reactions to

psychedelic-induced trauma as well, include the “persistent avoidance of stimuli

52
associated with the trauma and numbing of general responsiveness (not present

before the trauma)” (APA, 1994, p. 428), which can involve “markedly

diminished interest or participation in significant activities,” “feeling of

detachment or estrangement from others,” and a “sense of foreshortened future

(e.g., [the person] does not expect to have a career, marriage, children, or a

normal life span)” (p. 428). Furthermore, trauma symptoms can include

“persistent symptoms of increased arousal (not present before the trauma)” such

as “irritability or outbursts of anger,” “difficulty concentrating,” “hypervigilance,”

and “exaggerated startle response” (p. 428), and can include “clinically significant

distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of

functioning” (p. 429).

It is interesting to note that a DSM-III criterion describing the nature of a

traumatic event as being “outside the range of usual human experience” (Frances

et al., 1995, p. 261) was eliminated in DSM-IV because it was considered too

vague and unreliable (p. 261). Although it is understandable that this vague

language was changed, the condition of being “outside the range of usual human

experience” is an especially evocative characterization of the extraordinary nature

of psychedelic experience in general and psychedelic-induced psychotic states in

particular.

Psychedelics have a long record of safety when used in controlled settings

with appropriate safeguards (Frecska, 2007, pp. 69-70; Strassman, 1984, p. 590).

However, when used carelessly (and on rare occasions even when used

appropriately) psychedelic experiences can be psychologically traumatic in their

53
own right. The potentially traumatic effects of psychedelics are suggested by the

counterculture term bad trips and are indicated by established safeguards and

contraindications for the responsible practice of psychedelic psychotherapy

(Cohen, 1967, p. 208 ff.; Frecska, 2007; Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 151-154). They

include screening out potential participants with pre-existing psychiatric

conditions, 12 establishing a safe and therapeutically supportive setting, and

instituting participant supervision and follow-up by an experienced therapeutic

team (Cohen; Frecska; Grof).

Psychedelic Therapy as Treatment for Past Trauma

As I indicated in my discussion of new research, there is currently a

resurgence of empirical research into the psychotherapeutic effectiveness of

psychedelics, and the relationship between psychedelics and trauma is usually

discussed these days in terms of the potential psychedelics have to bring past

trauma to conscious awareness by overcoming defenses against treatment and

resistance to trauma-based memories and feelings (Bastiaans, 1983; Grob, 2002d,

p. 273; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 28). Grof’s observations from extensive psychedelic

psychotherapy research clearly indicate the extraordinary potential psychedelics

have to facilitate insights and healing through reliving past traumatic experiences

(pp. 30, 36, 74, 105, 207, 282, 285). Grof attributes the great success he and his

colleagues have had using LSD for treating a wide range of trauma-induced

disorders to LSD’s unique properties as an abreactive, or releasing, agent

12
A survey of 44 investigators who had tested the effects of LSD and mescaline
before their prohibition revealed no serious physical complications even when the drugs
had been given to alcoholics who were in poor health (Cohen, 1967, p. 209).
54
(p. 250). Abreaction is the discharge of emotion and pent-up physical energies

associated with a previously unconscious experience, especially a trauma.

Abreaction often involves reliving the original experience and dramatically acting

out associated emotions and energies through body movement and vocal

expression (Grof, 2000, pp. 13, 192; Rycroft, 1968, p. 1; Samuels, Shorter, &

Plaut, 1986, p. 8). (I discuss abreaction in more detail in “Treating Trauma:

Integration versus Abreaction in Jung’s Psychology,” in Chapter Six.)

Grof frequently encourages therapists, whether conducting psychedelic

psychotherapy or non-drug forms of experiential psychotherapy, to facilitate the

free flow of energy and the completion of experiential gestalts. He believes these

experiences are inherently healing, no matter how challenging the content of those

experiences (1985, p. 381; 1980/1994, p. 282). Difficult psychedelic experiences,

says Grof (1980/1994),

are caused by the emergence of highly-charged emotionally traumatic

unconscious material. Since this material is the source of the patient's
difficulties in everyday life, negative episodes in LSD sessions, if
properly approached and handled, represent great opportunities for
therapeutic change. (p. 156)

I discuss specific approaches to using psychedelics for treating trauma and

other psychological disorders in the section “Psychedelic Psychotherapy.”

55
 Psychedelics and Psychosis

Psychosis and Psychotic States

Psychiatric research has revealed the extreme complexity of psychosis, a

process that is affected by a wide range of factors, including genetic elements,

developmental history, biochemical changes, situational circumstances, and

sociocultural influences (Grof, 1985, p. 304). The DSM-IV explains that the term

psychosis has been historically defined in different ways, none of which has been

universally accepted (APA, 1994, p. 273; see also Lukoff, 1985, p. 156).

Definitions used in earlier classifications (e.g., DSM-II) focused on the severity of

the impairment and were so broad that psychosis covered any disorder that

“resulted in ‘impairment that grossly interferes with the capacity to meet ordinary

demands of life’” (APA, p. 273). Some earlier definitions include characteristics

that are clearly biased against psychedelic experience and other forms of

transpersonal experience. These include characteristics such as “a loss of ego

boundaries” (p. 273) and “prominent hallucinations that the individual realizes are

hallucinatory experiences” (p. 273). The DSM-IV classifications for psychosis use

much more restrictive criteria that emphasize aspects of various definitions for

different disorders. In the classifications of Schizophrenia, Schizophreniform

Disorder, and Brief Psychotic Disorder, for instance, “the term psychotic refers to

delusions, any prominent hallucinations, disorganized speech, or disorganized or

catatonic behavior” (p. 273). Substance-Induced Psychotic Disorder, on the other

hand, “refers to delusions or only those hallucinations that are not accompanied

by insight” (p. 273).

56
 In his book Healing the Split: Integrating Spirit Into Our Understanding

of the Mentally Ill, transpersonal psychiatrist John Nelson (1994) defines

psychosis as “any one of several altered states of consciousness, transient or

persistent, that prevent integration of sensory or extrasensory data into reality

models accepted by the broad consensus of society, and that lead to maladaptive

behavior and social sanctions” (p. 3). Although this definition is problematic

because it undervalues the integration of experience into unconventional reality

models and because, in retrospect, some of history’s sanest people suffered social

sanction for “maladaptive” behavior, Nelson’s treatment is on the whole quite

evenhanded and useful. To begin with, he points out that “to the confusion of

many, this definition also describes several potentially adaptive altered states of

consciousness (ASCs)” (p. 4). Among these Nelson includes "mystical rapture"

and "the effects of certain consciousness-altering drugs” (p. 4).

This recalls Grof’s (1985) insight that “the same perinatal and

transpersonal matrices that are involved in psychotic breakdown can, under

certain circumstances, mediate the process of spiritual transformation and

consciousness evolution” (p. 303). Given the complexity of the psychotic process

and its ambiguous symptomatology (i.e., indicating transformative as well as

destructive altered states of consciousness), it is imperative to identify the factors

by which we can distinguish transformative and destructive psychotic states.

Grof’s model highlights two factors that are especially useful in making this

distinction. We have to take into account, first, the triggering mechanism that

elicits the emergence of extraordinary unconscious content, and second, the

57
individual’s attitude toward and ability to integrate such content (p. 303). It is not

the content itself that is problematic, as unconventional and bizarre as that content

might be. As Nelson (1994) says, the difference between a benign spiritual

emergency and a schizophrenic break has everything to do with the way the

individual integrates the content of the experience into his or her thought and

feeling (p. 266; see also Lukoff, 1985, p. 164).

Nelson’s model of consciousness and his treatment of the relationships

between psychosis, psychedelic-induced altered states, and transformation help

clarify concepts central to my investigation of psychedelic-induced psychotic

states and help establish a basis upon which to distinguish between what he calls

benign and malignant psychotic states of consciousness. (The specific criteria

Lukoff [1985] establishes for distinguishing between mystical experiences with

psychotic features, which are essentially religious experiences, and psychotic

disorders with mystical features are relevant here, too.) Nelson (1994) integrates

concepts from mainstream neuropsychiatry, transpersonal psychology, and

Eastern philosophy and applies them to the task of understanding the “sudden

unnamed terrors” (p. xix) of psychosis.

Within the field of transpersonal theory, Nelson (1994) draws from and to

some degree tries to reconcile Ken Wilber’s and Michael Washburn’s points of

view as well as contributing insights that diverge from both their theories (p. vi).

Nelson also draws from Grof’s and Jung’s theories. He respects Grof as an ally

against the materialistic approach to the mind-brain relationship (p. 8), as an

important theorist regarding the relationship between psychotic experience and

58
birth trauma (p. 176), and as the originator, with Christina Grof, of methods of

holotropic therapy that induce productive altered states of consciousness

(pp. 411-412). Nelson even participated in a series of holotropic breathwork

sessions with the Grofs at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California, and he briefly

describes the therapeutic value of these sessions in his book (p. 412).

Nelson’s relationship to Jung’s psychology is less direct; yet many of his

insights are clearly consistent with Jung’s. This is apparently due to the influence

of Washburn’s Jungian-oriented paradigm on Nelson’s thought. In any case,

Nelson (1994) relates many of his own concepts to such Jungian concepts as the

collective unconscious, archetypes, psychic phenomena, persona and shadow, the

psychological significance of myth, and the necessary avoidance of powerful

techniques for expanding consciousness by those with fragile ego boundaries.

Most importantly, Nelson credits Jung with having unusual insight into “the

Source of consciousness . . . accessible to all sentient beings” (p. 312), alluding to

Jung’s concepts of the collective unconscious and the archetype of the Self.

Nelson refers to this “Source of consciousness” as “the Spiritual Ground”

(p. 312).

Of special importance for my investigation into psychedelic-induced

psychotic states and their transformative potential is Nelson’s (1994) emphasis on

the critical need to distinguish between “benign psychotic states that herald

spiritual emergence” (p. xxiii) and “malignant [psychotic] states that portend

retreat to primitive mental levels” (p. xxiii), to distinguish, that is, “profound

breakthroughs of higher consciousness from malignant psychotic regressions that

59
permanently submerge the self in primitive areas of the psyche” (p. xx). Although

I think that Nelson’s characterization of so-called primitive mental levels as

malignant is problematic, I appreciate his argument that we need to distinguish

between benign and malignant psychotic states in terms of cause, degree of

regression, adaptive value, potential for spiritual growth, and treatment strategies

(p. 4).

Nelson’s (1994) discussion of psychotic states is laid out within a

transpersonal conception of consciousness as a universal nonphysical reality, an

infinite spirit, that infuses all matter and assumes a variety of forms (pp. xxiii).

Human consciousness and selfhood—and altered states of consciousness, whether

manifested as sanity or insanity—develop in relationship to this universal

consciousness, or Spiritual Ground (pp. 9-14). This transpersonal ontology

informs Nelson’s approach to the intriguing relationship of psychotic and mystical

states of consciousness to psychedelics.

Essentially, Nelson presents a developmental model of consciousness and

selfhood that is reminiscent of Michael Washburn’s theory of the ego and the

Dynamic Ground. As the ego develops in childhood, a psychic membrane, or

self-boundary, is formed that establishes the child’s sense of identity and at the

same time isolates the child on a conscious level from the Spiritual Ground of

reality, which eventually becomes alien to the individual’s consciousness.

Because this psychic membrane always remains semi-permeable to the

vital Spiritual Ground, the self-boundary is always vulnerable to “catastrophic

fragmentation” during psychotic states of consciousness (Nelson, 1994, p. 12).

60
Within this model of consciousness and selfhood, altered states of

consciousness—whether benign spiritual emergencies or malignant

regressions—can be understood in terms of changes in the permeability of the

self’s psychic boundary. Within this context we can conceive of

psychedelic-induced psychotic states as dramatic infusions from the Spiritual

Ground that overwhelm the self. 13

Those individuals who have become shut off from life’s most fundamental

reality, and who then suddenly become infused by it, can naturally find it a

terrifying force that threatens to carry them into madness. But even individuals

whose spiritual path has enabled them to gradually reopen themselves to the

Spiritual Ground can experience unanticipated openings, or spiritual emergencies,

which can damage the self if handled clumsily. Such openings of course can come

even more unexpectedly and terrifyingly to unprepared users of psychedelic

substances. In any case, says Nelson (1994), it is important to distinguish between

relatively benign psychotic states and truly pathological psychotic states that can

deteriorate into malignant and chronic psychosis (pp. 13-14).

Making these distinctions can be challenging because benign and

malignant psychotic states share many characteristics in common, which,

according to Nelson (1994, pp. 15-17), may include:

1. Shifts in the relationship between self and Ground, which the individual
can experience as anything from blissful to terrifying

2. Confusion resulting from shifts to more primitive, or regressive, states of

consciousness or shifts to higher, or transcendent, states

13
This conception is compatible with a Jungian interpretation of psychedelic-
induced psychotic states, which I discuss in Chapters Five and Six.
61
 3. Shifts in attention away from ordinary concerns

4. Changes in the experience of time and space

5. Changes in the perception of the material world and reality itself

6. Inability to discriminate between these new perceptions and ordinary

reality

7. Shifts in the relationship between the conscious and unconscious mind

8. Different forms of logic leading to bizarre ideas and extraordinary insights

(“Ideas that are obviously true in one state of consciousness may be absurd
in another, and vice versa” [p. 16].)

9. Unusual emotional coloration of ordinary events leading to insights into

arbitrary social conventions or to terrifying paranoia

10. Changes in self identity (which may incorporate other life forms or the
whole universe) leading to insights and spiritual growth or confusion, fear,
and psychosis

11. Changes in behavior, such as increased introversion

In the rest of this section on psychedelics and psychosis, I examine

psychedelic-induced psychotic states in relation to characteristics of this sort,

clarifying how they may be similar to and different from natural forms of

psychosis, especially schizophrenia. As part of this examination, I look at three

models of psychedelic substances: psychedelics as psychosis-inducing agents, as

therapeutic aids, and as dramatically transformative expanders of consciousness.

Finally, before turning to my literature review’s next section on psychedelics and

transformation, I consider in more depth how psychedelics induce psychotic

states.

62
 Psychedelics as Psychosis-Inducing Drugs

Our understanding of the relationship between psychedelic-induced

psychotic states and endogenous, or “natural,” psychosis has changed as

researchers have become more knowledgeable about the psychological effects of

psychedelics. In the early 1950s the relationship between psychedelic experience

and natural psychosis was assumed to be so strong that psychedelic substances

were referred to as psychotomimetic drugs because they were thought to induce a

temporary “model psychosis.” And they were thereby thought to establish a new

model for understanding the biological basis of mental illness, especially

schizophrenia (Bravo & Grob, 1996a, p. 335; Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997,

p. 6; Grob, 2002d, p. 268; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 24). The implication was that the

drug reaction might provide insights into the causes and treatment of natural

psychoses, say Grinspoon and Bakalar in Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered (p. 6).

That is, if apparently psychotic reactions to psychedelic drugs were caused by

some fundamental interference with the brain’s neurochemistry, this seemed to

indicate that the diseased brain of the person suffering from schizophrenia might

be producing its own LSD-like substances (Stevens, 1987, p. 25).

As early as the 1890s, at the same time as the concept of schizophrenia

was being formed, researchers viewed “mescaline intoxication” as a potential

chemical model for psychosis (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 59). In 1927,

Karl Beringer issued a tome on mescaline intoxication that described similarities

to psychosis. This view was supported by later research, including a 1940 clinical

study of mescaline-induced psychosis by G.T. Stockings published in the Journal

63
of Mental Science. According to Grinspoon and Bakalar, Stockings’ description of

the mescaline-induced symptoms and his summary of their resemblances to acute

schizophrenia are striking (p. 374). In that article, Stockings concludes that

mescaline intoxication is indeed a true ‘schizophrenia’ if we use that word

in its literal sense of ‘split mind,’ for the characteristic effect of mescaline
is a molecular fragmentation of the entire personality, exactly similar to
that found in schizophrenic patients. (quoted in Stevens, 1987, p. 11) 14

Stockings administered mescaline to himself as well to people suffering from

schizophrenia, and he observed that he could induce a wide range of abnormal

states, including paranoia, delusions of grandeur and persecution, catatonia,

religious ecstasy, mania, suicidal impulses, and hallucinations (Stevens, p. 11).

Albert Hofmann's historic first self-experiment with LSD certainly lent

credence to the notion that psychedelics can induce psychotic states. In LSD: My

Problem Child, Hofmann (1983) gives a detailed account of that experiment, an

experience he describes as a “most severe crisis” (pp. 16-20). Feeling dizzy,

anxious, and at the same time wanting to laugh, Hofmann bicycled home from his

laboratory with his assistant. While resting at home, his furniture assumed

grotesque forms, and the lady next door, who had brought him milk to drink,

became “a malevolent, insidious witch with a colored mask” (p. 17).

Even worse than these demonic transformations of the outer world, were
the alterations that I perceived in myself, in my inner being. Every
exertion of my will, every attempt to put an end to the disintegration of the
outer world and the dissolution of my ego, seemed to be wasted effort. A
demon had invaded me, had taken possession of my body, mind, and soul.
I jumped up and screamed, trying to free myself from him, but then sank
down again and lay helpless on the sofa. The substance, with which I had
wanted to experiment, had vanquished me. It was the demon that

14
For a nuanced and fascinating description of the neurophysiological and
biochemical correlates of psychotic states of consciousness, see “The Chemistry of
Madness” (Nelson, 1994, chap. 6, pp. 117-131).
64
 scornfully triumphed over my will. I was seized by the dreadful fear of
going insane. I was taken to another world, another place, another time.
(pp. 17-18)

Early research on mescaline intoxication and Hofmann’s own

psychedelic-induced psychotic states led Hofmann’s employer, Sandoz

Pharmaceuticals, to offer LSD samples to select researchers in 1947. Sandoz

recommended that the LSD samples be used to deepen psychiatrists’ insight into

their mentally ill patients (by psychiatrists taking the LSD themselves) and be

used to study the pathogenesis of mental illness by administering the drug to

healthy subjects who would experience short-term psychoses (Stevens, 1987,

pp. 11-12). 15 Thus the first phase of intense psychedelic research was heralded to

the scientific community shortly after World War II, at a time when the medical

community was inclined to find a physical basis for mental illness and for

prescribing pharmacological substances to cure it (p. 19). “For a young field

struggling to gain credibility as a medical science,” says Grob (2002d), “this

model of chemically controlled psychosis emerged as a propitious sign for the

future” (p. 271).

Harvard University psychiatrist Max Rinkel summarized the

psychotomimetic concept when he concluded that “the psychotic phenomena

produced [by psychedelic substances] were predominantly schizophrenic-like

symptoms. . . . Rorschach tests and concrete-abstract thinking tests showed

responses quite similar to those obtained with schizophrenics” (quoted in Grob,

2002d, p. 271). In Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered, Grinspoon and Bakalar

15
Sandoz Pharmaceuticals also recommended in 1947 that the LSD samples be
used to help release repressed unconscious content (Stevens, 1987, p. 11). I discuss this
property of psychedelics in “The Psycholytic and Psychedelic Models,” below.
65
(1979/1997, pp. 245-246) outline the grounds on which psychedelic-induced

psychotic states can be compared to natural psychosis. Generally speaking,

psychedelic-induced psychotic states are compared to schizophrenia. Despite

great variations, people suffering from schizophrenia share certain common

characteristics; and these common characteristics provide a basis for comparison

to psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Common characteristics of schizophrenia

include:

1. The reality of persons suffering from schizophrenia tends to be incoherent

and incompatible with consensus reality.

2. Persons suffering from schizophrenia do not distinguish between external

and internal events, and they “confound perceptions with memories,
wishes, and fears” (p. 245).

3. “Reading inappropriate meanings into innocuous situations, they often

begin to believe that everything happening around them is somehow
directed at them, and they develop what are known as ideas of reference,
feelings of influence, and delusions of grandeur or persecution” (p. 245).

4. Persons suffering from schizophrenia also become suspicious and

terror-stricken, and they often experience hallucinations of threatening,
mocking, and accusing voices (p. 245).

Among the several classifications of schizophrenia (e.g., paranoid,

catatonic, undifferentiated, residual), the most important distinction that

Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) make for the purpose of comparison with

psychedelic-induced psychosis is the distinction between acute, or short-term, and

chronic, or long-term, schizophrenia (p. 245). As I noted above, DSM-IV no

longer classifies schizophrenia in terms of acute and chronic. DSM-IV classifies

short-term schizophrenia as Brief Psychotic Disorder when episodes last at least 1

day but less than 1 month (APA, 1994, p. 304) and as Schizophreniform Disorder

when episodes last at least 1 month but less than 6 months (p. 290). Furthermore,

66
DSM-IV uses classifications such as Substance- or Hallucinogen-Induced

Psychotic Disorder (pp. 310-311; see also Frances et al., 1995, pp. 152-154) that

specifically characterize psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

The consensus in the field of psychedelic studies is that the strongest

correlation is found between psychedelic-induced psychosis and short-term

schizophrenia, which Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) characterize as having

“a relatively sudden onset . . . , often in a previously normal person, [which] often

ends in full recovery after a period of several days to several months, although it

may recur” (p. 245). David Lukoff (1996) refers to such abrupt and relatively

short-term experiences as psychotic episodes with mystical features or spiritual

emergencies with psychotic features (p. 272).

The distinction between short-term and long-term psychosis is an

important one for my study of psychedelic-induced psychosis. Although I often

use the term psychosis interchangeably with the term psychotic states, and

although the literature I have reviewed often does the same, the focus of my study

is on relatively temporary psychedelic-induced psychotic states and not on

long-term psychosis brought on by the use of psychedelics. As just indicated,

most psychotic conditions induced by psychedelics are short-term reactions. Even

though psychedelic experiences can elicit a long-term psychotic breakdown, such

tragic developments are relatively rare and, based on studies of emergency

psychiatric hospital admissions in the 1960s (the vast majority of which were

short-term), cases of long-term psychedelic-induced psychosis tend to be

67
attributable to complications stemming from preexisting psychiatric disorders

(Bravo & Grob, 1996b, p. 183; Stevens, 1987, pp. 273-274).

Having distinguished acute from chronic schizophrenia, Grinspoon and

Bakalar’s (1979/1997) review of the relevant scholarly literature revealed a

“startling resemblance between schizophrenic and psychedelic experience” (p.

248). A number of papers “find the effects of psychedelic drugs and the

symptoms of schizophrenia to be almost the same” (p. 248). They note that both

conditions involve:

1. Heightened sensory responses

2. Symbolic projections

3. Changes in time sense and feelings of regression in time

4. Preoccupation with usually disregarded details

5. Impairment of judgment and reasoning

6. Unusually strong ambivalent emotions: on one hand, anxiety, dread,

suspicion, guilt, fear of disintegration; and on the other hand, awe, bliss, a
sense of certainty, feelings of extraordinary creative awareness or spiritual
breakthrough, or dissolution of the self in a greater unity (p. 248)

The extreme variability of schizophrenic symptoms also corresponds to the great

variety of psychedelic experiences, a finding consistent with Grof’s (1980/1994)

characterization of psychedelics as “nonspecific catalysts and amplifiers of the

psyche” (p. 11). “It is not surprising,” Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997)

conclude, “that psychedelic drugs were long regarded as a potential tool of special

value in the study of endogenous psychosis” (p. 248).

But, they add, psychedelic-induced psychosis also differs in significant

respects from schizophrenia (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 248). In the

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late 1950s and early 1960s, after many studies comparing psychedelic experiences

with psychosis, most researchers concluded that although there are symptomatic

resemblances, the clinical syndrome of psychosis as a whole is significantly

different than psychedelic-induced psychosis (Hollister, 1968, p.122; see also

Bravo & Grob, 1996a, pp. 335-336; Grinspoon & Bakalar, pp. 6, 248-249; Grof,

1980/1994, p.25). Some of the notable differences between psychedelic effects

and psychosis that Grinspoon and Bakalar highlight in their review of the

literature (pp. 248-249) include:

1. Psychedelics predominantly induce visual hallucinations rather than the

auditory hallucinations (imaginary voices) of schizophrenia.

2. Drug takers experience more perceptual changes, and their mood is rarely
apathetic or emotionally flat.

3. Psychedelics can induce the symptoms of other psychological disorders

besides schizophrenia.

4. Persons suffering from schizophrenia cannot associate their altered states

of mind with a drug they have taken, and are thus more typically driven
involuntarily into a psychotic state. (Understandably, people who are not
aware that they have been given a psychedelic drug more often suffer a
classic psychotic reaction.)

5. Psychedelic experiences typically last six to 12 hours as opposed to the

more open-ended duration of psychosis.

In his review of the psychotomimetic research model, Grob (2002d) notes

that the central argument against that model was forcefully articulated in 1959 by

Manfred Bleuler. (Manfred Bleuler is the son of Eugen Bleuler, who coined the

term schizophrenia, and who was Jung’s chief physician at Burghölzli Mental

Hospital in Zurich [Sandison, 2001, p. 35].) Schizophrenia, Bleuler maintains, is

characterized by “the gradual and inexorable progression of a symptom complex

that included disturbed thought processes, depersonalization and auditory

69
hallucinations, evolving into a generalized functional incapacitation” (Grob,

p. 271). And although psychedelics may have improved our understanding of

natural psychoses, Bleuler asserts, they have “contributed nothing to the

understanding of the pathogenesis of schizophrenia” (quoted in Grob, p. 272).

Grof notes that generations of scientists have endeavored unsuccessfully to

understand the nature and etiology of schizophrenia, and he describes it as “one of

the greatest enigmas of modern psychiatry and medicine” (p. 294).

From the Psychotomimetic to the Psychedelic Paradigm

There were early indications that the psychological effects of these

mind-altering substances were more complex than the psychotomimetic paradigm

indicated. The first experiments conducted with LSD by Sandoz Pharmaceuticals

had shown that low-dose LSD sessions could bring unconscious content to

consciousness, which could presumably advance the psychotherapeutic process.

There was, nevertheless, an intense initial interest in LSD’s psychotomimetic

qualities (Grob, 2002d, p. 270), an interest that dominated the attention of most

researchers through the 1950s (p. 271; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 24).

When higher doses started to be used, however, new and unexpected

effects were discovered. Osmond and Hoffer initially conceived of high-dose

psychedelic sessions with mescaline and LSD as a method of treating chronic

alcoholics by using these substances’ psychotomimetic effects to replicate the

terrifying yet occasionally healing hallucinatory experiences of the delirium

tremens typical of alcohol withdrawal (Hoffer, 1970, p. 360). The high-dose

sessions that they administered led to some unusual results, however. Contrary to

70
their expectations, Osmond and Hoffer found that successful treatments were

characterized by the profoundly constructive experience of psychedelic-induced

mystical states of consciousness. Instead of terrifying subjects into sobriety,

high-dose psychedelic sessions had transformed some subjects through ecstatic

spiritual insight. Osmond and Hoffer thereby discovered that psychedelics could

do much more than induce temporary psychoses, and a new theoretical framework

emerged. Osmond coined the term psychedelic to indicate that these substances

could induce life-enhancing and transformative visions as well as pathological

states (Grob, 2002d, pp. 274-275; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 24).

“It became increasingly obvious,” says Grof (1980/1994), “that the

LSD-induced state had many specific characteristics clearly distinguishing it from

schizophrenia” (p. 25). The chemical psychosis model became discredited, then,

because it promoted a reductionistic view of the psychedelic experience as a

merely pathological state and reductionistic explanations of the biochemical

etiology of schizophrenia. Neither perspective was convincingly supported by

empirical data (p. 25). Moreover, the suggestion by researchers that psychedelic

experience could not be legitimately dismissed as a form of psychosis pleased

those who, from a wide variety of perspectives, were asserting that these

substances had extraordinary potential for transformative experience (Grinspoon

& Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 6; see also Leary, 1968; Watts, 1965).

The Psychotomimetic Model Reconsidered

Many important questions about the relationship between psychedelic

experience and psychosis remained unanswered (Grinspoon & Bakalar,

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1979/1997, p. 6), and some investigators had even returned to studying that

relationship in the 1980s (Bravo & Grob, 1996a, p. 336; see also Fischman,

1983). Even critics of the psychotomimetic paradigm such as Grof (1980/1994)

acknowledge that the profound psychological changes induced by LSD provide

clinicians and theoreticians valuable insights into abnormal mental states (p. 25).

Despite good reasons for abandoning the psychotomimetic model, I think

it is useful nevertheless to reexamine the parallels between psychedelic-induced

psychotic states and natural psychosis for reasons other than those traditionally

advocated. To begin with, as Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) say, “the

similarities between some kinds of psychedelic experiences and some forms of

schizophrenia remain impressive despite the divergences” (p. 249). Nelson (1994)

notes that although theorists have abandoned psychedelics as a model for

psychosis because the psychedelic experience differs greatly from chronic

schizophrenia, the first stages of an acute psychosis (when, for instance, visual

hallucinations are more prominent) show an unmistakable resemblance to a

psychedelic experience (p. 150). The altered states of consciousness associated

with both conditions “stretch self-boundaries into unfamiliar areas of Ground

consciousness, for better or worse” (p. 150). 16

And, in fact, even characteristic differences between psychedelic-induced

psychotic states and schizophrenia are not always born out in actual experience.

For example, experienced psychedelic users would recognize many of the

following states that Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997, p. 249), in their

16
Nelson’s better or worse can briefly be translated as “temporary or permanent,
wholesome or morbid, uplifting or destructive” (Nelson, 1994, p. 131).
72
summary of the clinical research on psychedelics and schizophrenia, describe as

characteristic of schizophrenia alone.

1. “The schizophrenic is taken by surprise and driven involuntarily into the

altered state” (p. 249).

2. The schizophrenic crisis lasts much longer than 6 to 12 hours [i.e., the
typical duration of a psychedelic experience].

3. The person suffering from schizophrenia does not know whether his or her
condition will ever end.

4. “The schizophrenic is drawn by forces out of his control into an [unknown

world], with no assurance of return” (p. 249).

Even though the chemical psychosis model has fallen out of favor for

good reason, it is not without value in seeking new ways to understand

psychedelic-induced psychotic states of consciousness. Whereas the

psychotomimetic paradigm aimed at using psychedelics to provide clues to the

nature, causes, and treatment of endogenous psychosis, I am proposing that we in

effect turn the chemical psychosis paradigm on its head. That is, the existing body

of knowledge concerning the relationship between natural psychosis and

psychedelic-induced psychotic states, as well as the existing body of knowledge

concerning the nature, causes, and treatment of natural psychosis, can provide

clues to the nature, causes, and treatment of psychotic reactions to psychedelic

experience.

I think, then, that in relation to my inquiry, many of the issues around the

psychotomimetic model are a red herring. Although these issues are important and

deserve to be addressed, the problems encountered with the psychotomimetic

paradigm do not invalidate the need to inquire into the relationship between

psychedelic experience and psychosis for the purpose of dealing with psychedelic

73
crises. As Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) conclude in their treatment of

psychedelics and psychosis:

Psychedelic experiences should not be identified with an acute

endogenous psychosis, especially if the purpose is either to glorify
psychotics or to denounce drug users. But it would also be a mistake to
ignore the similarities. As we have seen, the overlap in symptoms is often
striking, the causes might yet turn out to be related, and there might even
be implications for treatment [of psychosis]. (p. 252)

Acknowledging a seed of truth in the anti-psychiatry movement

associated with R.D. Laing, if not the movement’s argument as a whole,

Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) add to their conclusion that if we accept the

potential implications for treatment of psychosis that may be revealed by

psychedelic research, then “we may also have to admit that psychosis can

sometimes produce insights” (p. 252). This of course touches on the

transformative potential of psychedelic experience and even psychedelic-induced

psychotic states, to which I will turn in the final section of this literature review.

How Are Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States Explained?

Before looking at the relationship between psychedelics and

transformation, I would like to review a variety of non-Jungian perspectives on

the nature of psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Clearly, as with any inquiry

into the nature of psychedelics, one needs to approach this question knowing that

reactions vary greatly across individuals and even across sessions for the same

individual. One also needs to keep in mind the fact that set and setting are

significant determinants of psychedelic experience. I am looking, nevertheless, for

74
some basic principles that help explain the nature of psychedelic-induced

psychotic states.

Nelson (1994) notes that although the three most common psychedelics in

the Western world—LSD, psilocybin, and mescaline 17 —each have a unique

chemical makeup, they all affect the mind in the same general way (pp. 149-150).

Nelson, as we have seen, accounts for psychedelic-induced psychotic states in

relation to his model of self and consciousness. From his perspective, the

semi-permeable nature of the self’s psychic membrane leaves it vulnerable to

“catastrophic fragmentation” (p. 12) during altered states of consciousness. This

fragmentation increases the permeability of the psychic membrane to the vital

Spiritual Ground. Psychedelics can do this quite powerfully, sometimes with such

force that the self becomes dangerously overwhelmed. As one’s sense of self is

annihilated, a person who has become too separated from the Spiritual Ground,

and who is unprepared and not supported by an experienced guide, can be carried

terrifyingly into madness (pp. 12-14). 18

As I have indicated, Grof (1985) accounts for psychotic reactions to

psychedelic experience in terms of the individual’s attitude toward and inability to

integrate the content of an extraordinary experience. As with spontaneously

17
This group of common psychedelics now would include Ayahuasca.
18
Nelson maintains that “every major hallucinogenic drug slows the firing of
serotonin-rich neurons in the raphe nucleus. In other words, they inhibit an inhibitor and
free neurons downstream to fire without constraint” (p. 151). They affect, that is, the
limbic system of the brain, which is mediated by dopamine and implicated in psychosis.
This very roughly is, it seems, the biochemical mechanism that regulates the expansions
and contractions of self-boundaries. This link between serotonin and dopamine activity
also seems to provide a compelling link among psychedelic experiences, dreams, and
psychosis (p. 151).
75
occurring emergences of bizarre content, it is not the content itself that is

problematic, as unconventional and bizarre as that content might be. Rather,

the individual’s capacity to keep the process internalized, “own” it as an

intrapsychic happening, and complete it internally without acting on it
prematurely is clearly associated with the mystical attitude and indicates
basic sanity. Exteriorization of the process, excessive use of the
mechanism of projection, and indiscriminate acting out are characteristic
of the psychotic style in confronting one’s psyche. Psychotic states thus
represent an interface confusion between the inner world and consensus
reality. This distinguishes them sharply from both mystical and shamanic
states of consciousness where this discrimination is maintained. (p. 303)

Christina Grof and Stanislav Grof (1990) give a dramatic example of the

failure to contain the process internally without acting it out. The Grofs’

innovative work with psychological crises led to the concept of “spiritual

emergency,” a critically difficult stage of psychological transformation (chap. 1).

Such crises, they say, often occur in nonordinary states of consciousness and are

typically described in sacred literature as “rough passages along the mystical

path” (p. 31). According to them, a symbolic confrontation with death is often a

vital part of spiritual growth. In order to move into a new state of consciousness,

it is often necessary for an old way of living to “die.” That is, the ego, the

individual’s personality structure, must be destroyed (p. 61). “Although [ego

death] is one of the most beneficial, most healing events in spiritual evolution, it

can seem disastrous” (p. 61), they say. When people are struggling with ego

death, the Grofs explain, there is the potential for “a very tragic

misunderstanding” in which the need for ego death is confused with the necessity

to kill oneself (p. 62). People in the throes of ego death can be “driven by a

forceful inner insistence that something in them has to die. If the internal pressure

76
is strong enough and there is no understanding of [ego death], they may misread

these feelings and act them out” (p. 62).

The challenge to contain the death-rebirth process internally is apparently

experienced by many whose psychedelic sessions tap the psyche’s deepest realms.

In her treatment of psychedelic-assisted therapy, “The New Psychotherapy:

MDMA and the Shadow,” Ann Shulgin (2001) asserts that the pull toward literal

death is so strong in challenging psychedelic sessions that she adamantly

prescribes a mandatory pre-session contract between therapist and client. This

contract includes the rule that, should the client “see the friendly death door and

know, that by stepping through it, you can be done with this life, you will NOT do

so during this session” (p. 198). “The death door is an actual experience that most

explorers in the world of the human psyche will eventually encounter” (p. 199),

Shulgin says. “It takes many forms, all of them gently welcoming, and its

message is ‘Here is the way back home, when you decide to return’” (p. 199).

Whether the experience of “the death door” is a psychotic or a mystical

state, would depend, in terms of Grof’s criteria, on the individual’s attitude

toward and ability to integrate the content of the experience without exteriorizing

the process, or acting it out, as I did in my attempt to honor God’s command to

kill myself. Clearly, as Shulgin’s example suggests, a skillful guide could mean

the difference between life and death for someone unable to make this distinction

alone.

I would like now to examine cultural factors that help account for

psychedelic-induced psychotic states, beginning with Ralph Metzner’s reflections

77
on the vehement resistance psychedelics have encountered from mainstream

groups in America and Europe. Metzner (2002b) describes himself as “one of the

psychedelic researchers who saw the enormous transformative potential of

‘consciousness expanding’ drugs . . . [and who was] eager to continue the

research into their psychological significance” (p. 24). Why, Metzner wondered,

did the dominant culture demonize and criminalize the same kind of substances

accepted as sacraments in the Native American subculture only a century earlier?

After observing and participating in a variety of Native American sacred and

healing ceremonies that did not use peyote, Metzner concluded that these

ceremonies must have provided a pre-existing structure that naturally

incorporated psychedelics once they were introduced into Native American

culture. These pre-existing ceremonial structures were “simultaneously religious,

medicinal, and psychotherapeutic” (p. 24), so that body, mind, and spirit were

treated as a unity. This, Metzner argues, stands in stark contrast to the dominant

Western culture’s compartmentalization of medicine, psychology, and religion

into seemingly incongruent fields of knowledge, each of which

separately considered the phenomenon of psychedelic drugs and were

much too frightened by the unpredictable transformations of perception
and worldview that they seemed to trigger. The dominant society’s
reaction was fear, followed by total prohibition, even of further
research. . . . The fragmented condition of our whole society is mirrored
back to us through these reactions. (p. 25)

Clearly, although understandable within the cultural context, these reactions were

excessive and harmful. They also reflect, I believe, our fragmented psychological

condition. We have come to fear the deep unconscious and to flee from it, by way

78
of a psychotic reaction, if necessary. Opportunities for learning, exploration,

transformation, and integration are thereby truncated.

The fear of psychedelics goes quite deep in Western culture. Between the

fourteenth and seventeenth centuries in Europe, indigenous healers (usually

women who practiced nature-based witchcraft medicine with psychedelic plants

such as Datura, henbane, mandrake, and belladonna) were condemned by the

Church, which saw psychedelic plants as Satan’s tools (Grob, 2002d, p. 265; see

also Harner, 1973). Similar forms of persecution were practiced on native peoples

of the New World by Spanish conquistadors. Again, because psychoactive plants

and fungi (morning glory seeds, peyote, and psilocybin mushrooms) were used by

these native peoples for religious purposes alien to their conquerors, these sacred

medicines were seen as the Devil’s weapons against Christianity’s triumph over

traditional religions (Grob, p. 266).

Given that psychedelic experience often includes visions and perceptions

of a demonic nature, it is interesting to speculate whether and to what degree such

visions and perceptions might draw upon these historical prejudices, or whether

perhaps these historical prejudices grew out of early psychedelic visions and

perceptions of a demonic nature. In any case, it is certainly safe to say that the

draconian eradication of traditional pagan and shamanic knowledge left a legacy

of ignorance that could in turn predispose modern users of psychedelics to react

fearfully and even psychotically to alien aspects of the psychedelic experience.

Our modern secular culture’s dismissal of religious symbolism in general,

79
including Christian symbolism, would seem to further alienate contemporary

users of psychedelics from the irrational imagery that so often confronts them.

Andrew Weil, whose book The Natural Mind: An Investigation of Drugs

and the Higher Consciousness (1986) is a thoughtful reflection on the hypothesis

that we humans have an innate drive to alter our consciousness, notes that

scopolamine, the psychoactive alkaloid in the plants commonly used by medieval

witches, can take people into other worlds “populated by monsters and devils and

filled with violent, frenzied energy” (Weil & Rosen, 1993, pp. 132-133).

Furthermore, he says, witches in medieval Europe used these psychedelic plants

“to have the experience of flying and to meet the Devil in their visions” (p. 133).

It would be understandable if contemporary users of psychedelics who are

ignorant of these traditions—and ignorant of the potential psychedelics have to

induce such dark visions—were to react psychotically to encounters with, say,

Satan in their psychedelic experiences.

Psychedelics and Transformation

Transformation is treated variously in the psychedelic literature as change,

development, and healing of a psychological or spiritual nature. 19 Many sources

suggest, implicitly if not explicitly, that psychological and spiritual development

are integrally related aspects of psychedelic and therapeutic experience (e.g.,

Grob, 2002b; Grof, 1980/1994; Lukoff, Lu, & Turner, 1996; Lukoff, Zanger,

& Lu, 1990; Roberts, 2001; Stolaroff, 1994; Winkelman & Roberts, 2007).

19
Parsing transform into trans as beyond or change and form as structure or
essence, I generally think of transformation as a fundamental change in one’s personality
structure.
80
Although my discussion of transformation will at times emphasize psychological

development and will at other times emphasize spiritual development, I do not

make hard and fast distinctions between the two. I therefore use the term

psychospiritual transformation because I accept the changes I discuss as

psychological or spiritual in nature, or as some indefinable blend of both. In this

regard, I find Jung’s psychology, with its phenomenological treatment of religious

experience, a profoundly insightful and useful guide to the psychospiritual forces

that have affected my life for so many years.

In Shadow, Self, Spirit: Essays in Transpersonal Psychology, Daniels

(2005) notes Jung’s refusal to draw metaphysical conclusions from psychological

experience (p. 225). Daniels concludes, appropriately I think, that transpersonal

psychologists should “bracket as far as possible ALL metaphysical assumptions in

what should essentially become a phenomenological examination of experiences

of transformation” (p. 230). (Daniels’ emphasis on “all” metaphysical

assumptions unfortunately obscures his important qualification, “as far as

possible.”) Nevertheless, as Kelly (1993) points out, it should not be forgotten

that Jung came to the conclusion that there is much more to the nature of the

psyche than can be conveyed through psychological explanation (p. 18). Jung

(1942/1969s) conveys this attitude in his conclusion to “A Psychological

Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity.”

These considerations have made me extremely cautious in my approach to

the further metaphysical significance that may possibly underlie
archetypal statements. There is nothing to stop their ultimate ramifications
from penetrating to the very ground of the universe. We alone are the
dumb ones if we fail to notice it. Such being the case, I cannot pretend to
myself that the object of archetypal statements has been explained and

81
 disposed of merely by our investigation of its psychological aspects.
(p. 200, para. 295)

The idea of transformation runs through all of Jung’s work (Samuels et al.,

1986, p. 151). Quite generally, Jung’s concept of transformation can be

characterized as a psychological transition involving temporary regression and

ego loss as unconscious material becomes conscious in the ongoing process of a

person’s becoming more psychologically whole (p. 151). Although Jung was

careful to discuss spirituality in psychological terms, and although most of his

work takes an agnostic stance towards extrapsychic realities (Ferrer, 2002,

pp. 44-45), his concept of transformation is inherently related to what he

conceived as the psyche’s “religious function” (Samuels et al., p. 130; see also

Corbett, 1996; Edinger, 1992).

In the original version of Psychology and Religion, Jung (1938/1966k)

characterizes religion as “the attitude peculiar to a consciousness which has been

altered by experience of the numinosum” (p. 6). Having adopted the concept of

the numinosum from Rudolf Otto, 20 Jung (1938/1940/1969n) characterizes it as

a dynamic agency or effect not caused by an arbitrary act of will. On the

contrary, it seizes and controls the human subject, who is always rather its
victim than its creator. . . . The numinosum is either a quality belonging to
a visible object or the influence of an invisible presence that causes a
peculiar alteration of consciousness. (p. 7, para. 6)

For Jung (1916/1969b), it is an elementary truth that “the God-image

corresponds to a definite complex of psychological facts, and is thus a quantity

which we can operate with; but what God is in himself remains a question outside

the competence of all psychology” (p. 279, para. 528). Even though Jung is

20
Otto (1958) formed the term numinous from the Latin numen (pp. 6-7).
82
adamant about the fundamental role that the psyche plays in religious experience,

his agnosticism regarding supernatural realities by definition neither denies nor

affirms them (Hill, 2007b, p. 14).

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelics

Myron Stolaroff (2002) expresses a widespread sentiment in the

psychedelic community when he says that “psychedelics, used with good

motivation, skill, and integrity, can contribute much toward easing the pain and

suffering of the world while giving access to wisdom and compassion for spiritual

development” (p. 103). As mentioned above, psychedelic substances have been

used for religious purposes “from time immemorial” (Wulff, 1997, p. 90; see also

Schultes & Hofmann, 1992). In modern times, the transformative potential of

psychedelics has been supported by the extensive clinical studies and scientific

experiments of the 1950s and 1960s, before the ban on human subjects was

imposed (Walsh & Grob, 2005). Several religious groups currently use

psychedelics as a core element in their spiritual practice, including the Native

American Church, the Ayahuasca-based churches in South America, and the

Bwiti religion in Gabon, West Africa (Dombrowe, 2005).

The transformative potential of psychedelic substances is often discussed

in terms of the “transpersonal state.” Grof (1985) describes the transpersonal state

as the feeling that one’s “consciousness has been expanded beyond the usual ego

boundaries and has transcended the limitations of time and space” (p. 129). I use

the terms transpersonal, religious, spiritual, and mystical experience

interchangeably to refer to the direct, subjective perception of spirit, the divine,

83
and ultimate reality or realities, transcendent or immanent. This usage is

consistent with the way Ferrer (2002) refers to “transpersonal, spiritual, and

mystical phenomena somewhat interchangeably” (p.193). Given the lack of

consensus on defining these complex phenomena, Ferrer suggests that “their

relationship is more one of family-resemblance than identity, equivalence, or

inclusion” (p.193).

In their review of methods used in research on psychoactive substances

and transpersonal states, Lukoff et al. (1990) allude to the transformative potential

of psychedelic substances when they refer to one researcher’s characterization of

“the transpersonal dimensions of the profound human experience which these

substances evoke” (Yensen quoted in Lukoff et al., p. 108). Beyond clinical and

empirical indications, the transformative potential of psychedelics has been

reflected in the personal experiences of vast numbers, probably millions, of

people who on their own have used LSD, mescaline, psilocybin, and other

psychedelic substances. Many maintain, as Dobkin de Rios and Winkelman

(1989) state, that psychedelics bring about “changes in the individual’s awareness

of reality, which leads the individual to a perception of a spiritual, mystical,

timeless, transcendent reality and of being at one with the universe” (p. 4). Such

experiences have left many with the conviction that they understood the nature of

mystical experiences known otherwise only by venerated religious sages

(Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, pp. 86-88).

The transformative, or transpersonal, potential of psychedelics is usually

discussed in terms of psychological or spiritual experiences, insights, changes,

84
growth, and development. Even though psychedelic use has often led to an

experience the user perceived as spiritual, researchers and theoreticians in the

field have discussed extensively the validity and significance of such spiritual

experiences (see, for example, Roberts, 2001; Smith, 2000). Generally, I think of

psychedelic-induced transformation as being a significant and noticeable

long-term change in the individual’s personality, attitudes, world view, and

behavior. This is consistent with Huston Smith’s distinction between

drug-induced religious experiences and drug-inspired religious lives. In his essay

“Do Drugs Have Religious Import?,” Smith (2000, chap. 2) asserts that

psychedelics have the potential to induce religious experiences; but he questions

whether they can lead to a religious life (p. 30). 21 In his long-term follow-up to

the noted 1962 Good Friday experiment on mystical experience (Pahnke, 1963),

Doblin (2001) used similar criteria for evaluating the religious significance of

subjects’ experience, criteria that he describes generally as “persisting positive

effects” (p. 74).

Christopher Bache (2000) emphasizes collective rather than individual

transformation, theorizing that beyond the potential psychedelics have for

effecting personal healing, psychedelic-induced development in any one

individual’s consciousness can generate transformation in the consciousness of

the human species as a whole. As suggested by his book’s title, Dark Night, Early

Dawn, Bache envisions transformation in terms of the Christian notion of “the

dark night of the soul” (p. 15). The dark night, Bache says, “is an arduous stage of
21
Smith’s essay “Do Drugs Have Religious Import?” was originally published in
1964 in The Journal of Philosophy. See also Smith (2000), “Psychedelic Theophanies
and the Religious Life” (chap. 3).
85
spiritual purification in which the aspirant endures a variety of physical and

psychological purifications, eventually undergoing a profound spiritual death and

rebirth” (p. 15).

Bache (2000) maintains that the conscientious use of psychedelic

substances potentially expands the scope of this dark-night process as well as

intensifying it. He believes, that is, that the individual’s personal dark-night

process can advance the dark-night process that humanity as a whole is

undergoing (p. 16). This expansion to the collective level of being, Bache says, is

consistent with the environmental principle of interconnectedness underlying the

concept of deep ecology that was developed by the Norwegian philosopher Arne

Naess. Bache asserts that “in order to understand the transformative dynamics

that sometimes surface in nonordinary states, we need to expand our frame of

reference beyond the individual human being and look to the living systems the

individual is part of [italics in original]” (p. 16.).

In the end, it is difficult to define conclusively the transformative potential

of psychedelics. They are known to evoke a lingering sense of mystery that I

think is aptly expressed in Grinspoon and Bakalar’s (1979/1997) reflection on the

transformative potential of psychedelics. Even though most people in the field of

psychedelic research no longer see psychedelics as the key to changing the world,

they note, many retain a strong sense of possibilities not yet realized, “of

something felt as intensely real and not yet explained or explained away” (p. 88).

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 The Transformative Potential of Psychotic States

The topic of psychosis and transformation is usually discussed in terms of

psychosis and mysticism (Lukoff, 1985; Wapnick, 1969), psychosis and

spirituality (I. Clarke, 2001), or psychosis and religious experience (James,

1902/1982, pp. 21-25; Lukoff, 1985, p. 155). Lukoff, who was instrumental in

psychiatry’s official recognition of religious and spiritual issues through the

adoption of the transpersonally-inspired diagnostic category Religious or Spiritual

Problem in DSM-IV (APA, 1994, p. 685; see also Lukoff & Lu, 1990), speaks of

mystical experiences with psychotic features (Lukoff, 1985, pp. 155-156) and

spiritual emergencies with psychotic features (Lukoff, 1996, p. 272).

As many have pointed out, “traditional psychiatry has tended to ignore or

pathologize religious and spiritual issues” (Lukoff et al., 1996, p. 231; see also

Clark, 2001; Grof, 2000; Grof & Grof, 1989; Lukoff, 1985, p. 158). Psychiatry’s

narrow focus on biological factors, and its historical bias against religion in

general and against religious experiences in particular, makes it difficult for

mainstream practitioners to provide sympathetic and insightful treatment to those

struggling with religious and spiritual problems (p. 232). In such an atmosphere, it

is of course difficult to examine the transformative potential of psychosis, let

alone the transformative potential of psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Nevertheless, a current of thought has emerged in the fields of psychiatry and

psychology inquiring into the transformative aspects of people’s psychotic

episodes (Lukoff, 1985, pp. 156-158; 1996, p. 272). As a result, “an alternative

understanding of psychotic states” has emerged (Grof & Grof, 1989, p. 238) .

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 Grof and Grof (1989) give an overview of this school of thought in their

book Spiritual Emergency: When Personal Transformation Becomes a Crisis.

They introduce this anthology of key writings on the subject by explaining that

the central theme explored in this book in many different ways by various
authors is the idea that some of the dramatic experiences and unusual
states of mind that traditional psychiatry diagnoses and treats as mental
diseases are actually crises of personal transformation, or “spiritual
emergencies.” (p. x)

They identify the roots of this alternative understanding of psychosis in

the work of Jung among others (including William James, Roberto Assagioli, and

Abraham Maslow). They describe Jung as “a rare exception to the dismissal of

spirituality in the field of depth psychology” (Grof & Grof, 1989, p. 237).

(Although this is an accurate characterization of depth psychology in its early

psychoanalytic stage, the field of course came to include other theorists and

therapists who were open to spiritual concerns. In addition to those just listed,

they include John Weir Perry, James Hillman, Lionel Corbett, and Grof himself.)

For Jung, the process of psychological development, maturation, and

transformation was inherently fraught with psychotic potentials. Describing the

nature of the archetypes, a core concept in his personality theory, Jung

(1939/1969o) says that the archetypes:

live in a world quite different from the world outside—in a world where
the pulse of time beats infinitely slowly, where the birth and death of
individuals count for little. No wonder their nature is strange, so strange
that their irruption into consciousness often amounts to a psychosis. They
undoubtedly belong to the material that comes to light in schizophrenia.
(p. 287, para. 519)

Jung also suggests the potential of such irruptions when he says, for example, that

the unconscious psyche must contain its own “‘myth-forming’ structural

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elements” (p. 152, para. 259), which no doubt lend “a certain hidden coherence”

to even irrational and often-unintelligible psychotic fantasies (p. 153, para. 260).

Jungian analyst John Weir Perry became in the 1970s a leading proponent

of the transformative potential of acute psychotic episodes. He asserted that, with

proper attention, even the apparently scattered images expressed by a person

suffering acute psychic upheaval may take on coherent form and may reveal a

meaningful psychological process (1999, pp. 4-5). And in books such as The Far

Side of Madness (1974), The Self in Psychotic Process (1987), Roots of Renewal

in Myth and Madness (1976), and Trials of the Visionary Mind: Spiritual

Emergency and the Renewal Process (1999), Perry advanced Jung’s concept of

psychosis and the transformative potential of psychotic states (Grof & Grof, 1989,

p. 237).

Other notable critics of conventional attitudes toward psychotic states are

Kazimierz Dabrowski (1986, Positive Disintegration), Thomas Szasz (1961, The

Myth of Mental Illness), and R. D. Laing (1967, The Politics of Experience). More

recently, Isabel Clarke (2001) has assembled a collection of essays in Psychosis

and Spirituality: Exploring the New Frontier that attempts to link spirituality and

psychosis, “the highest realms of human consciousness and the depths of

madness” (p. 1). Clarke asserts that in the minds of many of those exploring the

frontiers of human consciousness, the customary polarization into two

incommensurable states of consciousness, indicated by reference to “heights” and

“depths,” conceals an essential commonality between spiritual and psychotic

experience (pp. 1-5). The whole idea of there being two incommensurable states

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of consciousness is belied by the ambiguity and relativity of the two words

“heights” and “depths.” As Richard Tarnas puts it, one could just as easily say

“the deepest realms of human consciousness and the heights of madness”

(personal communication, 2007). Jung’s personal confrontation with the

unconscious, says Kelly (2002), shows that “going ‘down’ is equivalent to going

‘in’” (p. 82), which suggests that for Jung the “heights” are in the “depths”

(personal communication, 2008).

Less nuanced arguments than Clarke’s (2001) meet criticism, however,

even among those who generally agree that conventional views of psychosis are

unfortunately limited. Nelson (1994) carefully examines the differences and

similarities between religious experience and psychosis from the perspective of a

transpersonal psychiatrist in his book, Healing the Split: Integrating Spirit Into

Our Understanding of the Mentally Ill. The relationship between the two, he

argues, is a highly complex one, and opposing schools in the field of psychiatry

need to take that complexity into account, both when discussing this issue and,

more importantly, when making a diagnosis. The failure to adequately

discriminate between benign and pathological psychotic states, Nelson says,

bedevils both mainstream psychiatry and alternative schools of thought.

Each errs in its own characteristic way by failing to recognize that various
psychotic states of consciousness—although apparently similar—differ
from each other in important ways that can be readily recognized. (p. 4)

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States

Even though a great quantity of literature exists on the relationship

between psychedelics and psychosis, on the one hand, and between psychedelics

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and transformation on the other, relatively little literature exists on all three

elements—psychedelics, psychosis, and transformation—together. There are

notable exceptions to this rule, however, and I would like to highlight here the

work of those people who connect all three elements.

Although he is open to criticism for romanticizing psychosis, R.D. Laing

views psychosis as “a harrowing but revelatory and potentially restorative mental

journey with some of the same virtues as an LSD experience” (Grinspoon &

Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 6). In “Transcendental Experience in Relation to Religion

and Psychosis,” which was originally published in The Psychedelic Review, Laing

(1965/1979) says that “madness need not be all breakdown. It is also

breakthrough. It is potentially liberation and renewal, as well as enslavement and

existential death” (p 115). Laing describes especially well the potential rightness

as well as wrongness one can experience upon entering the otherness of a

psychedelic-induced reality.

Many people enter it—unfortunately without guides, confusing outer with

inner realities, and inner with outer—and generally lose their capacity to
function competently in ordinary relations.
This need not be so. The process of entering into the other world
from this world, and returning to this world from the other world, is as
‘natural’ as death and childbirth or being born. But in our present world,
[which] is so terrified and so unconscious of the other world, it is not
surprising that, when ‘reality,’ the fabric of this world, bursts, and a person
enters the other world, he is completely lost and terrified, and meets only
incomprehension in others. (pp. 117-118)

Transpersonal psychologist David Lukoff (1996) appreciates John Weir

Perry’s positive view of acute psychosis “as a renewal process in which the

psyche is seeking to reorganize itself fundamentally” (p. 271). Lukoff writes of

his own “hallucinogen-induced psychotic disorder,” which began in 1971 when

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he was 23 years old (p. 278); and he describes his “shamanistic initiatory crisis”

(1991, p. 28) and the long process through which he was able “to integrate [his]

psychotic episode as a transformative transpersonal experience” (1996, p. 279).

Lukoff went on to develop new and valuable forms of transpersonal

psychotherapy for psychotic disorders and spiritual emergencies with psychotic

features (1996; see also Shorto, 1999, pp. 16-29).

Ralph Metzner and Richard Alpert (also known as Ram Dass), have both

dedicated their lives to realizing the transformative potential of the psychedelic

experience following their groundbreaking and controversial work in the early

1960s with Timothy Leary at Harvard University. And both view the experience

of psychotic states as a common element in the psychedelic experience. As

Metzner (1998b) puts it, the potential for psychedelic substances to “trigger

hellish, psychotic-like trips is so well known that they were first referred to as

psychotomimetic” (p. 81). He explains, nevertheless, that when a person

experiencing a psychedelic-triggered psychosis recognizes—and can yield to the

recognition—that he or she is involved in a temporary process, a transitional stage

that has a definite purpose or “end,” the person can come to regard such

experiences “as a necessary purgation, accepted—even welcomed—for their

transformative power” (pp. 81-82).

Richard Alpert (1979), speaking to therapists at the Menninger Clinic in

the early 1970s about an alternative framework for understanding psychosis, and

alluding to insights arising from psychedelic experience, explains that “the

journey of consciousness is to go to the place where you see that all [the different

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realities] are really relative . . . [, are] merely perceptual vantage points for

looking at it all” (p. 129). The point, he explains, is that “you have to be able to go

in and out of all of them, that any one you get stuck in is the wrong one” (p. 129).

The person whose work most obviously and thoroughly relates to all three

elements—psychedelics, psychosis, and transformation—is transpersonal

psychologist Stanislav Grof. Grof is widely considered the world’s foremost

researcher of psychedelics and psychedelic psychotherapy (Walsh & Grob, 2005,

pp. 119-120; see also Grof, 1980/1994). In Spiritual Emergency: When Personal

Transformation Becomes a Crisis, Grof says that “clinical research of

nonordinary states of consciousness induced by psychedelics . . . has many

implications for an alternative understanding of psychosis” (Grof & Grof, 1989,

p. 238). Grof is a member of the school of thought that “emphasize[s] the positive

value in the psychotic process. In this view, many unusual states of consciousness

traditionally considered psychotic . . . are seen as radical attempts at

problem-solving” (1985, p. 295). If properly understood, Grof asserts, the

psychotic process can result in personal and collective transformation (p. 295).

From this theoretical perspective, Grof maintains that it is even appropriate to use

psychedelics to “intensify and accelerate the [transformation] process and bring it

to a positive resolution” (p. 296). Furthermore, Grof says, substantial empirical

evidence shows that many people considered psychotic are actually undergoing

“an extraordinary and potentially healing process of self-discovery” (p. 296).

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 I close this section on the transformative potential of psychedelic-induced

psychosis with an especially pertinent passage from Grof’s (1985) Beyond the

Brain: Birth, Death and Transcendence in Psychotherapy.

Many aspects of the phenomenology of psychosis seem to have their

origins in the transpersonal realms of the human psyche. These domains
contribute to schizophrenic symptomatology the interest in ontological and
cosmological problems; an abundance of archetypal themes and
mythological sequences; encounters with deities and demons of different
cultures; ancestral, phylogenetic, and past incarnation memories; elements
of the racial and the collective unconscious. . . .
In spite of the revolutionary developments in modern psychology
represented by the contributions of Jung, Assagioli, and Maslow, all these
experiences are still automatically considered symptomatic of psychosis
by traditional psychiatry. In the light of LSD psychotherapy and other
powerful experiential approaches, the concept of psychosis will have to be
dramatically revised and reevaluated. The matrices for perinatal and
transpersonal experiences seem to be normal and natural components of
the human psyche, and the experiences themselves have a distinct healing
potential if approached with understanding. It is therefore absurd to
diagnose psychosis on the basis of the content of the individual’s
experience. In the future, what is pathological and what is healing may
have to emphasize the attitude toward the experience, the style of dealing
with it, and the ability to integrate it into everyday life. (p. 315)

Psychedelic Psychotherapy

Aside from the psychotomimetic paradigm, investigation into the

psychological effects of psychedelic substances has focused on their therapeutic

potential. In the four decades following LSD’s discovery in 1943, researchers

produced an impressive number of papers on the psychotherapeutic utility of

these substances (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, pp. 192-193; Grof,

1980/1994, pp. 26-28; Passie, 2007; Yensen, 1985, p. 267). Figures on the

number of papers vary, and it is difficult to know precisely how many focused on

the therapeutic qualities of various psychedelic substances during any specific

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time period. Buckman (1967) reports that over 2,000 scientific publications

connected in one way or another to LSD alone appeared between 1943 and 1967

(p. 83). Grinspoon and Bakalar note that more than 1,000 clinical papers on

psychedelic drug therapy discussing 40,000 patients were published between 1950

and the mid-1960s (p. 192). Grof says that hundreds of papers on LSD therapy

were published following early clinical reports on LSD (p. 27). Passie documents

more than 700 scientific publications on psychedelic psychotherapy dated

between 1931 and 1995 (p. 45).

The therapeutic application of these substances has been studied and

reported in relation to a wide range of disorders, including alcoholism and drug

addiction, depression, neurosis, psychosis, autism, sexual deviations, character

disorders, criminal pathology, anxiety, trauma, as well as emotional suffering and

physical pain associated with terminal diseases. Grof (1980/1994) affirms that

sufficient psychedelic therapy has been conducted and sufficient clinical

observations have accumulated to critically review relevant clinical experience

and current knowledge (p. 27).

Looking at this extensive body of research, observers typically identify

two major models of psychedelic psychotherapy: psycholytic therapy and

psychedelic therapy.

The Psycholytic and Psychedelic Models

Even though the distinction between psycholytic therapy and psychedelic

therapy is a common and useful one, the two therapies should not be reduced to

an irreconcilable dichotomy. The two approaches share common features and

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goals (Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 115-116) and in practice have often been combined

(Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 196).

Early experimentation at Sandoz Pharmaceuticals following Hofmann’s

discovery of LSD in 1943 indicated that relatively low to medium doses of LSD

(between approximately 25 and 200 micrograms of LSD 22 ) could facilitate the

release of repressed unconscious material in a series of psychotherapeutic sessions

(Grob, 2002d, p. 273; Grof, 1980/1994, p. 35). These initial findings led Sandoz

to recommend that researchers use LSD as an adjunct to psychotherapy (Stevens,

1987, p. 11), and the term psycholytic was coined by the British psychiatrist

Ronald Sandison in the early 1960s to describe what became known as the

low- and medium-dose model of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. Lytic, which

is derived from the Greek lysis (able to loosen), indicates for Sandison (1997) the

ability that these substances have to loosen unconscious mechanisms and thereby

release unconscious content (p. 65). For Grof (1980/1994) and many others in the

field, the term psycholytic refers to the release of tensions through the dissolving

of psychological conflict and resistance (Grof, p. 35).

Psycholytic therapy tends to focus on the personal unconscious and avoid

the archetypal or transpersonal realms of the collective unconscious (Bravo &

Grob, 1996a, p. 336). The relatively low doses used in psycholytic therapy over a

series of several to many sessions allow the patient to become aware of

unconscious content without overwhelming his or her ability to reflect and

22
There are no clear-cut boundaries between what are considered low, medium,
and high dosages. Dose ranges are typically given for LSD, the prototypical psychedelic
substance; and although these ranges vary somewhat from source to source, the amounts I
report here are representative of the various breakdowns.
96
communicate (p. 336). “By facilitating ego regression, uncovering early

childhood memories, and inducing an affective release,” Grob (2002d) notes,

“psychiatrists claimed to have achieved a breakthrough in reducing the duration

and improving the outcome of psychotherapeutic treatment” (pp. 273-274).

Although certain obvious adjustments are called for (longer periods of silence,

more intense therapeutic support during longer sessions, and higher tolerance for

bizarre behavior, for instance), psycholytic therapy uses the basic principles and

practices of dynamic psychotherapy (Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 35-36). 23 In practice,

then, psycholytic therapy resembles the modified psychoanalytic methods adopted

for psychotherapy with patients suffering from schizophrenia (p. 35).

Stolaroff (2002) asserts that individuals undergoing very low-dose

psychedelic psychotherapy (25-50 micrograms of LSD) are more likely to come

to terms with repressed unconscious material, while those undergoing high-dose

sessions (300 - 1,500 micrograms of LSD) tend to transcend and thereby avoid

difficult material (pp. 100-101). “If we work persistently to clear away repressed

areas,” Stolaroff says,

we can enter the same sublime states that are available with larger
doses—with an important additional gain. Having resolved our
uncomfortable feelings, we are in a much better position to maintain a
high state of clarity and functioning in day-to-day life. (p. 101)

As I have indicated, after higher doses yielded successful results in

treating chronic alcoholics, Osmond coined the term psychedelic to distance this

use of LSD and related substances from the traditional psychotomimetic

23
I understand Grof’s reference to dynamic psychotherapy here to mean
primarily Freudian psychology and secondarily Jungian psychology, both of which view
the psyche as a dynamic system of forces. These psychic forces, such as consciousness
and the unconscious, are often in conflict (Samuels, 1986, p. 8).
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approach. In high-dose psychedelic therapy (300 - 1,500 micrograms of LSD), the

psychedelic experience itself, a single overwhelming experience independent of

verbal psychotherapy, is considered the potentially significant therapeutic agent.

Such an extraordinary experience can bring about a temporary mystical state of

consciousness and consequently a radical change in the individual’s perception of

life. (Abramson, 1967, p. ix; Yensen, 1985, p. 270). The objective of psychedelic

therapy, says Grof (1980/1994),

is to create optimal conditions for the subject to experience ego death and
the subsequent transcendence into the so-called psychedelic peak
experience. It is an ecstatic state, characterized by the loss of boundaries
between the subject and the objective world, with ensuing feelings of unity
with other people, nature, the entire Universe, and God. . . . In general,
there is much more concern about transcending psychopathology than
interest in its analysis. (p. 37)

In contrast to the psycholytic approach, then, psychotherapy plays a

predominately preparatory role to facilitate the mystical experience in psychedelic

therapy (Yensen, p. 270), with an emphasis on the value of “total yielding to the

effect of the drug and psychological surrender to the experience” (Grof, p. 38).

Psychotherapy also plays a role within a spectrum of supportive techniques that

facilitate integration following the experiential session in psychedelic therapy

(Grof, p. 147).

By way of illustrating the caution that psycholytic and psychedelic

therapies should not be reduced to an irreconcilable dichotomy, it is worth noting

the following description of psychedelic therapy with chronic alcoholics by

Abram Hoffer (1970), one of its first practitioners. In light of the emphasis

typically put on the mystical experience independent of psychotherapy in

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psychedelic therapy, it is especially interesting to note Hoffer’s emphasis here on

psychotherapy and the importance of the patient’s relationship to the therapist.

Psychedelic therapy aims to create a set and a setting that will allow
proper psychotherapy. The psychedelic therapist works with material that
the patient experiences and discusses, and helps him resynthesize a new
model of life or a new personal philosophy. During the experience, the
patient draws from his own past, and uses it to eliminate false ideas and
false memories. With the aid of the therapist, he evaluates himself more
objectively and becomes more acutely aware of his own responsibility for
his situation. . . . He also becomes aware of inner strengths or qualities that
help him in his long and difficult struggle toward sobriety. (p. 360)

What becomes apparent in Hoffer’s characterization of psychedelic

therapy is the important role that psychotherapy can play in the process even if it

is not used during the psychedelic session itself, in contrast to the psycholytic

approach. The essential difference between psycholytic and psychedelic therapies

could be described, with some oversimplification, by saying that psycholytic

therapy uses the psychedelic experience as an adjunct to psychotherapy while

psychedelic therapy uses psychotherapy as an adjunct to psychedelic experience.

It follows from this that the dosage, frequency and total number of sessions, and

the timing of interaction with the therapist would naturally vary between the two

approaches. Grof’s (1980/1994) concise characterization of the two major

categories of LSD psychotherapy is pertinent here. These two modalities

differ in degree of significance attributed to the role of the drug. The first
category involves approaches in which the emphasis is on systematic
psychotherapeutic work; LSD is used to enhance the therapeutic process
or to overcome resistances, blocks and periods of stagnation. The
approaches in the second category are characterized by a much greater
emphasis on the specific aspects of the drug experience and the
psychotherapy is used to prepare the subjects for the drug sessions, give
them support during the experiences, and to help them integrate the
material. (p. 33)

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But again, this distinction only indicates a difference in emphasis, not an

irreconcilable dichotomy. “It seems reasonable to assume that psycholytic and

psychedelic therapies deal with phenomena that occur on the same continuum and

are closely related, if not identical,” says Grof (p. 116). The differences seem to

lie not so much in the nature of the experiences as in the incidence of different

types of phenomena in the two types of sessions and in the emphasis different

therapists put on certain types of phenomena (p. 116). As Grinspoon and Bakalar

(1979/1997) put it in their review of these two forms of psychedelic

psychotherapy, “the transcendent and the analytic aspects can never be entirely

separated” (p. 196).

Grof (1980/1994) discusses several variations of the psycholytic and

psychedelic models, including “anaclitic therapy with LSD,” “hypnodelic

therapy,” and “aggregate LSD psychotherapy” (pp. 40-44). Most relevant to my

thesis is an especially extreme form of psychedelic psychotherapy, Salvador

Roquet’s “psychosynthesis” (not to be confused with Roberto Assagioli’s non-

drug psychosynthesis). This lesser known version of psychosynthesis drew from

Roquet’s psychoanalytic training and his knowledge of the indigenous healing

practices of Mexico. Using a variety of psychedelic substances (including

dissociative drugs) and media (including horrific images of human brutality) in

marathon group sessions, Roquet intentionally forced participants into traumatic

psychedelic experiences and even temporary psychotic states in order to have

them confront their fear of death and achieve psychospiritual rebirth. Ten to

twenty such cathartic sessions were conducted at intervals of a month or more,

100
interspersed with verbal therapy to integrate the material that had emerged during

the psychedelic sessions (Grinspoon & Bakalar, 1979/1997, p. 197; Grof,

1980/1994, pp. 43-44; see also pp. 201-202, below, and Clark, 1983, pp. 72-75,

for a personal account of Roquet’s methods from a participant’s perspective).

Grof (1980/1994) proposes that taken together, and approached in an open

and integrated way, both psycholytic and psychedelic therapies could be used in

various ways that take advantage of the strengths of each approach (chap. 3; see

also Di Leo, 1975-76). Although psycholytic therapy typically takes longer to

achieve the same results as psychedelic therapy, psycholytic therapy can give the

serious inquirer a much more intimate knowledge of the structure of the psyche

and dynamics of psychological change and can give one a more certain

opportunity to work through important psychological issues than is possible with

only one or two high-dose sessions (p. 117). Psychedelic therapy, on the other

hand, more typically occasions positive and profoundly transformative mystical

experiences that are less likely to occur during psycholytic therapy, which

emphasizes confrontations with psychopathological and traumatic material

(p. 120). Furthermore, “high dosages and internalization of the process lead to

greater depth, intensity, and spontaneous flow of the experience; this results in

more emotional turmoil, but also in a better chance for a positive breakthrough”

(p. 120).

Despite Grof’s extensive theoretical work, Grinspoon and Bakalar point

out that, overall, the theoretical basis for the effectiveness of psychedelic therapy

is less developed than the theoretical basis for the effectiveness of psycholytic

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therapy (1979/1997, p. 194; see also Grof, 1980/1994, p. 39). This is so in part

because psycholytic therapy is in effect an extension of the therapist’s underlying

psychotherapeutic orientation, which historically has been psychoanalytic (see,

for instance, Leuner, 1983, and House, 2007, p. 185). The theoretical basis for the

effectiveness of psychedelic therapy is also more difficult to develop because the

mystical nature of insights induced by psychedelic therapy, like the spiritual

conversions that these experiences resemble, are notoriously resistant to

theoretical explanation (Grinspoon & Bakalar, pp. 194-195).

Existing Therapeutic Frameworks

Because most theorists in the field see psychedelics as only one element of

psychedelic psychotherapy rather than healing agents in their own right, the

therapeutic value of psychedelics is generally assumed to be significantly affected

if not wholly determined by extrapharmacological factors, including the

therapeutic approach, the quality of the therapist, and the depth of integration and

implementation of the psychedelic experience (Bravo & Grob, 1996a, p. 337;

Buckman, 1967, p. 88; House, 2007, pp. 179-184; Masters & Houston, 1970,

p. 335; Victor, 1996, p. 331). Given the importance of these extrapharmacological

factors, the therapist’s theoretical framework clearly has a significant influence on

his or her practice of psychedelic psychotherapy. Too often in the past, the

underlying therapeutic orientation remained implicit in discussions about the

nature, methods, and effectiveness of psychedelic psychotherapy (Blair in

discussion of conference paper by Buckman, 1967, p. 99). With publications like

Psychedelic Medicines (Winkelman & Roberts, 2007), which surveys major

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theoretical frameworks, this situation is improving. With many theoretapproical

and methodological questions in need of investigation (Goldsmith, 2007, p. 109),

and with theoretical differences leading to differences in therapeutic practice

(Samuels, 1986, p. 11), we have good reason to be explicit and clear about the

theoretical frameworks underlying psychedelic psychotherapy.

Masters and Houston (1970) maintained that by 1970, although most

therapists conducting psycholytic therapy were psychoanalysts, success with

psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy had been reported by hundreds of therapists

of various persuasions using a diverse range of established psychotherapeutic

procedures from many countries of the world (pp. 323-324). In 1967, Blair noted

that the variety of theoretical approaches represented by conference papers on

LSD psychotherapy was astounding (Buckman, 1967, p. 99; see also Ditman &

Bailey, 1967, p. 75). In a 1969 review of psychedelic psychotherapy, Caldwell

(1969) points out that the tendency of therapists to borrow techniques from each

other and rapidly develop their own approach makes classification of distinct

approaches to psychedelic psychotherapy difficult (p. 122). In 1996 Bravo and

Grob reported that there was no standard procedure for psychedelic

psychotherapy (1996a, p. 337).

Given the lack of standardization and the probable extent of unofficial

psychedelic psychotherapy practiced today, it would still seem difficult if not

impossible to classify what one can imagine is an exuberant profusion of

underlying frameworks. Still, as Caldwell suggested in his 1969 review, some

general trends can be identified. Drawing principally from Winkelman and

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Roberts’s (2007) Psychedelic Medicines: New Evidence for Hallucinogenic

Substances as Treatments, I sketch here a brief overview of today’s most

prominent frameworks for psychedelic psychotherapy.

Psychoanalytic. Although compatible with other forms of psychotherapy

such as Jungian and Gestalt therapies (Grof, 1980/1994, pp. 33-34), psychedelic

psychotherapy programs between 1950 and the mid-1960s were dominated by a

psychoanalytic orientation. This is most evident in papers on psycholytic therapy

(e.g., Abramson, 1967, p. xi; Buckman, 1967, pp. 84-85; Leuner, 1967, 1983).

Many practitioners, having discovered that their psychoanalytic framework was

too limited to accommodate the extraordinary variety of experiences and content

they encountered in psychedelic sessions, expanded their approach to include a

more eclectic range of orientations (Grof, 1980/1994, p. 116; Merkur, 2007,

p. 196). Nevertheless, the psychoanalytic framework still holds a respected place

in psychedelic literature (Merkur, 1998, 2007).

Merkur (2007) proposes a contemporary psychoanalytic approach to

psychedelic psychotherapy that attempts to overcome the limitations of traditional

psychoanalytic assumptions. Conceiving emergent unconscious material as

“co-constructions, negotiated between the analyst and the patient” (p. 197),

Merkur says that the challenge to psychedelic therapists working from a

psychoanalytic perspective is to know what to say to individuals undergoing

high-dose treatment so as to bring about the kind of therapeutic rapport Grof

identifies as so important in psycholytic, low-dose, therapy (pp. 197-198). The

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ultimate task, Merkur says, “is to interpret what a patient’s unconscious

integrative process is trying to communicate to consciousness” (p. 198).

Grofian. Stanislav Grof started his work with LSD as an orthodox

psychoanalyst following principles that later became known as psycholytic

therapy. 24 In the light of his observations during clinical practice with LSD,

however, the psychoanalytic orientation became untenable for Grof; and he

“moved far beyond the narrow psychoanalytic framework to full recognition of

the practical and theoretical significance of the death-rebirth process and

transpersonal phenomena” (p. 116). Grof went on to develop a comprehensive

model of consciousness that he characterizes as holotropic (“oriented toward

wholeness” or “moving in the direction of wholeness” [Grof, 2007, p. 256] ) and

that accounts for the transformative potential of nonordinary states of

consciousness. Grof also constructed an expanded cartography of the psyche that

incorporates the dynamics of the death-rebirth process and the wide range of

transpersonal phenomena he has observed during decades of non-drug as well as

psychedelic research (Grof, 1985, chap. 2; see also Grof, 1975).

Grof’s framework for psychedelic psychotherapy (1980/1994) includes a

discussion of the nature, treatment, and transformative potential of psychedelic-

induced psychotic states. In Beyond the Brain: Birth, Death and Transcendence in

Psychotherapy, Grof (1985) discusses the beneficial potential of the acute

24
In Realms of the Human Unconscious: Observations from LSD Research, Grof
(1975) explains that he “developed, independently of several other European therapists,
the concept of a therapeutic series of LSD sessions, usually referred to as psycholytic
therapy” (p. 20). He notes that the term psycholytic therapy was coined by Ronald
Sandison, whom he characterizes as “an English therapist of Jungian orientation and
pioneer of clinical LSD research” (p. 20). I discuss Sandison’s research in “Early Jungian
Approaches to Psychedelic Psychotherapy, below.
105
psychotic process (p. 295). If properly understood and worked through, Grof

asserts, the psychotic process can result in personal transformation (p. 295).

Shamanic. Prohibitions on experimental and clinical research with

psychedelics has increased the importance of other kinds of research on their

healing potential. One such alternative has been the cross-cultural study of the use

of psychedelics, sometimes called sacred medicines, by indigenous peoples

throughout the world. Since ancient times psychoactive plants have been used for

healing and spiritual purposes in shamanic ceremonies and rituals (Grob, 2002d,

pp. 282, 285; Grof, 1984, p. 17). Study of these practices contributes to the

beneficial use of psychedelic substances within contemporary cultures lacking

this knowledge and experience (Dombrowe, 2005; see also Calabrese, 2007;

Metzner, 1999, 2002a, 2002b; Winkelman, 2007a). Indeed, such a synthesis of

ancient wisdom and modern science could have far-reaching consequences for the

health of our endangered planet (Grof, 1984, pp. 10, 21).

Hybrid. The cross-cultural study of indigenous healing with psychedelic

substances has led to new forms of group-based psychedelic psychotherapy that

combine elements of shamanic ritual healing with principles of transpersonal and

psychedelic psychotherapy (Marsden & Lukoff, 2007, p. 287; Metzner, 1998a).

Metzner (1999) calls such combined forms of psychedelic psychotherapy “hybrid

shamanic psychotherapeutic rituals” (pp. 40-42). Conducting sessions as neither

shaman nor therapist, Marsden and Lukoff observe, the group guide attempts to

create conditions that help “establish a conscious and growth producing link

between the participant and the hallucinogenic experience” ( p. 287).

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Early Jungian Approaches to Psychedelic Psychotherapy

Before turning to the construction of a Jungian framework, I close this

literature review with a discussion of early Jungian approaches to psychedelic

psychotherapy. As indicated above, Sandison (1954), Cutner (1959), and

Fordham (1963) discuss from a Jungian standpoint clinical studies of psychedelic

psychotherapy conducted in the 1950s. Sandison and Cutner speak of the

therapeutic value of LSD-assisted psychotherapy, which each of them conducted

as Jungian-orientated therapists. Reviewing case studies of LSD-assisted

psychotherapy, Fordham cautions that the relatively passive process of

psychedelic psychotherapy must be distinguished from the active process of

analysis, that the lasting therapeutic value of the LSD experience is slight, and

that the strongest therapeutic agent in the cases he reviewed was the transference

(p. 129).

Sandison was the head psychiatrist at Powick Mental Hospital at

Worcester, England, in 1952 when he joined a tour of mental hospitals in

Switzerland. Besides visiting Burghölzli Hospital in Zurich, where Jung’s career

started, Sandison had the opportunity to visit Sandoz Pharmaceutical Laboratories

in Basel. He was fascinated to learn of the work being done there with LSD; and

although no one else in his party was especially interested, Sandison made a point

of retuning a few months later. This time he left Sandoz carrying several

psychedelic-related publications and a box with 100 ampoules of LSD (Sandison,

2001, p. 35).

Soon after returning to England, Sandison initiated the first program of

psychedelic psychotherapy in Britain at Powick Hospital in late 1952, when

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“there was as yet no theoretical basis for supposing that LSD could be used as a

practical tool in combination with psychotherapy” (Sandison, 2001, p. 38). There

was, however, evidence from research others had done that LSD “produced a

loosening of mental associations, that it facilitated the transference, and that

forgotten and sometimes painful memories could be released” (p. 38). A pioneer

in clinical LSD research, Sandison coined the term psycholytic and published the

results of his early work with LSD therapy in three journal papers (Sandison,

1954; Sandison, Spencer, & Whitelaw, 1954; Sandison & Whitelaw, 1957; see

also Sandison, 2001; Sessa, 2008) and at least two conference papers (Sandison,

1960; Sandison, 1963).

Sandison (1954) sees LSD as an instrument for advancing psychotherapy

through its ability to produce “an upsurge of unconscious material into

consciousness” ( p. 514), and in his clinical work he “developed a reverence for

its properties, rather as the shamans of old regarded their magical plants” (2001,

p. 39). Working with patients who took between 20 and 100 micrograms of LSD,

Sandison (1954) identified three distinct types of experience: dream-like

hallucinations, reliving of forgotten personal memories, and imagery from the

collective unconscious. He described the third category of experience as

archaic, impersonal images . . . exactly similar in nature to those

experiences of the collective unconscious which patients undergoing deep
analysis experience in their dreams, visual impressions, and fantasies. . . .
Furthermore, these more primitive LSD experiences are accompanied by a
sense of their agelessness and timeless quality which is the hallmark of the
great archetypes of the collective unconscious. (p. 508)

As I have indicated, Fordham, who is a Jungian analyst, argues that the

strongest therapeutic agent in the cases he reviewed was the transference (1963, p.

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129). Sandison (1954) confirms that transference, in both its positive and negative

aspects, is readily revealed in LSD therapy. Patients may identify the doctor with

images experienced and yet patients usually have no doubt about the meaning of

the experience (p. 514), presumably with insight gained through work with the

therapist. Regarding Fordham’s view that psychedelic psychotherapy is a

relatively passive process that must be distinguished from the active process of

analysis, however, Sandison says that the

satisfactory ability to make fantasies active, and to move amongst the

unconscious images is one of the most useful properties that LSD may
confer on a patient. One may compare it with the process of active fantasy
so much used in analysis. (p. 512)

Sandison also differs with Fordham on the therapeutic value of

unconscious material revealed during psychedelic psychotherapy. Fordham

(1963) argues that “it is fallacious to assume that making patients aware of

unconscious fantasy, repressed memories, etc., is necessarily therapeutic”

(p. 125). Real therapy, he emphasizes, “depends more on integrating the

previously unconscious products into the ego” (p. 125). Sandison (2001)

maintains, however, that the process of integration is central to LSD therapy.

Each feeling, fantasy, and image must be explored by the therapist and integrated

by the patient (pp. 38-39).

One of Fordham’s (1963) case studies was a suicidally depressed woman

who had received LSD therapy with Sandison. At the conclusion of this patient’s

LSD therapy, Sandison (1954) had reported that “there seems little reason to

doubt that this patient will completely recover and live a satisfying and

consummate married life” (p. 513; also quoted in Fordham, p. 126). Three years

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later, “after ECT [Electroconvulsive therapy] treatment for depression which had

led to a suicidal attempt” (Fordham, p. 126), this patient was referred to a

therapist under Fordham’s supervision at the C.G. Jung Clinic in London.

Fordham maintains that “only after three and a half years [of] hard and

painstaking work did a new phase start. This began through her concern for

friends who had also been treated with LSD—the results were all inadequate as

she reported them” (p. 126). Putting aside questions regarding the objectivity of

Fordham’s assessment as well as that of the patient herself, who felt rage toward

her former therapist for having failed her (p. 126), Fordham’s critical evaluation

raises the fundamental issue of whether LSD treatment is ultimately a problematic

substitute for the integrative process of ongoing analysis. Ironically, even

Sandison and Whitelaw (1957) suggest this possibility when they conclude that

“LSD treatment continues to be of the utmost value in psychotherapy, both in

cases otherwise resistant to treatment and as a method of avoiding the prolonged

time necessary for a full psychological analysis” (p. 342).

Cutner (1959), a Jungian colleague of Sandison’s at Powick Hospital,

values LSD as an aid to deep analysis yet “believes it is very important for any

analyst to remain awake to these problems when working with LSD (or indeed

with any kind of ‘short cut’ in analysis)” (p. 717). And she explains that her “aim

has always been to use it as sparingly as possible and to keep the main accent on

the analysis itself [Cutner’s italics]” (p. 715). I cannot do justice here to all the

specific concepts, principles, and issues discussed in these papers, but I will return

to them in several chapters of this dissertation.

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 On his first study tour in Switzerland, Sandison fulfilled his “dream of

touching the hem of Jung’s garment” (2001, p. 36) by visiting the Jung Institute in

Zurich. As it turned out, Jung was away somewhere in the mountains. Several

years later, after initiating the LSD treatment program at Powick Hospital in

England, Sandison returned to the Jung Institute in hopes of catching Jung this

time. Missing him a second time, Sandison spent most of the day visiting with the

institute’s director, Carl Meier, who warned Sandison during his visit that day not

to talk to Jung about his work with LSD. Jung, Meier told Sandison, was greatly

opposed to its use (pp. 36-37).

I try to imagine the rich conversation Sandison might have had that day

with Jung, had things been different. My analysis of the relationship between

Jung’s psychology and psychedelic experience, to which I now turn, is in a sense

a humble attempt to construct such a dialogue.

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 CHAPTER 3: BASIC JUNGIAN CONCEPTS AND PRINCIPLES

While volumes have been written about basic Jungian concepts and

principles, my purpose in this chapter is very briefly to introduce only the most

fundamental concepts and principles that provide a foundation for the Jungian

interpretation of psychedelic experience that I present in the following chapters. I

begin with Jung’s treatment of consciousness, the unconscious, and their

relationship. I then introduce several closely related concepts and principles:

individuation, archetypes and their manifestation in the psyche, and finally

dreams and other symbolic products of the unconscious. These basic concepts and

principles lay the foundation for, first, my discussion of Jung’s explicit

explanation of the nature of psychedelic experience and, second, my discussion of

the nature and transformative potential of psychedelic-induced psychotic states in

the light of Jung’s psychology.

Before proceeding, it is worth recalling that many of Jung’s concepts and

principles are working models of psychological entities, structures, relationships,

and processes. Consciousness, the unconscious, archetypes, and individuation,

like the atom in physics, are constructs used to describe entities and processes that

cannot be known through direct observation. They can only be inferred from

descriptions of subjective experience and from observable effects on, or

manifestations in, human behavior, such as symptoms, images, symbols, and

dreams (Jacobi, 1942/1973, pp. 35-36; Whitmont, 1991, p. 15). Nevertheless,

these concepts and principles have proven to be useful working hypotheses

(Jacobi, p. 2; Whitmont, p. 15), and they have become a useful means by which

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Jungian theorists and psychotherapists attempt to describe and understand the

psyche in all its invisible complexity.

Consciousness and the Unconscious

As I have indicated, Jung’s model of the conscious mind’s relationship to

the unconscious—especially the archetypal unconscious—can provide meaningful

insights into the effects psychedelics have on the psyche, including their potential

to induce psychotic reactions. More specifically, Jung (1958/1972j) accounts for

the basic effect of psychedelics in terms of a psychological phenomenon that he

refers to as an abaissement du niveau mental, or a lowering of the threshold of

consciousness, which allows unconscious material to enter consciousness and

potentially overwhelm it (p. 263, para. 569). To appreciate the significance of

such a lowering of the threshold of consciousness, which I discuss in Chapter

Four, we need to look at the relationship between consciousness and the

unconscious in Jung’s psychology.

Understanding the hypothetical nature of these two complex psychic

categories helps one appreciate Jung’s paradoxical statements about them. That is,

Jung’s paradoxical statements about consciousness and the unconscious are due to

more than changes in his thinking over time. On the one hand, Jung (1947/1969u)

speaks of the psyche as “a conscious-unconscious whole” with no definite

boundaries (p. 200, para. 397). Yet when emphasizing the autonomous nature of

certain psychic entities such as complexes, Jung (1920/1969e) asserts that “the

psyche is not an indivisible unity but a divisible and more or less divided whole”

(p. 307, para. 582). Generally speaking, however, Jung characterizes the psyche

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as “the totality of all psychic processes” (Jacobi, 1942/1973, p. 5) consisting of

two spheres, consciousness and the unconscious, that complement each other in

an antithetical and compensatory relationship (pp. 5-6). This view of the psyche

parallels Jung’s view of the Self, which Kelly (1993) characterizes as a “complex

whole” (p. 28). For Jung, Kelly says, the Self as a total union of opposites, or

“complexio oppositorum,” is psyche in its totality, the integrated unity of

consciousness and the unconscious (pp. 26-27, 30).

Consciousness

As Samuels et al. (1986) point out, Jung’s definition of consciousness

emphasizes the role of the ego in consciousness as well as the dichotomy between

consciousness and the unconscious (p. 36). Jung (1921/1976a) defines

consciousness as “the function or activity which maintains the relation of psychic

contents to the ego. . . . in so far as this relation is perceived as such by the ego”

(pp. 421-422, para. 700). Elsewhere, Jung (1940) defines consciousness as “the

sum total of representations, ideas, emotions, perceptions, and other mental

contents which the ego acknowledges” (p. 3). Samuels et al. also point out that at

various times Jung equates consciousness with various psychological functions,

including awareness, intuition, and apperception, and that Jung stresses the role of

reflection in the achievement of consciousness (p. 36). The attainment of

consciousness, they say, “would appear to be the result of recognition, reflection

upon and retention of psychic experience, enabling the individual to combine it

with what he has learned, to feel its relevance emotionally, and to sense its

meaning for his life” (p. 36). As will become clear in Chapter Seven, this

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characterization of Jung’s concept of consciousness has much in common with

Jung’s concept of the process of integration.

Jung (1921/1976a) conceives the ego itself as “a complex of

representations which constitutes the center of [one’s] field of consciousness and

appears to possess a very high degree of continuity and identity” (p. 425, para.

706). Jung also conceives of the ego as “the subject of consciousness” (Jacobi,

1942/1973, p. 7). Consciousness needs a center, says Jung (1939/1969o), “an ego

to which something is conscious. We know of no other kind of consciousness, nor

can we imagine a consciousness without an ego. There can be no consciousness

when there is no one to say: ‘I am conscious’” (p. 283, para. 506). Jung’s frequent

use of the term ego-consciousness emphasizes the ego’s centrality in

consciousness.

Samuels et al. (1986) argue that Jung tends to equate the ego with

consciousness and that this obscures unconscious aspects of the ego, such as its

unrecognized shadow properties. Yes, they say, consciousness is the

distinguishing characteristic of the ego, but we must keep in mind that this is a

proportional property (p. 51). That is, although the ego is highly conscious in

comparison to the unconscious, it has nevertheless unconscious aspects of its

own. This nuanced view of the unconscious aspects of the ego is reminiscent of

William James’s (1902/1982) discussion of the “field of consciousness” with its

indeterminate and shifting “margin” of awareness (p. 231). It is impossible to

outline this field with any definiteness, James says; it is so vaguely drawn that it is

difficult to say exactly what we are conscious of at any particular moment

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(pp. 231, 232). Again, then, we are reminded of the wisdom of approaching these

concepts with a tolerance for their complexity and ambiguity.

The Unconscious

The unconscious for Jung (1921/1976a) constitutes “all psychic contents

and processes that are not conscious, i.e., not related to the ego in any perceptible

way” (p. 483, para. 837); or put slightly differently, “the totality of all psychic

phenomena that lack the quality of consciousness” (1948/1969v, p. 133, para.

270). Indeed, Jung (1939/1969o) points out that unconscious material is normally

so unrelated to the ego that most people deny its existence altogether (pp. 275-

276, para. 490). And even when the existence of this unconscious material is

recognized, it is seldom appreciated as a source of knowledge, let alone wisdom.

For Jung (1921/1976a), however, in addition to the personal unconscious with

“all the acquisitions of personal life, everything forgotten, repressed, subliminally

perceived, thought, felt” (p. 485, para. 842), deeper collective levels of the

unconscious contain

all the patterns of life and behavior inherited from [our] ancestors, so that
every human child is possessed of a ready-made system of adapted
psychic functioning prior to all consciousness. . . . This unconscious,
instinctive functioning is continually present and active. (Jung,
1934/1969j, p. 349, para. 673)

That is, underneath the personal level of the unconscious, lies what Jung

sometimes calls “an absolute unconscious [or the “objective psyche” as opposed

to the subjective psyche] which has nothing to do with our personal experience”

(1947/1969u, p. 148, para. 311).

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 The essential difference between the psyche’s conscious and unconscious

functioning, says Jung (1934/1969j), is that consciousness is intensely

concentrated upon the immediate field of attention within the scope of the

individual’s lifetime while the unconscious “is not concentrated and intensive, but

shades off into obscurity; it is highly extensive and can juxtapose the most

heterogeneous elements in the most paradoxical way” (p. 349, para. 673). Jung

conceives of the deepest levels of the unconscious as “combining the

characteristics of both sexes, transcending youth and age, birth and death, and,

from having at its command a human experience of one or two million years,

practically immortal” (p. 349, para. 673). Indeed, this collective, or archetypal,

unconscious seems “something like an unceasing stream or perhaps ocean of

images and figures which drift into consciousness in our dreams or in abnormal

states of mind” (p. 350, para. 674).

The Relationship Between Consciousness and the Unconscious

Jung conceives the fundamental relationship between consciousness and

the unconscious as a compensatory one (Samuels et al., 1986, p. 156). Like the

self-regulatory system that maintains the organism’s physiological equilibrium,

Jung (1921/1976a) conceives this compensatory relationship as “an inherent

self-regulation of the psychic apparatus” (p. 419, para. 694). Comparing

consciousness to the focal point of vision that holds only a limited amount of

content at one time, Jung characterizes consciousness as selective.

Selection demands direction. But direction requires the exclusion of

everything irrelevant. This is bound to make the conscious orientation
one-sided. The contents that are excluded and inhibited by the chosen

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 direction sink into the unconscious, where they form a counterweight to
the conscious orientation. The strengthening of this counterposition keeps
pace with the increase of conscious one-sidedness until finally a noticeable
tension is produced. (p. 419, para. 694)

This tension can be overcome by increased conscious effort to a point, but

unconscious content eventually breaks through in the form of dreams,

spontaneous imagery, or symptoms (p. 419, para. 694; Samuels et al., 1986,

p. 32). Every conscious process that goes too far inevitably brings about

compensation (Jung, 1934/1966h, p. 153, para. 330). “The more one-sided the

conscious attitude, the more antagonistic are the contents arising from the

unconscious, so that we may speak of a real opposition between the two” (Jung,

1921/1976a, p. 419, para. 694).

Through an ongoing process of balancing, adjusting, and supplementing,

the unconscious compensates the one-sided tendency of consciousness in order to

bridge two psychological worlds (Jung, 1921/1976a, pp. 418, 419, paras. 693,

694; Samuels et al., 1986, p. 32). The other world of compensatory unconscious

content is by nature experienced as unexpected and strange from the standpoint of

consciousness (Samuels et al., p. 33). Indeed, some unconscious content, such as

that of persons suffering some forms of schizophrenia, is so strange and utterly

baffling that no one can understand it (Jung, 1939/1969o, pp. 277ff., paras. 493,

494, 497). As Jung puts it, the conscious mind simply “lacks the premises which

would help to explain the strangeness of the ideas” (p. 278, para. 495).

Although consciousness easily succumbs to unconscious influences, the

consequences are not simple. Under certain conditions, unconscious content can

overpower an individual’s ego-consciousness and bring about pathological

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conditions of severe confusion and even insanity. Often, however, the

unconscious brings the very wisdom that consciousness so sorely lacks (Jung,

1939/1969o, pp. 278, 279, 282, paras. 495, 496, 497, 504). As I discuss in a later

section on the transformative potential of psychotic states, the psyche can bestow

its deepest wisdom under the most improbable conditions. “The collaboration of

the unconscious is intelligent and purposive,” Jung says, “and even when it acts in

opposition to consciousness its expression is still compensatory in an intelligent

way, as if it were trying to restore the lost balance” (p. 282, para. 505).

The preceding statement by Jung suggests two essential elements of my

thesis regarding adverse reactions to psychedelic experience: the potentially

antagonistic relationship between consciousness and the unconscious, on the one

hand, and the transformative potential of even the most problematic conscious

reactions to unconscious content, on the other. Jungians understand and accept

that the relationship between consciousness and the unconscious is often initially

problematic. Jung poses the basic problem this way:

Say you have been very one-sided and lived in a two-dimensional world
only, behind walls, thinking that you are perfectly safe; then suddenly the
sea breaks in: you are inundated by an archetypal world and you are in
complete confusion. (quoted in Miller, 2004, p. 65) 25

One might ask what possible good could come of such confusion. Jungians

maintain that if the ego can face (that is, reflect upon and relate to) 26 the

25
Originally from Jung (1988), Nietzsche’s Zarathustra: Notes of the Seminar
Given in 1934-1939, p. 975.
26
I use face here in the same way Samuels et al. (1986) characterize working
upon or working through as reflecting upon and relating to unconscious material (p. 146).
All these terms are shorthand for the complex therapeutic process of becoming conscious
of the unconscious, which I discuss in Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the
Therapeutic Process of Integration.”
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confusion and darkness that can occur as the result of difficult confrontations with

of the archetypal unconscious, such an engagement can advance the process of

psychological growth, or individuation.

Before introducing Jung’s concept of individuation, I want to emphasize

these two fundamental principles: First, psychological confusion and darkness

inevitably accompany the ego’s confrontation with the archetypal unconscious.

And second, working through this confusion and darkness is a fundamental step

in the process of individuation. These two principles occupy a central position in

my Jungian treatment of psychedelic experience in general and psychedelic-

induced psychotic states in particular. They represent the most fundamental

psychological dynamics that clarify the nature and transformative potential of

psychotic reactions to psychedelic experience from a Jungian perspective. They

also provide the theoretical context within which the other interrelated concepts

and principles that constitute the Jungian framework I propose can be understood

and applied.

Individuation

Jung (1939/1969o) defines individuation as “the process by which a

person becomes a psychological ‘in-dividual,’ that is, a separate, indivisible unity

or ‘whole’” (p. 275, para. 490). Understanding that Jung also sees individuation as

“an extension of the sphere of consciousness, an enriching of conscious

psychological life” (1921/1976a, p. 450, para. 762), we can appreciate the

centrality that bringing unconscious content to consciousness plays in Jung’s

theory of psychological wholeness. (I discuss the practical consequences of the

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concept of individuation in Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the Therapeutic

Process of Integration” and Chapter Eight, “Jungian Psychotherapy.”)

The process of psychological development towards wholeness, says Jung

(1940), is “a rather extraordinary task” (p. 26) that implies a balanced

relationship, or “approximate harmony” (1945/1969t, p. 289, para. 548) between

consciousness and the unconscious, the psyche’s two incongruous halves that

together make a whole (1940, p. 26). Consciousness and the unconscious are both

essential aspects of life, and if either is suppressed, there can be no psychological

wholeness, no psychological harmony (p. 27). “This rounding out of the

personality into a whole may well be the goal of any psychotherapy that claims to

be more than a mere cure of symptoms,” says Jung (1939/1969o, p. 289,

para. 524).

Summing up his late essay “On the Nature of the Psyche,” Jung

(1947/1969u) explains that his theory of the psyche culminates in the

developmental process that consists in the integration of unconscious content into

consciousness. The process of becoming psychologically whole “has remarkable

effects on ego-consciousness which are extremely difficult to describe,” Jung says

(p. 223, para. 430).

It is a relatively rare occurrence, which is experienced only by those who

have gone through the wearisome but, if the unconscious is to be
integrated, indispensable business of coming to terms with the
unconscious components of the personality. Once these unconscious
components are made conscious, it results not only in their assimilation to
the already existing ego-personality, but in a transformation of the latter.
The main difficulty is to describe the manner of this transformation.
Generally speaking the ego is a hard-and-fast complex which, because tied
to consciousness and its continuity, cannot easily be altered, and should
not be altered unless one wants to bring on pathological disturbances. The

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 closest analogies to an alteration of the ego are to be found in the field of
psychopathology, where we meet not only with neurotic dissociations but
also with the schizophrenic fragmentation, or even dissolution, of the ego.
In this field, too, we can observe pathological attempts at integration. . . .
These consist in more or less violent irruptions of unconscious contents
into consciousness, the ego proving itself incapable of assimilating the
intruders. But if the structure of the ego-complex is strong enough to
withstand their assault without having its framework fatally dislocated,
then assimilation can take place. In that event there is an alteration of the
ego as well as of the unconscious contents. (pp. 223-224, para. 430)

When Jung says that the ego “should not be altered unless one wants to bring on

pathological disturbances” (p. 224, para. 430), I understand him to mean that

whenever the ego is altered by a confrontation with the deep unconscious one

must be prepared for potentially harmful disturbances of the ego’s equilibrium.

That potential for harm can be realized if the ego is not strong enough to

withstand and assimilate such an assault of unconscious content. Jung is also

saying, however, that psychological transformation cannot occur unless the ego is

altered by a conscious relationship to the unconscious. This description of the

inseparable danger and necessity of altering the hard-and-fast complex of ego-

consciousness in the service of psychological transformation strikes at the heart of

the risks and potential benefits inherent in the difficult psychedelic experiences

that I treat in the rest of this dissertation.

Archetypes and Their Manifestation in the Psyche

To appreciate the challenges involved in any form of deep psychological

exploration—and certainly serious work with psychedelics—it is necessary to

understand the nature of the archetypes and their effects on consciousness. For

Jungians, archetypes are hypothetical constructs that are conceived as instinctual

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entities or structuring patterns within the collective unconscious. Jungians

typically describe the effects of the collective unconscious on ego-consciousness

in terms of the manifestations of various archetypes. Jung came later in his life to

distinguish between the archetype per se and its manifestation as image, symbol,

emotion, projection or behavior (Samuels et al., 1986, pp. 26, 73).

Jung characterized the archetype in different ways as he refined the

concept. In 1912 he used the term primordial images for autonomous unconscious

images expressed in such universal cultural motifs as death and rebirth, the hero,

and the evil demon (Edinger, 1955, p. 624; Samuels et al, 1986, p. 26). In 1919

Jung first used the term archetype to distinguish more explicitly the hypothetical

underlying pattern of the unconscious image from its psychological manifestation,

experienced by the individual as, for instance, a dream image. Jung’s occasional

references to the archetype per se emphasize what he conceived as the archetype’s

irrepresentable underlying pattern (Samuels et al., p. 26; see also Jung,

1919/1969d, p. 133, para. 270n7), or “preconscious, invisible ‘ground plan’”

(Jung, 1920/1969e, p. 311, para. 589n6). “Everything archetypal which is

perceived by consciousness,” says Jung (1947/1969u), “seems to represent a set

of variations on a ground theme” (p. 213, para. 417).

Generally, Jung conceives of archetypes as inherited psychological

patterns or images linked to instinct. He characterizes archetypes as “deposits of

the constantly repeated experiences of humanity” (1917/1943/1966d, p. 69, para.

109). Although the archetypes can only become conscious as individual

experience, Jung (1928/1969g) understands them to be universal “preexistent

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pathways which are merely ‘filled out’ by individual experience. Probably every

‘impressive’ experience is just such a break-through into an old, previously

unconscious river-bed” (pp. 53-54, para. 100).

Jung (1934/1969i) cautions that it is quite difficult to understand the

nature of archetypes because the intellect tends to oversimplify their multiple and

paradoxical meanings (p. 38, para. 80). Furthermore, their numinous quality

always engages our emotions, making them even more difficult to comprehend

intellectually (Jung, 1952/1969w, p. 452, para. 735). Jung (1963) concludes,

nevertheless, that “insofar as the archetypes act upon me, they are real and actual

to me, even though I do not know what their real nature is” (p. 352). For these

reasons, my treatment focuses on Jung’s phenomenological descriptions of the

subjective experience of the archetypes.

Given my interest in psychedelic-induced psychotic states, my treatment

of the archetypes also tends to emphasize their problematic effects on

consciousness. It should not be forgotten, however, that the archetypes are

universal characteristics of human experience and culture that Jungians view as

important sources of psychic energy and therefore vital components of psychic

health. For Jungians, psychic health is a function of a balanced tension between

opposites, especially between consciousness and the unconscious (Edinger, 1955,

pp. 625-626; see also Jung, 1928/1969g, pp. 32-32 , para. 61). The archetypes

become problematic only when the ego loses contact with them (through a one-

sided emphasis on consciousness or through the defensive repression of their

disturbing manifestations) or conversely when the ego is overwhelmed by their

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sudden and unexpected emergence from the depths of the unconscious. Under

such circumstances, the psyche loses its dynamic equilibrium and health is

threatened (Edinger, p. 625). In extreme cases, eruptions of archetypal content

from the collective unconscious fragment a relatively weak conscious personality

and bring about an acute psychosis (p. 626).

Jung (1938/1940/1969n) describes the archetype as a powerful instinctive

force that consciousness experiences as “wholly unexpected, new, and even

strange” (p. 15, para. 24). And the archetypes remain strangers to consciousness,

saturating it “with uncanny forebodings or even with the fear of madness”

(1939/1969o, p. 286, para. 517). Archetypes appear in dreams and other products

of the unconscious with an influence which has “a numinous or a fascinating

effect. . . . They behave like highly charged autonomous centres of power—they

exert a fascinating and possessive influence upon the conscious mind and can thus

produce extensive alterations in the subject” (Jung, 1917/1943/1966d, p.70, paras.

109, 110).

Even though we should not consider these instinctual psychic patterns

pathological per se (Edinger, 1955, p. 625), evidence of their effects are

especially apparent in certain forms of schizophrenia. The irruption of archetypes

into consciousness often amounts to a psychosis, says Jung (1939/1969o). “They

undoubtedly belong to the material that comes to light in schizophrenia” (p. 287,

para. 519). In this light, it is understandable that the ego resists the instinctive

force of the archetypes. As Jung (1947/1969u) puts it, “consciousness struggles in

a regular panic against being swallowed up in the primitivity and unconsciousness

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of sheer instinctuality. . . . The closer one comes to the instinct-world, the more

violent is the urge to shy away from it” (p. 212, para. 415).

And yet the individual is paradoxically pulled toward this instinctual-

archetypal world. Psychologically, says Jung (1947/1969u),

the archetype as an image of instinct is a spiritual goal toward which the

whole nature of man strives; it is the sea to which all rivers wend their
way, the prize which the hero wrests from the fight with the dragon.
(p. 212, para. 415)

It should not be surprising, then, that religious and mythological imagery has

traditionally provided individuals an essential link to the archetypal unconscious

(Edinger, 1955, p. 625). Indeed, for Jungians, the archetypes are what people have

hitherto called gods, and the central archetype, the Self, 27 is what people have

experienced as God. “The idea of an all-powerful divine Being is present

everywhere, unconsciously if not consciously, because it is an archetype,” says

Jung (1917/1943/1966d, p. 71, para. 110). And the Self, says Jung (1942/1969s),

as a psychological totality, is indistinguishable from an archetypal “God-image”

(p. 157; para. 233; see also Jung, 1938/1940/1969n, p. 59, para. 102).

Jung often describes the experience of an archetype in religious terms. In

“A Psychological Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity,” Jung (1942/1969s)

describes archetypal experience in terms of “holiness,” an idea or thing that

possesses the highest value, and in the presence of [which] men are, so to
speak, struck dumb. Holiness is also revelatory: it is the illuminative

27
The term Self (as in archetype of the Self) is not capitalized in the English
translations of Jung’s writings in The Collected Works of C.G. Jung, even though the
German equivalent of Self, das Selbst, is, like all nouns in German, always capitalized.
Many writers capitalize the term in English, however, to distinguish Jung’s usage from
theorists who do not associate the term with transpersonal, numinous, or spiritual
dimensions of the personality (Kalsched, 1996, pp. 3, 216 n2). I have adopted this
convention, and I also use self (i.e., with a lowercase s) as synonymous with ego.
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 power emanating from an archetypal figure. Nobody ever feels himself to
be the subject of such a process, but always as its object. He does not
perceive holiness, it takes him captive and overwhelms him; nor does he
behold it in a revelation, it reveals itself to him. . . . Everything happens
apparently outside the sphere of his will, and these things are contents of
the unconscious. (p. 152, para. 225)

In Ego and Archetype: Individuation and the Religious Function of the

Psyche, Edinger (1992) characterizes the Self as “the central archetype or

archetype of wholeness [or meaning]” in Jung’s model of the personality (p. 3).

Jungians find reference to the archetype of the Self in many themes and images,

including motifs of spiritual transformation and images of wholeness and unity

such as mandalas and bridges. The relationship of the ego to the Self is often

represented in the relationship of the individual to God, the Creator, in religious

myth (p. 4). For Jung (1954/1976b), the Self is an image originating in the

collective unconscious and therefore transcends the individual in time and space.

The experience of the Self consequently engenders a sense of timelessness and

eternity (p. 694, para. 1567). An encounter with the Self can also engender a sense

of terror because the ego can experience such an encounter as a subjugation—it

feels like slavery (Edinger, 1987, p. 26). Jung (1955-1956/1970) puts it this way:

You have become a victim of a decision made over your head or in

defiance of the heart. From this we can see the numinous power of the
self, which can hardly be experienced in any other way. For this reason the
experience of the self is always a defeat for the ego. (p. 546, para. 778)

Dreams and Other Symbolic Products of the Unconscious

Jung’s unique approach to the unconscious and its archetypal content

becomes especially evident in his views on the nature and psychological

significance of dreams as symbolic products of the unconscious. Although dreams

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are the most common and accessible form of unconscious material (Jung,

1945/1969t, p. 287, para. 544; see also Jacobi, 1942/1973, pp. 70-71), many other

products of the unconscious transmit symbolic expression to consciousness. When

speaking of products of the unconscious, Jung typically refers to dreams,

fantasies, visions, and delusional ideas (see, for instance, 1945/1969t, p. 291,

para. 554). He sometimes speaks of hallucinations, too (1920/1969e, p. 308, para.

584). All these psychological manifestations can be understood as psychic content

arising from the unconscious, or as Jung (1939/1969o) says of dreams, as

“unconscious processes obtruding on consciousness” (p. 144, para. 300; see also

Jacobi, p. 72). Although Jung rarely made the connection explicitly, he also

viewed psychedelic-induced images, visions, and delusions as symbolic products

of the unconscious. I return to this parallel momentarily (p. 130) and again in

Chapter Four.

Contrary to prevailing prejudices against the value of dreams, Jung, like

Freud, considers dreams vital sources of information for understanding the

functioning of the psyche (Whitmont, 1991, p. 36). Jung’s approach to dreams is

distinct from Freud’s in several significant respects, however. Jung sees dreams as

revealing rather than concealing a psychic fact. In contrast to Freud’s view that

the dream is essentially wish-fulfillment in disguise, Jung (1916/1969b) sees

dreams as “a spontaneous self-portrayal, in symbolic form, of the actual situation

in the unconscious[Jung’s italics]” (p. 263, para. 505). Although Jung recognizes

the possibility that a dream can be reduced to a symptom of an underlying

psychological problem, he emphasizes the symbolic nature of dreams, which may

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“point further and deeper, to a development still called for and a meaningfulness

so far unrealized” (Whitmont, 1991, p. 20). For Jung, dreams, even dreams

revealing pathological conditions, are natural products of a psyche attempting to

balance itself. Out of psychological darkness and confusion, says Jung (1988),

there arises “a reconciling symbol which unites the vital need of man with the

archetypal conditions” and thereby raises consciousness to a higher level (quoted

in Miller, 2004, p. 65).

For Jung (1916/1969b), a symbol has complex, indeterminate meaning as

opposed to a sign, which has a fixed, conceivable meaning (p. 246, para. 471). A

symbol, explains Jung (1964), is a term, a name, or a picture that, although

familiar to us, “possesses specific connotations in addition to its conventional and

obvious meanings. It implies something vague, unknown, or hidden from us”

(p. 20). The image of the bald eagle in American culture is a sign in the Jungian

sense because it denotes through common usage the recognizable meanings of

American strength and freedom. The image of the eagle in Christianity is more

complex, however. As an animal representing one of the four Evangelists, its

significance is straightforward for those aware of this meaning. In this sense, the

eagle is a mere sign. Its symbolic value becomes apparent only when we became

aware of its less obvious, hidden meanings. According to Jung, the four animals

that represent the four Christian Evangelists are derived from the four winged

creatures of Ezekiel’s vision, which are in turn analogous to the four animals

representing the sons of the ancient Egyptian sun god Horus (p. 20).

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 It could be argued, I suppose, that the image of the bald eagle in American

culture is symbolic to the extent that it evokes relatively unknown and hidden

meanings, such as the predatory dominance of other nations and peoples that

empire entails. Yet even this more unconventional meaning is relatively fixed and

therefore does not share the characteristics of a real symbol as Jung conceived it.

For Jung, symbols always have a significance that can never be precisely defined

or fully understood. “As the mind explores the symbol, it is led to ideas that lie

beyond the grasp of reason. . . . [It] reaches the edge of certainty beyond which

conscious knowledge cannot pass” (p. 21).

This quality of reaching the edge of certainty becomes more apparent

perhaps when we consider, say, the wheel as a symbol of the divine. Jung (1964)

explains that the image of the wheel may evoke the concept of a divine sun. “But

at this point reason must admit its incompetence; man is unable to define a

‘divine’ being. When, with all our intellectual limitations, we call something

‘divine,’ we have merely given it a name” (p. 21). The use of symbolic imagery in

all religions arises from the need to represent phenomena and concepts that cannot

be fully defined or comprehended. Just as important psychologically, however, is

the spontaneous production of symbols in dreams and other products of the

unconscious (p. 21).

A symbol in a dream or other product of the unconscious is the mediating

agent in the psyche’s ongoing process of bridging the conscious and unconscious

worlds. This process cannot be prescribed, says Jung (1939/1969o), because it is

irrational (p. 289, para. 524). The symbol is “the middle ground on which the

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opposites can be united” (Jung, 1921/1976a, p. 479, para. 825). Jung

(1916/1958/1969c) characterizes the symbol, or “dream-image,” as “the best

possible expression for a complex fact not yet clearly apprehended by

consciousness” (p. 75, para. 148). As Whitmont (1991) puts it, the unconscious is

not rational and it does not conceptualize. The unconscious speaks in images, not

concepts (p. 37). Yet to be an effective compensatory agent, to be assimilated and

integrated into consciousness, the symbol must be comprehensible on some level

(Samuels et al., 1986, p. 32). “We must translate the dream statements into some

sort of conceptualization that is at least accessible to us, even though this

translation can never be a completely adequate one,” Whitmont says, “because a

dream image always points to much more than can be put into an abstract

concept” (p. 37). Although the symbol is not logical, Samuels et al. explain, “it

encapsulates the psychological situation. Its nature is paradoxical and it represents

the third factor or position that does not exist in logic but provides a perspective

from which a synthesis of opposing elements can be made” (p. 145). Jung

(1939/1969o) says that it is in symbols that “the union of conscious and

unconscious contents is consummated. Out of this union emerge new situations

and new conscious attitudes” (p. 289, para. 524). One illustration of this synthesis

of opposing elements in a symbol can be found in the psychedelic-induced

imagery that one of Sandison’s patients reported after an LSD psychotherapy

session. 28 Having first faced what she described as “the good and evil within me”

28
I present this woman’s account in more detail at the conclusion of Chapter
Nine.
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during an earlier session, this woman became determined to overcome her fear

and “go to the bottom of the sea” (Sandison, 2001, p. 41).

I came closer and closer and suddenly it was as if I was looking in a

mirror. These four stones formed a face. I cannot describe its ugliness and
horribleness. At the same time the face was beautiful. I could not say what
piece was ugly and what was beautiful, for in it were both extremes
completely merging and forming a whole. I felt that these were my
anchors and on these I had to build up my personality. I knew too that this
was the same in all of us and everything alive. I had a feeling that what I
had just seen was part of God. (pp. 41-42)

As indicated above, my interpretation of psychedelic experience from a

Jungian standpoint is based to a great extent on a fundamental commonality

between the kinds of unconscious manifestations that Jungians typically work

with (dreams, fantasies, visions, and delusions) and psychedelic-induced images,

hallucinations, visions, and delusions. This commonality is suggested by Jung in

numerous ways. Jung (1907/1972b) characterizes dreams as hallucinatory

representations of unconscious material, or “the hallucinations of normal life”

(p. 148, para. 308). In the sleeping state, says Jung (1920/1969e), the psyche

“produces contents that are strange and incomprehensible, as though they came

from another world” (p. 306, para. 580). Although not referring specifically to

psychedelic-induced visions, Jung (1940-1941/1969r) links dreams and visions in

general when he says “a vision is in the last resort nothing less than a dream

which has broken through into the waking state” (p.226, para. 344). And, as I

discuss in “Psychosis in Jungian Psychology” (Chapter Five), a strong link can be

found between dreams and psychedelic experience by tracing the commonality

Jung establishes between dreams and schizophrenia, on the one hand, and

between schizophrenia and psychedelic experience, on the other. We can see hints

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of these connections in Jung’s early (1911-1912/1967) characterization of a dream

as a series of apparently contradictory and meaningless images that nevertheless

contains material that yields a definite meaning when properly translated (p. 7,

para. 6). The link between dreams and psychedelic experience in Jung’s thought is

supported by Grof’s (1980/1994) statement that the content of psychedelic

experiences in psychedelic psychotherapy is interpreted and worked with in much

the same way as the content of dreams in non-drug psychotherapy (p. 33).

These connections between various manifestations of the unconscious are

based on the fact that Jung (1916/1958/1969c) explicitly considered dreams,

fantasies, visions, hallucinations, psychotic delusions, and psychedelic

experiences to be instances in which an abaissement du niveau mental, or a

lowering of the threshold of consciousness, occurs. As the intensity of

consciousness is reduced in such states, says Jung (1940/1969q), “the check put

upon unconscious contents by the concentration of the conscious mind ceases, so

that the hitherto unconscious material streams, as though from opened

side-sluices, into the field of consciousness” (p. 155, para. 263).

Again and again we see Jung coming back to the fundamental insight that

unusual, altered, pathological, and even religious states of consciousness–whether

reflected in dream images, spiritual visions, psychedelic hallucinations, or

psychotic delusions–can be understood as unconscious content arising into and

often overwhelming consciousness. As bizarre or even pathological as some of

these manifestations may seem, Jung maintains that they all reveal unconscious

content and processes that not only have meaning when understood in the context

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of a person’s life but that can transform that person’s life when properly worked

through in therapeutic analysis.

This perspective is clearly implicated in the two previously mentioned

principles that provide the basis for understanding psychedelic-induced psychotic

states and their treatment from a Jungian standpoint, viz.: (a) psychological

confusion and darkness inevitably accompany the ego’s confrontation with the

archetypal unconscious, and (b) working through this confusion and darkness is a

fundamental step in the process of individuation. From the foundation that these

basic concepts and principles provide, Jung accounts for psychedelic experience

in terms of a number of related concepts, most notably an abaissement du niveau

mental, complexes, trauma, dissociation, the shadow, psychosis, and integration,

all of which I discuss in the following chapters.

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 CHAPTER 4: JUNG’S EXPLANATION OF PSYCHEDELIC EXPERIENCE

Jung’s knowledge and understanding of psychedelic substances and their

psychological effects is derived from his intimate acquaintance with the psyche in

general rather than personal experience with psychedelics or direct observation of

their effects on others. Jung’s 1955 letter to A.M. Hubbard, one of the originators

of psychedelic psychotherapy, begins,

Thank you for your kind invitation to contribute to your mescaline

scheme. Although I have never taken the drug myself nor given it to
another individual, I have at least devoted 40 years of my life to the study
of that psychic sphere which is disclosed by the said drug; that is the
sphere of numinous experience. Thirty years ago I became acquainted
with Dr. Prinzhorn’s mescalin experiments, and thus I had ample
opportunity to learn about the effects of the drug as well as about the
nature of the psychic material involved in the experiment. (1975b, p. 222)

Jung’s letter to Hubbard did not mention that his study of that numinous sphere of

the psyche was rooted in personal experience. In his autobiography, Memories,

Dreams, Reflections, Jung (1963) describes his intimate lifelong relationship with

his unconscious that began in childhood and became especially intense between

1913 and 1916. Reading Jung’s account of his most intense confrontation with the

depths of the unconscious (1963, chap. 6), one can appreciate how that experience

provided him with indispensable insight into the nature and dynamics of

psychedelic experience.

That experience unfolded during a period of uncertainty and disorientation

following his split with Freud in 1913 (Jung, 1963, p. 170). As difficult as these

experiences were for Jung, they became the foundation of his study of the psyche.

“The years when I was pursuing my inner images were the most important in my

life—in them everything essential was decided” (p. 199), Jung says. “It all began
135
then; the later details are only supplements and clarifications of the material

that burst forth from the unconscious, and at first swamped me. It was the

prima materia for a lifetime's work” (p. 199).

A series of dreams, reflections, and visions left Jung (1963) with a chronic

inner pressure that perplexed him (p. 173). Finally, he intuitively made the

decision to submit himself to the impulses of the unconscious, a process that at

one point left him fearing that he was “menaced by a psychosis” (p. 176).

In order to grasp the fantasies which were stirring in me “underground,” I

knew that I had to let myself plummet down into them, as it were. I felt
not only violent resistance to this, but a distinct fear. For I was afraid of
losing command of myself and becoming a prey to the fantasies—and as
a psychiatrist I realized only too well what that meant. After prolonged
hesitation, however, I saw that there was no other way out. (p. 178)

Sitting at his desk thinking over his fears one day, Jung resolved to let himself

drop. “Suddenly it was as though the ground literally gave way beneath my feet,

and I plunged down into dark depths. I could not fend off a feeling of panic”

(p. 179). Jung had a vision of landing in a soft, sticky mass in complete darkness.

In this vision, Jung enters a cave and encounters a dwarf with mummified skin,

deep icy water, a glowing red crystal, the corpse of a youth with a wound in his

head, a gigantic black beetle, a sun rising out of the depths of the water, and blood

spurting for an unendurably long time (p. 179).

After a series of archetypal dreams, visions, and fantasies, Jung (1963)

attempted to work with this unconscious material by imagining a steep descent.

Trying to get to the very bottom, at one point he found himself

at the edge of a cosmic abyss. It was like a voyage to the moon, or a

descent into empty space. . . . . I had the feeling that I was in the land of
the dead. The atmosphere was that of the other world. (p. 181)

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Jung’s account of his fantasies and visions continues with a long description and

analysis of his encounter with an old man, a young girl, and a black serpent.

Reflecting on his experience, he writes:

It is of course ironical that I, a psychiatrist, should at almost every step of

my experiment have run into the same psychic material which is the stuff
of psychosis and is found in the insane. This is the fund of unconscious
images which fatally confuse the mental patient. But it is also the matrix
of a mythopoetic imagination which has vanished from our rational age.
Though such imagination is present everywhere, it is both tabooed and
dreaded, so that it even appears to be a risky experiment or a questionable
adventure to entrust oneself to the uncertain path that leads into the depths
of the unconscious. It is considered the path of error, of equivocation and
misunderstanding. . . . Unpopular, ambiguous, and dangerous, it is a
voyage of discovery to the other pole of the world. (pp. 188-189)

Lowering of the Threshold of Consciousness

As I discussed in Chapter Three, Jung accounts for manifestations of

unconscious content in general—whether in the form of dreams, fantasies,

visions, hallucinations, symptoms, psychotic delusions, or psychedelic

experience—in terms of an abaissement du niveau mental, or a lowering of the

threshold of consciousness. Jung explains the basic effect of psychedelics in terms

of the same psychological phenomenon, which allows unconscious material to

enter consciousness and potentially overwhelm it.

A term Jung (1939/1972h) adopted from Pierre Janet, an abaissement du

niveau mental is a psychic condition characterized as a reduced intensity of

consciousness, or a “depotentiation of the conscious personality” (p. 238, para.

516; see also p. 236, para. 510) that starts with “a relaxation of concentration or

attention” (1956/1972i, p. 251, para. 544). It is a state of reduced conscious

control in which consciousness can be unexpectedly interrupted by strange,

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autonomous, and disruptive contents from the unconscious (1939/1972h, p. 234,

para. 505; see also Samuels et al., 1986, pp. 7-8). An abaissement can have many

causes, including fatigue, sleep, fever, intense emotions, religious or political

fanaticism, intoxication (1939/1972h, p. 237, para. 513) or, as Jung (1921/1976a)

puts it, “morbid cerebral conditions in general” (p. 451, para. 765).

Jung (1952/1969x) also characterizes an abaissement as “a certain

narrowing of consciousness and a corresponding strengthening of the

unconscious” (p. 446, para. 856). Such an alteration of consciousness becomes

especially apparent, Jung says, in individuals experiencing strong emotions. In an

especially intense emotional state, “the tone of the unconscious is heightened,

thereby creating a gradient for the unconscious to flow towards the conscious.

The conscious then comes under the influence of unconscious instinctual impulses

and contents” (p. 446, para. 856). Jung is alluding here to the extraordinary

emotional qualities associated with the archetypes. Archetypes, says Jung,

have a ‘specific charge’ and develop numinous effects which express

themselves as affects. The affect produces a partial abaissement du niveau
mental, for although it raises a particular content to a supernormal degree
of luminosity, it does so by withdrawing so much energy from other
possible contents of consciousness that they become darkened and
eventually unconscious. Owing to the restriction of consciousness
produced by the affect so long as it lasts, there is a corresponding lowering
of orientation which in its turn gives the unconscious a favorable
opportunity to slip into the space vacated. Thus we regularly find that
unexpected or otherwise inhibited unconscious contents break through and
find expression in the affect. Such contents are very often of an inferior or
primitive nature and thus betray their archetypal origin. (pp. 436-437,
para. 841)

Although the conditions associated with an abaissement that Jung describes here

arise in relatively healthy as well as in mentally disturbed individuals, their

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impact on the psyche understandably varies depending upon the stability of the

individual’s personality and the circumstances in which they occur.

Even though a lowering, or narrowing, of consciousness may cause a

subsequent decrease in the ego’s capacity to function and may hinder consistent

and complete trains of thought (Jung, 1939/1972h, p. 236, para. 510), the unity of

the personality is at least potentially preserved when the psyche is relatively stable

(in the case, that is, of relatively healthy or even neurotic individuals). In

individuals suffering from schizophrenia, however, these effects can damage the

personality’s unity (p. 236, para. 511). From Jung’s discussion of latent psychosis

(to which I return in Chapter Five), and from what is known about the

susceptibility of individuals with preexisting psychiatric disorders to

psychedelic-induced psychotic states (see pp. 67-68, above), it is certainly

conceivable that the personality unity of individuals suffering from a latent

psychosis could also be damaged by the effects of an extreme abaissement.

Beyond those letters in which Jung discusses psychedelics (1975a, 1975b,

1975c, 1975d), he only explicitly discusses the psychological effects of

psychedelics in his essay “Schizophrenia” (1958/1972j, p. 263, paras. 569-570).

There he compares schizophrenia and psychedelic experience in terms of an

abaissement du niveau mental. As brief as that discussion is, it provides valuable

insights into the nature of psychedelic-induced psychotic states, and I return to it

in my Jungian interpretation of psychosis in Chapter Five. My intention in this

chapter is only to establish Jung’s view of the basic nature of an abaissement as it

functions in psychedelic experience.

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 Abaissement du Niveau Mental in Psychedelic Experience

Samuels et al. (1986) point out that an abaissement du niveau mental

describes a psychic condition irrespective of the condition’s cause, and they note

that a lowering of the threshold of consciousness is a characteristic effect of

certain drugs (pp. 7-8). In “Schizophrenia,” Jung (1958/1972j) compares the

abaissement induced by schizophrenia with the abaissement induced by

psychedelic drugs. Jung makes this specific comparison within the context of

describing general conditions that can bring about an extreme abaissement, even

in so-called normal people. These are conditions, Jung says,

that somehow threaten the very foundations of the individual’s existence,

for instance in moments of mortal danger, before or after accidents, severe
illnesses, operations, etc., or when psychic problems are developing which
might give his life a catastrophic turn, or in the critical periods of life
when a modification of his previous psychic attitude forces itself
peremptorily upon him, or before, during, and after radical changes in his
immediate or his general surroundings. (p. 262, para. 566)

This description certainly fits the intense suffering and confusion experienced by

persons undergoing difficult psychedelic experiences (see “Difficult Psychedelic

Experiences as Potentially Traumatic,” above).

Jung (1958/1972j) goes on to say that mescaline and related drugs, with

their “countless nuances of form, meaning, and value” (p. 263, para. 569), cause a

lowering of the threshold of consciousness that

renders perceptible the perceptual variants that are normally unconscious,

thereby enriching one’s apperception to an astounding degree, but on the
other hand making it impossible to integrate them into the general
orientation of consciousness. This is because the accumulation of variants

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 that have become conscious gives each single act of apperception a
dimension that fills the whole of consciousness. (p. 263, para. 569) 29

Jung’s description of the abaissement that is a characteristic psychological

effect of psychedelics brings to mind Grof’s (1980/1994) characterization of the

“mind manifesting” quality of psychedelics as “nonspecific catalysts and

amplifiers of the psyche” (p. 11) and his characterization of the power of

psychedelics to release contents from the deep recesses of the psyche (p. 32).

While psychedelics such as LSD, psilocybin, and mescaline have no specific

psychological effects, Grof (1980/1994) says, increases in psychological and

physical energy levels result in the manifestation of otherwise unconscious

psychological content and processes (p. 11). Grof has a different assessment of

the possibility of integrating the material manifested, however.

Enriched Apperception and the Limits of Integration

Before turning to my Jungian interpretation of psychedelic-induced

psychotic states, I would like to address Jung’s (1958/1972j) view that

psychedelic substances allow consciousness to be flooded with unconscious

content to such “an astounding degree” that it is “impossible to integrate them

into the general orientation of consciousness” (p. 263, para. 569; see also p. 140,

above). This statement, made in 1958, is an unconditional iteration of the

criticism made in Jung’s 1955 letter to Hubbard (1975b; see p. 12, above), that is,

that psychedelics release unconscious content that the individual is not prepared

29
Jung also notes here that “it cannot be denied that schizophrenic apperception
is very similar” (p. 263, para. 569), a comparison to which I return in Chapter Five.
141
to integrate. Jung repeated that criticism in a series of other letters written

between 1954 and 1957 (Jung, 1975a, 1975b, 1975c, 1975d).

Jung’s concept of psychological integration, which I discuss at length in

Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the Therapeutic Process of Integration,” is

central to his psychology and is integrally related to his views regarding the

process of individuation. Integration from a Jungian perspective can generally be

understood as the process of bringing activated unconscious material into a

constructive relationship to consciousness. When Jung declares that psychedelics

are dangerous and that it is impossible to integrate the unconscious material they

release, he seems to be implicitly asserting an overly strict interpretation of one of

his most fundamental principles: the process of psychological development

towards wholeness entails a balanced relationship between consciousness and the

unconscious. However, Tarnas points out, it is more accurate to say that the

process of psychological development towards wholeness entails a movement

towards a balanced relationship between consciousness and the unconscious. And

Jung’s failure to make that distinction in his assessment of psychedelic

psychotherapy lies at the heart of his blatant condemnation of psychedelics

(R. Tarnas, personal communication, April, 2009).

As I discussed in Chapter Three, consciousness and the unconscious are

both essential aspects of life for Jung; and if either is suppressed, there can be no

psychological harmony. Although Jung tirelessly emphasized the vital importance

of the unconscious in the individual’s life, he was just as adamant about the vital

importance of the ego’s capacity to resist the potentially overwhelming chaos of

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the unconscious. For Jung, integration can only occur when consciousness is

stable enough to withstand the onslaught of unconscious material. If at times Jung

seems to overemphasize the importance of the unconscious in relation to

consciousness, this is surely because he was so acutely aware of the dangerous

consequences inherent in the concentrated consciousness of civilized life (see, for

instance, Jung, 1916/1958/1969c, p. 71, para. 139).

The high value Jung placed on the stability of ego-consciousness in the

process of integration is illustrated in his account of his own confrontation with

the unconscious that occurred, as I mentioned, during a period of disorientation

following his split with Freud. Jung (1963) writes in his autobiography of his

paradoxical effort to protect his conscious mind from the chaos of the

unconscious even as he allows himself to drop into the darkness.

An incessant stream of fantasies had been released, and I did my best not
to lose my head but to find some way to understand these strange things. I
stood helpless before an alien world; everything in it seemed difficult and
incomprehensible. I was living in a constant state of tension; often I felt as
if gigantic blocks of stone were tumbling down upon me. One
thunderstorm followed another. My enduring these storms was a question
of brute strength. (pp. 176-177)

What is essential in such experiences, Jung explains, is to differentiate oneself

from the contents of the unconscious and yet “at the same time to bring them into

relationship with consciousness. That is the technique for stripping them of their

power” (p. 187).

Jung’s (1963) effort to protect his conscious personality from the turmoil

of unconscious forces also entailed maintaining the stability of his individual

identity.

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 Particularly at this time, when I was working on the fantasies, I needed a
point of support in "this world," and I may say that my family and my
professional work were that to me. It was most essential for me to have a
normal life in the real world as a counterpoise to that strange inner world.
My family and my profession remained the base to which I could always
return, assuring me that I was an actually existing, ordinary person. The
unconscious contents could have driven me out of my wits. But my family,
and the knowledge: I have a medical diploma from a Swiss university, I
must help my patients, I have a wife and five children, I live at 228
Seestrasse in Küsnacht—these were actualities which made demands upon
me and proved to me again and again that I really existed, that I was not a
blank page whirling about in the winds of the spirit. (p. 189)

In his personal correspondence Jung repeatedly referred to the danger that

psychedelic drugs make it impossible to maintain this necessary balance between

the stability of ego-consciousness and the potentially overwhelming force of the

unconscious. In a 1956 letter to Romola Nijinsky, Jung (1975c) notes that the

intense perceptions induced by mescaline are due to the fact that “the lowering of

consciousness by the drug offers no resistance to the unconscious” (p. 300). In a

1957 letter to psychedelic psychotherapist Betty Eisner, Jung (1975d) explains

that he regards the use of psychedelic drugs with suspicion even though he

recognized that they can open individuals to the same sorts of perceptions and

experiences that occur in mystical states and in analysis. “I don’t feel happy about

these things, since you merely fall into such experiences without being able to

integrate them” (p. 382), he wrote.

Sandison (1963), the Jungian-oriented psychiatrist whose work with

psychedelic psychotherapy I highlighted at the conclusion of my literature review

(pp. 107-111), agrees with Jung regarding the activating property of psychedelics.

“The psychological basis of LSD treatment lies in its peculiar property of

releasing unconscious material” (p. 34), he says. Sandison also acknowledges the

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risks of suicide and psychosis when the natural barriers between ego-onsciousness

and the unconscious are broken down in the absence of a carefully designed and

administered therapeutic environment (pp. 34-35). He argues, however, that

extensive clinical experience provides ample evidence that the rate of

complications in appropriate therapeutic settings is low. Sandison cites an

important 1960 study by Sidney Cohen on the side effects and complications

arising from LSD-enhanced psychotherapy. Cohen (1985) surveyed 62

psychedelic investigators about complications associated with LSD and found that

out of 5,000 people who had taken the drug some 25,000 times “the proportion of

psychotic states that lasted more than 24 hours was about one in a thousand, and

this group included emotionally ill patients” (p. 295). Cohen concludes that

prolonged psychotic reactions are almost completely preventable and that even

the prolonged reactions that do occur tend to subside within a week (pp. 294, 295;

see also Cohen, 1960, 1967).

Sandison (1997) also argues that it is definitely possible for individuals to

successfully integrate the unconscious material released by psychedelic

substances, although he acknowledges this may not occur, and that failure to

integrate such material can raise barriers to further psychological development

(p. 71; see also Cutner, 1959, p. 725). The key to successful integration, Sandison

says, is that individuals receive appropriate support from a skilled therapist

(pp. 71, 82). Even Fordham (1963), a Jungian critic of psychedelic psychotherapy

(see pp. 107, 109-110, above), admits that Jung overstates his case when he says it

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is “impossible” for an individual undergoing psychedelic psychotherapy to

integrate the unconscious material activated by the drug.

Many questions need to be answered as to how individuals undergoing

psychedelic psychotherapy can safely and effectively integrate activated

unconscious material. There are promising indications that the current resurgence

in psychedelic research will lead to more clinical studies of psychedelic

psychotherapy (see “New Research,” above). I would hope to see

Jungian-orientated practitioners taking an active role in such investigations, which

can potentially contribute so much to understanding “the other pole of the world”

(Jung, 1963, p. 189).

Looking back on his clinical experience with LSD psychotherapy,

Sandison (1997) offers another perspective on Jung’s reaction to the use of

psychedelics in the treatment of mentally ill patients, which had been described to

him in a 1954 letter from Victor White (see p. 12, above). As it turns out, the

psychiatric hospital White had visited and written to Jung about was Powick

Hospital, where Sandison and his colleagues had their LSD clinic (p. 69). In his

reply to White, Jung (1975a) commented,

Is the LSD drug mescaline? It has indeed very curious effects, vide Aldous
Huxley [whose The Doors of Perception Jung had read that year]—of
which I know far too little. I don’t know either what its psychotherapeutic
value with neurotic or psychotic patients is. (p. 172)

Sandison concedes that some inexperienced therapists had no idea what to

do with the unconscious material that psychedelic drugs released in their patients,

as Jung charged. Nonetheless, he insists that Jung had fallen into the trap of

voicing prejudiced opinions without knowing what responsible psychedelic

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psychotherapists were actually doing (p. 71). “The experience gained and memory

of that short period of the true therapeutic use of LSD are valuable and precious”

(p. 82), Sandison says.

I believe that it made a real contribution to our understanding of the

human psyche, and the interaction between patient and healer. . . . Sadly,
if we had more support from the analysts in the 1950s we might have been
able to do a great deal more. (p. 82)

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 CHAPTER 5: THE NATURE OF PSYCHEDELIC-INDUCED
PSYCHOTIC STATES

Although Jung’s explicit discussion of psychedelic experience is

extremely limited, his approach to trauma and his extensive discussions of the

shadow, psychosis, and integration are especially relevant to understanding

psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Because the subjects of trauma, the shadow,

and psychosis are integrally related, I discuss them together in this chapter and

Chapter Six, “Trauma, Shadow, and Psychosis: The Transformative Potential.” I

return to discuss integration in Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the

Therapeutic Process of Integration.”

Trauma in Jungian Psychology

Kalsched’s Theory of Trauma and the Self’s Archetypal Defenses

I more fully appreciated the significance of trauma in psychedelic-induced

psychotic states after reading Jungian psychologist Donald Kalsched’s (1996)

pioneering work, The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defenses of the

Personal Spirit, on the primitive, or archaic, psychological defenses in victims of

early childhood trauma. In response to the unbearable psychic pain of

overwhelming life events, Kalsched says, the vulnerable child’s personality can

split and create autonomous persecutory figures, which emerge in dreams and

fantasies as personified archetypal daimonic images. These daimonic images

paradoxically act to protect the personality by carrying out inhibiting attacks on it.

The Greek root of daimonic, a variant of demonic, means to divide (Kalsched,

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p. 11). In Kalsched’s assessment these daimonic persecutory figures divide the

psyche. They are also a self-portrait of the psyche’s dissociative defenses, he says

(pp. 1-2, 11).

The imagery and dynamics of these trauma-induced defenses show

striking parallels to those observed in psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Kalsched’s findings clearly support the common understanding that difficult

psychedelic experiences can release archetypal imagery associated with repressed

trauma. Furthermore, Kalsched’s findings suggest that daimonic images

manifested during difficult psychedelic experiences can reflect the way the psyche

paradoxically protects itself from re-traumatization.

Kalsched’s (1996) Jungian-oriented approach to trauma is especially

valuable to my investigation of trauma vis-à-vis psychedelics because, even

though much of Jung’s psychology is clearly applicable to the study and treatment

of trauma, Jung rarely discussed trauma explicitly. Kalsched’s analysis of Jung’s

approach to trauma is therefore an invaluable guide to this aspect of Jung’s work

and its relation to psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Drawing on a range of theorists, from Freud and Jung to object-relations

and self-psychology theorists such as Winnicott and Kohut, Kalsched (1996)

conceives of trauma as any experience that causes “unbearable psychic pain or

anxiety” (p. 1). Although trauma occurs under a wide variety of conditions, from

physical and sexual abuse to the developmentally destructive effects of unmet

dependency needs, the distinguishing feature of trauma as Kalsched conceives it

is what Heinz Kohut called “disintegration anxiety” (p. 1), which stems from an

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event that threatens to dissolve the personality’s coherence and is “the deepest

anxiety [one] can experience” (quoted in Kalsched, p. 34). When such trauma

occurs in early childhood, before the formation of strong ego defenses, the psyche

relies on more primitive and dissociative unconscious defenses to protect itself.

Although it is widely understood how destructive these defenses can become in

later life, Kalsched argues that we also need to recognize their archetypal nature

and meaning and their life-saving potential (p.2).

Kalsched’s (1996) thinking about trauma-induced disorders relies heavily

on Jung’s work and develops out of Freud and Jung’s early dialogue about the

mythopoetic, daimonic, and uncanny imagery emerging from traumatized

patients. And Kalsched’s approach to trauma-induced disorders has clear parallels

to Jung’s approach to dissociation, which Jung described as a weakening of

consciousness resulting from a splitting of psychological content that becomes

increasingly autonomous in relation to consciousness (Kelly, 1993, p. 53). Yet a

classical Jungian interpretation of trauma-induced imagery and disorders, as

essential as it is for understanding trauma and its treatment, is insufficient in

Kalsched’s view. His interpretation of trauma-induced imagery combines

elements of both Jung’s and Freud’s interpretations with an eclectic selection of

contemporary research on trauma and disassociation, especially from the schools

of object-relations and self-psychology (Kalsched, pp. 2, 7).

Kalsched’s (1996) approach to trauma highlights the way dramatic

narrative patterns in dream imagery and other unconscious material symbolize the

psyche’s dissociative fragments and defensive processes—and thereby promote

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healing by bringing to consciousness previously unrecognized affects associated

with traumatic experiences (pp. 2-3). This insight into the therapeutic value of

bizarre psychological imagery, which often reflects ancient mythological and

religious symbols, brings to mind the work of Jungian analyst John Weir Perry,

who in the 1970s became a leading proponent of the transformative potential of

acute psychotic episodes. Perry (1999) asserted that, with proper attention, even

the apparently scattered images expressed by a person suffering acute psychic

upheaval may take on coherent form and may reveal a meaningful process of

psychological development (pp. 4-5).

I believe the therapeutic principles underlying Kalsched’s and Perry’s

work strongly support the value of carefully analyzing the fantastic imagery

associated with psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Such analysis can reveal

meaningful patterns that manifest the psyche’s attempt to transform trauma into

psychospiritual development. In addition, the process of bringing to

consciousness repressed trauma, related shadow material, and associated affects

can promote healing in its own right.

Kalsched’s Model of the Psyche’s Archetypal Self-Care System

Kalsched’s (1996) field of investigation concerns what happens within the

psyches of people who experience unbearable events in their lives. More

specifically, Kalsched asks how inner “object-images” compensate for such

overwhelming experiences, and how the psyche creates meaning when shattering

events threaten to destroy all meaning in the individual’s life (p. 1). Unconscious

imagery that Kalsched’s patients have reported, in combination with recent

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clinical research, reveals that childhood trauma typically results in archaic,

archetypal, and dissociative patterns of psychic fragmentation that manifest as

personified dyads. This dyadic structure typically takes the form of a “progressed”

part of the personality that adopts a “caretaking” relationship to a “regressed” part

(p. 3). The regressed part of the personality is usually expressed through images

of vulnerability and innocence and represent, Kalsched believes, the perennially

mysterious essence or core of the individual’s personality or selfhood. Kalsched

calls this essence the “personal spirit” (p. 3).

The progressed, or caretaking, part of the personality, can be represented

by “a powerful benevolent or malevolent great being who protects or persecutes

its vulnerable partner” (Kalsched, 1996, p. 3). Sometimes the protector figure

presents both benevolent and malevolent aspects, thereby representing a protector

and persecutor in one. An excellent example of this complex protector-persecutor

figure, I think, would be my psychedelic vision of a demanding God figure who

challenged me to kill myself in order to escape Hell and be with him in heaven.

Most often the caretaking figure is represented unambiguously albeit

paradoxically as a terrifying figure like the Devil. As such it exhibits compelling

parallels to Jung’s concept of the Self’s dark side, the archetype of evil (Kalsched,

1996, pp. 3-4). One of Jung’s psychological characterizations of the Devil, in the

form of Mephistopheles, is as “the diabolical aspect of every psychic function that

has broken loose from the hierarchy of the total psyche and now enjoys

independence and absolute power” (1936/1968a, p. 69, para. 88). Kalsched points

out that the root meaning of the word diabolical is to throw (ballein) across or

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apart (dia), which is also the root for the word Devil, “he who crosses, thwarts, or

dis-integrates (dissociation)” (pp. 16-17). Corbett (1996) notes that the Hebraic

root for Satan (or perhaps Devil; Corbett’s phrasing is ambiguous here) is to

persecute (p. 196).

The key principle underlying Kalsched’s (1996) trauma theory is

expressed in the idea that the violation of the inner core of the personality is

unthinkable, and that therefore, if other defense mechanisms fail, archetypal

defenses will go to any length, including killing the host personality (suicide), to

protect the Self (p. 3). As Kalsched conceives it, the dynamic of progressed versus

regressed parts of the personality makes up what he calls “the psyche’s archetypal

self-care system” (p.4). As its name implies, this dynamic dyadic structure

appears to emerge from the deepest layers of the unconscious because the imagery

and affects associated with the self-care system have the numinous qualities of the

archetypal unconscious as Jung conceived it. “When the ego falls through the

abyss of trauma into the darkness of the unconscious psyche,” Kalsched says, “it

falls into an archetypal world which is experienced by the ego as numinous—dark

or light. Unfortunately for the trauma victim, the numinous usually constellates

negatively” (p. 216).

The ultimate effect of the psyche’s paradoxical protector-prosecutor figure

is to protect the traumatized personality by becoming an anti-life force in which

new opportunities are experienced as threatening and re-traumatization is avoided

by repeated isolation from reality through such disorders as dissociation, schizoid

withdrawal, addiction, and depression (Kalsched, 1996, pp. 4-5). As much as the

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individual wants to change, “something more powerful than the ego continually

undermines progress and destroys hope. It is . . . as if the individual were

possessed by some diabolical power” (p. 5).

Trauma and Dissociation in Jung’s Psychology

What Kalsched (1996) describes as the daimonic, dividing, nature of the

paradoxical self-care system is discussed by Jung in terms of dissociation. The

symbolic daimon figure Kalsched has seen so often in the unconscious imagery of

his traumatized patients seems to personify the psyche’s dissociative defenses

against overwhelming events that it is unable to integrate (p. 11). Yet, Kalsched

asks, “How did the internal guardian figures of this [self-care] ‘system’ and their

vulnerable child ‘clients’ get organized in the unconscious, and from whence did

they derive their awesome power over the patient’s well-intentioned ego?”

(p. 12). To start to answer these fundamental questions, Kalsched turns to Jung’s

interpretation of psychological dissociation.

Jung demonstrated in word association tests that dissociation is the

psyche’s defense against the damaging impact of trauma (Kalsched, 1996, p. 13).

When physical withdrawal from injury is impossible, the psyche withdraws part

of the personality by splitting itself into fragments. The unbearable experience is

distributed to different parts of the individual’s mind and body, especially to the

unconscious. This accounts for “flashbacks of sensation,” says Kalsched, which

are often disconnected from the context in which they occur (p. 13). This

resonates, of course, with the well-known phenomenon of a psychedelic

flashback.

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 Although psychological dissociation helps traumatized individuals to go

about their lives in the world, the psychological price can be severe. The

psychological consequences of trauma can continue to haunt the mind in the form

of what Jung called feeling-toned complexes, which take the form of images

associated with a strong affect and which can manifest as frightening

psychological beings (Jung, 1920/1969e; 1937/1969m, p. 121, para. 253;

Kalsched, 1996, pp. 12-13). Jung observed that when a trauma-induced complex

causes a dissociation of the psyche, this psychological complex can have an

autonomous quality that acts in tyrannical opposition to the conscious mind. “The

explosion of affect is a complete invasion of the individual,” says Jung

(1921/1966e). “It pounces upon him like an enemy or a wild animal” (pp. 131-

132, para. 267). In a separate passage on hysteria, Jung (1906/1973a) adds,

The complex has an abnormal autonomy . . . and a tendency to an active

separate existence, which reduces and replaces the constellating power of
the ego-complex. In this way a new morbid personality is gradually
created, the inclinations, judgments, and resolutions of which move only
in the direction of the will to be ill. This second personality devours what
is left of the normal ego and forces it into the role of a secondary
(oppressed) complex. (pp. 406-407, para. 861)

Despite Jung’s characterization of the violent nature of traumatic

complexes, Kalsched (1996) argues that Jung failed to understand the violence

inherent in the psyche’s archaic, dissociative defenses against trauma. This,

Kalsched believes, is an insight that came more recently from contemporary

psychoanalysis. “Splitting is a violent affair—like the splitting of an atom”

(p. 13), Kalsched says. “This is a fact that strangely eluded Jung. Despite his

awareness that traumatic affect may appear in dreams as a ‘wild animal,’ he did

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not include violent affect in his understanding of the psyche’s primitive defenses

themselves” (pp. 13-14).

Kalsched (1996) presents extensive evidence of these self-attacking

dissociative defenses from his psychotherapeutic practice with trauma victims,

where he has observed repeatedly that as a past traumatic experience begins to

emerge into the consciousness of his patients, “an intra-psychic [dream] figure or

‘force’. . . violently intervenes and dissociates the psyche. This figure’s diabolical

‘purpose’ seems to be to prevent the dream-ego from experiencing the

‘unthinkable’ affect associated with the trauma” (p. 14) by terrifying it into a state

of horror and despair (p. 16). Ironically, the diabolical figure traumatizes the

subject’s inner world in order to protect him or her from becoming re-traumatized

in the outer world (p. 14).

The intra-psychic figures from many of Kalsched’s case-study

descriptions resonate strongly with the persecutory tone that can permeate

difficult psychedelic experiences. It is not unusual, explains Grof (1980/1994), for

threatening or demonic images to arise, or for the therapist to assume demonic

form, when individuals undergo psychedelic psychotherapy for severe trauma

(pp. 74, 100).

Sandison (1954) reports the case of a woman of 26 years suffering suicidal

depression related to her psychopathic father and the death of her mother when

she was 12 (p. 511). During the woman’s first LSD psychotherapy session, she

“met the spider, a huge, ugly, terrifying and menacing animal, quite out of her

control” (p. 512).

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 Then followed many experiences of the spider of which the following is a
fair descriptive example: “Flashes of a woman’s face, I think my mother’s.
Continuous pictures of the four eyes of the spider and complete spiders
advancing upon me (coloured green and black) . . . . The spider never
touches me but seems to want to enfold me and take me bodily.” (p. 512)

Cutner (1959) discusses the case of a woman in her early 30s suffering

from severe depression and paranoid tendencies. As a child this woman had a

traumatizing relationship to her mother stemming from unmet dependency needs.

Reporting on one of her LSD psychotherapy sessions, this woman says,

I saw my mother driving the sheep down the lane, and I saw a full-sized
bear walking among the trees and peeping at me. I saw a wood where the
trees were growing almost trunk to trunk and the ground was covered by
undergrowth. . . . (p. 740)

In this experience, Cutner notes, the collective, or archetypal images,

mainly of the Mother-archetype, emerge behind, or just after, her memory

of her real mother in the nursing chair. The wood—the trees—the bear—
the witch. The witch was actually seen, sitting on the chair in the clinic
room. On another occasion, the image of the bear was projected directly
onto the Analyst after the patient had experienced ‘deep longing’ for her
mother. (p. 741)

Leuner (1983) relays the following LSD-induced vision by a 23-year-old

university assistant during psychedelic psychotherapy. The young woman had a

history of traumatizing experiences during early childhood, and she suffered from

recurrent neurotic depression, aggressive outbursts against her parents, and

suicidal tendencies. “I saw Hitler several times. Then something very strange

happened: Hitler became my father, drove our car and came into our house. . . .”

(p. 180).

The intra-psychic figures from many of Kalsched’s case-study

descriptions resonate strongly with the persecutory tone that characterized my

early, 1967, psychedelic experiences in general and with the specific projections I
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experienced in 2006 during an MDMA-enhanced psychotherapy session in

particular. In that session I was attempting to probe my early traumatic

psychedelic experiences to reach a deeper understanding of my repeated

perceptions during those trips that God wanted me to kill myself in order to

achieve redemption. As I was struggling to recount an especially traumatic LSD

experience—my actual attempt to kill myself one night by driving into an

oncoming car—I suddenly and shockingly perceived a man observing the session

as Satan himself. Then I perceived the three other people supporting me in the

session as Satan’s demonic assistants. I was able to tell the three people sitting

with me what I was experiencing, and in the process of speaking with them I

gained some perspective on my feeling of being in Hell. This process had benefits

of its own, and the session led to months of fruitful inquiry on my part into the

role of trauma in my life. But the focus of the session had dramatically shifted

from gaining insight into my self-destructive vision to slowly working through

my terror and reestablishing trust for the three people helping me.

Again, Kalsched (1996) has repeatedly observed that the terrifying actions

of the inner daimonic figure seem to fragment one’s emotional experience in a

way that precludes conscious awareness of pain that has emerged or is about to

emerge in psychotherapy.

In effect, the diabolical figure traumatizes the inner object world in order
to prevent re-traumatization in the outer one. If this impression is correct,
it means that a traumatogenic imago haunts these patients’ psyches,
supervising dissociative activities, reminding one of Jung’s early suspicion
that ‘fantasies can be just as traumatic in their effect as real traumata’. . . .
In other words, the full pathological effect of trauma requires an outer
event and a psychological factor. Outer trauma alone doesn’t split the

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 psyche. An inner psychological agency—occasioned by the trauma—does
the splitting. (p. 14)

Given Jung’s (1936/1968a) view that the diabolical aspect of split-off

psychic functions can be perceived by the individual only when the function

becomes a separate, objective entity such as a dream image (p. 69, para. 88), it is

possible that my experience of seeing Satan represents a significant breakthrough

in my attempt to come to terms with psychedelic experiences that have haunted

me my entire adult life. Perhaps this partially accounts for the strong feelings of

exhilaration and gratitude that emerged several days after the session. This

healing potential was reported in each of the other three cases I just cited, and I

will discuss in detail the transformative potential of such experiences in Chapter

Six, “Trauma, Shadow, and Psychosis: The Transformative Potential.”

The key to understanding Kalsched’s complex concept of the daimonic

persecutory-protective figures, I think, is to see that the daimonic figures created

by the psyche as a consequence of the original trauma paradoxically act to protect

the individual from reexperiencing the pain of the original trauma by continually

terrifying, and thus retraumatizing, the individual. If the therapeutic process

brings the individual too close to reexperiencing the original pain, the daimonic

figures distract the individual by terrifying him. Or, as the case of Jung’s incest

victim (which I discuss shortly) illustrates, they protect the individual by

preventing her from venturing beyond her dissociative isolation to form new,

potentially dangerous, relationships. These psychic figures are like parents who

protect their children from a dangerous world by keeping them shut up in the

cellar. They protect destructively.

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 I believe the paradoxical nature of these psychic figures explains

Kalsched’s use of the word daimonic instead of demonic. Both words convey

positive as well as negative qualities. Both can mean fiendish, diabolical, evil, on

the one hand, or “motivated by a spiritual force or genius” (American Heritage

Dictionary, 1996), on the other. The Greek root of both is daim½n, meaning

divine power (American Heritage Dictionary). Thus, Socrates spoke of his

daimon as his divine guide and protector (R. Tarnas, personal communication,

May 14, 2009). Yet daimonic more explicitly carries benevolent as well as

destructive qualities, and thus more effectively conveys the paradoxically

protective quality of Kalsched’s hypothetical psychic figures.

In anticipation of my investigation into the Jungian concept of the shadow,

and the relationship between the shadow and trauma, I will close this section by

noting Kalsched’s (1996) explanation that the diabolical figure can appear as “a

true agent of death, . . . a truly perverse factor in psychological life” (p. 27),

which becomes a formidable resistance to psychological growth and to life itself.

As such, the archaic disintegrative energies of this figure should not be attributed

to the personal shadow but rather to what Jung conceptualized as the archetypal

shadow, the dark side of the Self (Kalsched, p. 28). We must also keep in mind,

however, that mysteriously ambivalent Self figures such as Satan or Mercurius,

the trickster figure of alchemy, represent, as symbols of the ostensibly evil

characteristics of the psyche, the power to heal as well as to destroy. As such, they

are diabolical forces of transformation (pp. 38-39).

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 Trauma and Jung’s Theory of the Complex

Before Freud and Jung’s time, psychologists such as Charcot and Janet

had discovered multiple centers of organization within the psyche, and they

understood that an autonomous secondary personality could take over a person’s

primary personality during altered states of consciousness. Even during this

earlier period, such secondary personalities were understood to be daimonic in

that they had destructive powers of possession that originated in trauma yet

somehow blocked memories of the trauma (Ellenberger, 1970; Kalsched, 1996,

p. 68).

By the time of Freud’s early work it was understood that healing could be

effected by hypnotically inducing this daimonic state of consciousness. But the

mechanism of the disorder was thought to be either mental weakness or brain

lesions, and therefore it was difficult to explain how a cure could come about by

evoking, and “exorcizing,” the daimon (Kalsched, 1996, p. 69). Using hypnosis

with his hysterical patients, Freud’s clinical practice led him to the concept of

psychic reality and thus a psychological theory of trauma, in which trauma

resulted from a lesion, or injury, to the psyche. Freud then hypothesized that

memories of the trauma became cut off from consciousness in what he called a

“second psychical group” or a “sub-conscious complex of ideas,” which resisted

healing (quoted in Kalsched, p. 69). Given the difficulty in tracing the patient’s

memory of the original traumatic event, Freud characteristically concluded that its

origin lay in the patient’s sex life (pp. 69-70).

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 A significant shift occurred in Freud's theory when he came to understand

that his patients were often struggling with fantasies of sexual trauma rather than

actual traumatic events, an insight that developed into his notorious theory of the

Oedipus complex. This leads us, by way of a rather truncated summation, 30 to

Jung’s statement that “fantasies can be just as traumatic in their effects as real

traumata” (quoted in Kalsched, 1996, p. 71). Although Jung disagreed with

Freud’s narrow sexual interpretation of trauma’s etiology, he agreed with Freud’s

fundamental hypothesis that trauma involves a psychological element that splits

the psyche and resists healing. Through his own word association studies, Jung

came to understand that his subjects’ associations were often blocked by affects,

which led to his theory of psychic dissociation and the concept of multiple

feeling-toned complexes, each with an archetypal core of images and affects that

indicated a deeper, numinous level of the unconscious. This numinous domain

was by definition both awe-inspiring and terrifying—and therefore potentially

traumatic in its own right. For Jung, then, this realm of archetypal images and

associated complexes became the universal source of trauma-induced unconscious

anxiety and fantasy (Kalsched, 1996, pp. 70-72; see also Samuels et al., 1986,

pp. 33-35). “A situation threatening danger pushes aside the tranquil play of ideas

30
Kalsched’s review of Freud’s developing thought on trauma as it relates to
Jung’s, as well as subsequent object-relations theory, is intriguing in its own right.
Although Freud’s early trauma theory focused on milder forms of trauma and reduced its
psychic defense mechanisms to repression (as opposed to dissociation), he was later
forced to address the complexities of severe trauma. His consequent theoretical
speculations “beyond the pleasure principle” led him to deeper and more complex notions
of resistance such as the repetition compulsion, negative therapeutic reactions, the death
instinct, and the severe superego—ideas that coincide to a surprising extent with Jung’s
thought on the more archaic and daimonic, if not religious, functions of the deeper psyche
(pp. 79-83).
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and puts in their place a complex of other ideas with a very strong feeling-tone,”

said Jung (1907/1972b, p. 41, para. 84). “The new complex then crowds

everything else into the background” (para. 84). For Jung (1934/1969k), then,

complexes originate in the emotional shock of trauma (p. 98, para. 204).

Jung’s model of dissociative complexes is well illustrated by his early

psychoanalytic treatment of an incest victim, a case that brings together all the

key elements of my thesis with the exception of psychedelics (i.e., trauma,

shadow, psychosis, and psychospiritual transformation). 31 Jung’s 19-year-old

patient had become catatonically psychotic and had withdrawn from the world

into dissociative fantasies of an alienated life on the moon that was ruled by an

evil vampire who killed women and children. Having patiently coaxed her into

revealing the content of her psychosis, Jung recognized meaning (as opposed to

mere sexual wishes) in the young woman’s bizarre fantasies. Jung’s intense

interest in her struggle allowed her to overcome the daimonic power of her

fantasy figure and relate meaningfully to another human being for the first time

since her psychosis had broken out, whereby she slowly came to recognize the

necessity of living on earth.

In Kalsched’s terms, the young woman’s trauma had fragmented her

psyche, creating the archaic, daimonic image of the moon vampire that

paradoxically persecuted and protected her by drawing her vulnerable ego into a

delusional isolation from the outer world. That is, the psychotic imagery of her

31
The case of the incest victim discussed by Kalsched (1996, pp. 72-78) is
presented by Jung (1958/1972j) in his essay “Schizophrenia” (pp. 264-256, paras. 571-
572). Jung had treated this young woman years earlier, when he worked at Burghölzli
Mental Hospital.
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archaic self-care system protected her from injury by insuring that she would

never trust anyone again. Jung’s patience, empathy, and authentic engagement

with the archetypal-transpersonal nature of her psychic reality helped her replace

her reliance on the archaic, daimonic defenses of her psyche’s self-care system

with an authentic life among people in this world.

Furthermore, the insufferable nature of the young woman’s trauma

necessitated a metaphorical form of representation that Jung characterizes as

redemptive, which bears on the relationship between trauma and religious

imagery. In his book God is Trauma, Jungian analyst Greg Mogenson (2005)

says,

It is not just that God is unknowable and unimaginable; it is that we reach

for “God” most earnestly when imagination fails us. . . [T]o stand before
an event for which we have no metaphors is to stand in the tabernacle of
the Lord. (quoted in Kalsched, 1996, p. 77)

And, suggests Mogenson, the path to healing lies in the painfully slow process of

working and reworking the symbolic metaphors that arise from the unconscious in

response to trauma (Kalsched, p. 77). This process brings to mind the creative

unfolding of the symbolic unconscious that Jung refers to as the transcendent

function (p. 86), to which I return in Chapter Seven, “Jung’s Approach to the

Therapeutic Process of Integration.” As Kalsched puts it, Jung’s dissociative

model of a pluralistic psyche “includes a religious or numinous background to the

imaginal psyche which seems . . . crucial in understanding severe forms of

character pathology and [their] primitive defenses” (p. 78). I would add that the

psyche’s religious, or numinous, background also seems crucial in understanding

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the transformative potential of these trauma-induced defenses, to which I return in

Chapter 6, “Trauma, Shadow, and Psychosis: The Transformative Potential.”

In introducing the case of the young victim of sexual trauma as an

illustration of Jung’s model of dissociative complexes, I mentioned that the case

brings together most of the key elements of my thesis. In this case, the element of

the shadow played out especially dramatically in relation to trauma, psychosis,

and transformation. At one point in her treatment, the young woman improved

enough to take a job as a nurse in a sanatorium. When a young doctor made a pass

at her, she shot him with a concealed pistol she had been carrying. (He survived,

and she went on to live a normal life.) In her last interview with Jung, she told

him that she would have shot him, too, if he had failed her. We can understand

how this young woman, who had become catatonic after having been the victim

of incest with her older brother when she was 15, would carry a great deal of

repressed anger in her shadow. I will touch on this in relation to my own case in

the next section of this chapter, “The Shadow in Jung’s Psychology."

The Affective Foundation of Jung’s Psychology

Despite emphasis on the psyche’s mental and spiritual functions in later

Jungian theory, Kalsched views affect as the basic functional unit and key

organizing principle of Jung’s psychology, citing Jung’s (1907/1972b) early

statement that “the essential basis of our personality is affectivity. Thought and

action are, as it were, only symptoms of affectivity” (p. 38, para. 78). Life

experiences associated with a strong affect become organized around a

feeling-toned complex, which Jung (1913/1973b) characterized as “a collection of

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various ideas, held together by an emotional tone common to all” (p. 599, para.

1350), and which he called “a higher psychic unity” (1907/1972b, p. 40, para. 82).

Jung’s affect orientation has not been fully appreciated, says Kalsched (1996),

because feeling later came to mean “valuing” as one type of consciousness in

Jung’s typology, along with sensation, intuition, and thinking. When he speaks of

feeling-toned complexes, however, Jung uses feeling to mean “emotion” or

“affect” (Kalsched, p. 89).

Jung’s Concept of Possession by Complexes and Its Relation to Kalsched’s

Archaic Defenses

As part of the psyche’s symbol-forming nature, feeling-toned complexes

tend to take form in dreams, fantasy, and other unconscious material as

personified images, or beings, which interact with the conscious ego (Kalsched,

1996, pp. 89-90). Perry (1976) referred to these complex-based images as “affect

images” (p. 28), and Jung (1926/1969f) spoke of them as “the image of a

personified affect” (p. 330, para. 628). Complexes constitute, then, the people

who populate our dreams, the hallucinatory voices that haunt schizophrenics, and

the figures, ghosts, demons, or spirits of our visions.

More or less autonomous complexes exist in everyone—“even in so-called

normals,” says Jung (1913/1973b, p. 602, para. 1354). Yet,

especially in those states where the complex temporarily replaces the ego,
we see that a strong complex possesses all the characteristics of a separate
personality. . . . somewhat like a small secondary mind, which deliberately
(though unknown to consciousness) drives at certain intentions which are
contrary to the conscious intentions of the individual. (p. 601, para. 1352)

The extent to which these complexes disturb the ego depends upon the degree of

their autonomy, which in turn is determined by the strength of their affect, or what
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Jung called their “affect-intensity” (p. 601, para. 1352). The superstition that

insane persons are “‘possessed’ by demons” has a certain validity, says Jung,

because such patients actually have autonomous complexes, which can behave

independently of the ego and completely overpower the individual’s self-control

(p. 601, para. 1352). Indeed, Jung refers to some forms of psychosis as “complex

disease[s]” (p. 602, para. 1353).

In his essay “The Psychological Foundation of Belief in Spirits,” Jung

(1920/1969e) distinguishes between unconscious autonomous complexes of a

personal and those of an archetypal nature. Those of a personal nature that are

related to an identifiable painful event in one’s life tend to be comprehensible

even if disturbing. A complex embedded in the collective unconscious, however,

is experienced by the individual as utterly foreign and irrational; and the

individual can understandably perceive its influence as literally coming from

outside himself or herself. Hence the notion of being possessed by a spirit. More

specifically, the conscious experience of a complex arising out of the archetypal

unconscious “is felt as strange, uncanny, and . . . fascinating [and] the conscious

mind falls under its spell, either feeling it as something pathological, or else being

alienated by it from normal life” (p. 311, para. 590). The eruption of such alien

content from the collective unconscious, Jung notes, is a symptom of mental

illness (p. 311, para. 590), and in his judgment this occurs “when something so

devastating happens to the individual that his whole previous attitude to life

breaks down” (p. 314., para. 594). If, on the other hand, this alien content from

the archetypal unconscious can be translated into the language of consciousness in

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some form, it can have “a redeeming effect” (pp. 314-315, paras. 595-596), says

Jung, suggesting the transformative as well as the pathological potential of

complexes of the archetypal unconscious.

Jung’s possessing spirits correspond to the persecutory-protective

daimonic figures Kalsched has so often encountered in the unconscious material

of traumatized patients. Jung’s spirits and Kalsched’s daimonic figures both

uncannily arise out of the archetypal unconscious with a terrifying impact on the

conscious mind. “As the affect-images of the collective layer of the psyche,

archetypes structure the most archaic, and primordial (primitive) emotional

experience in images,” says Kalsched (1996, p. 91).

If we can imagine the volcanic storms of affect that rampage through the
[child’s traumatized] psyche, we get some inkling as to why the forms
given such affect are themselves archaic, i.e., images of daimons or
angels—of titanic, god-like ‘great beings’ which threaten to annihilate the
immature ego. Potentiated by severe trauma, these inner figures continue
to traumatize the inner world. (p. 91)

The cases of the three women who suffered childhood trauma and

underwent LSD-assisted psychotherapy (pp. 156-157, above) illustrate the

psychedelic-induced emergence of unconscious imagery that is consistent with

Kalsched’s model of the psyche’s archetypal self-care system and its

persecutory-protective daimonic figures. Being of course intimately familiar with

my own case, I have been especially stuck by the resonance between the imagery

and dynamics of these archaic defenses and my own psychedelic-induced

psychotic states. Following the first psychedelic-induced psychotic experience in

1967, my psychedelic experiences and countless spontaneous recurrences have

consistently been pervaded by a sense that the world is a dark, threatening, hellish

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place. And because demonic imagery became strikingly explicit during my most

recent psychedelic experiences, Kalsched’s work has inspired me to take more

seriously the role of trauma in my own psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Kalsched’s work with victims of early childhood trauma suggests that the

explicit daimonic content of my most recent psychedelic experiences might be

due to more than the traumatic nature of my first psychedelic experiences at the

age of 19. It seems to me now that those first terrifying psychedelic experiences

could have released latent archetypal imagery associated with the traumatic

third-degree burns I suffered at the age of 2.

The origin of my psychedelic-induced psychotic states in early childhood

trauma also could account for the persistence and intensity of the spontaneous

recurrences I have experienced since my first traumatic psychedelic trips over 40

years ago. As Kalsched (1996) explains, the unbearable experience is distributed

to different parts of the mind and body, especially to the unconscious, and this

accounts for flashbacks of sensation that are often disconnected from the context

in which they occur (p. 13). Of course the connection Kalsched makes between

trauma and flashbacks of sensation recalls the phenomenon of the psychedelic

flashback or spontaneous recurrence. During the countless spontaneous

recurrences I have experienced, I momentarily relive a terrifying existential

silence and feel that I am either in Hell or insane—perceptions I first experienced

on LSD. Kalsched’s work has recently led me believe that those first

psychedelic-induced psychotic states in 1967 were possibly a version--a kind of

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flashback experience, if you will—of what I first experienced during the traumatic

burns I sustained at the age of two.

The Shadow in Jung’s Psychology

According to a former student and colleague of Jung’s, Liliane Frey-Rohn,

Jung referred to “the shadow side of the psyche” as early as 1912 in

characterizing Freud’s concepts of the repressed parts of the personality and its

unrecognized desires. The shadow for Jung most closely corresponds to the

repressed for Freud. Jung, however, conceived of the shadow as an autonomous

unconscious personality, or the other in oneself, a consequence of the ego’s

tendency to deny all negative aspects of itself, which in turn coalesce in the

unconscious. The shadow thereby serves a compensating function by making up

for our “one-sided,” or imbalanced, conscious identification with only that which

we find acceptable (Zweig & Abrams, 1991, pp. 3-4). Whitmont (1991) defines

the shadow as “that part of the personality which has been repressed for the sake

of the ego ideal” (p. 12).

By 1917, in his essay “On the Psychology of the Unconscious,” Jung

(1917/1966b) formally defined the shadow as “the ‘negative’ side of the

personality, the sum of all those unpleasant qualities we like to hide, together with

the insufficiently developed functions and the contents of the personal

unconscious” (p. 66, para. 103n). That is, the shadow also contains traits we

would not consider negative and even characteristics that are valued by the

individual’s culture. Although the psychopath comes immediately to mind, we

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might more profitably consider the occasional difficulty many of us have

manifesting qualities such as generosity and gentleness.

In a later essay, “The Shadow,” Jung (1948/1969v) quite succinctly

outlines the complexity of the shadow phenomenon: its personal and archetypal

nature, the resistance it engenders within the individual (and the ferocity of one’s

consequent unconscious projections), its emotional and autonomous nature

(which accounts for its power to overwhelm and isolate the ego), and the moral

effort required for its assimilation into consciousness (pp. 8-10, paras. 13-19).

Given the complex nature of the shadow in Jung’s thought and its apparent

relationship to so much of his work as a whole, the ideas he packs into his short,

three-page, essay deserve a more lengthy treatment than the scope of this

dissertation allows. I nonetheless define here briefly Jung’s concept of the shadow

and outline its relationship to trauma, psychedelic-induced psychotic states, and

transformation.

Personal and Archetypal Levels of the Shadow

Again and again Jung distinguishes between the personal and the

archetypal levels of the unconscious. And this is certainly true in his treatment of

the shadow. If I try to draw a definite distinction between the personal and the

archetypal unconscious, however, I find that this creates some confusion. When

Jung (1948/1969v) refers to the shadow as an archetype (p. 8, para. 13), for

instance, I have a difficult time thinking of it as part of the personal unconscious.

It helps me to realize that sharp distinctions between the personal and archetypal,

both as dimensions of experience and as categories of the unconscious, do not

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likely reflect the psyche’s actual complexity, as suggested by the title of

Williams’s essay “The Indivisibility of the Personal and Collective Unconscious”

(cited in Samuels, Shorter, & Plaut, 1986, p. 27). Williams’s indivisibility

hypothesis is supported by Joseph Henderson’s (1990) observation that the

psyche’s different levels are intimately interrelated and should not be separated in

the therapist’s mind even when patients experience their problems at only one

level (p. 69). Henderson identifies three levels of the shadow: the personal, the

cultural, and the archetypal. This is a valuable categorization scheme that suggests

various nuanced interrelationships worth more detailed consideration. I will focus

here on the personal and archetypal levels, nevertheless.

A relatively flexible distinction between personal and archetypal levels of

the unconscious makes even more sense when we understand that the concept of

the complex, which Jung conceived as a collection of images with a common

affective tone and an archetypal core, enabled him to connect the personal and

archetypal levels of an individual’s experience (Samuels et al., 1986, p. 34).

Keeping in mind that all complexes have for Jung an archetypal core, I conceive

of the shadow as a set of complexes, as Whitmont suggests (1991, p. 15). The

inseparable nature of the personal and archetypal shadows is also supported by

Corbett’s (1996) characterization of the personal shadow as the totality of

“demonic” complexes “formed around negatively toned archetypal components of

the Self. . . . [T]heir archetypal cores are pieces of the transpersonal shadow, or

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the dark side of the Self” (p. 197). That is, the dark side of the Self is the

archetypal core of those complexes that produce destruction and pain, and painful

complexes can be seen as “incarnations” of the dark side of the Self (p. 195).

Although Jung (1948/1969v) claims that the shadow “represents first and

foremost the personal unconscious” (p. 10, para. 19), he also says that it is

sometimes manifested—with even greater intensity—at the level of the archetypal

unconscious. “It is quite within the bounds of possibility for a man to recognize

the relative evil of his nature,” Jung says, “but it is a rare and shattering

experience for him to gaze into the face of absolute evil” (p. 10, para. 19). (This is

the only reference to absolute evil in the General Index to the Collected Works of

C. G. Jung [Jung, 1979, p. 257]. By absolute evil, I understand Jung to mean the

dark side of the God archetype, or the Self.) Henderson (1990) maintains that

Jung’s truest insight into psychological reality, and his real interest, was not the

ego and its personal shadow but the Self and its archaic and archetypal shadow

nature (p. 66). This assertion is born out in Jung’s (1952/1969w) monumental

Answer to Job, in which he analyzes Job’s shattering encounter with Yahweh as a

symbolic representation of the individual’s confrontation with the dark side of the

Self.

More accurately, Yahweh represents a paradoxical combination of

opposites, and Jung’s (1952/1969w) characterization of this complexio

oppositorum (p. 443, para. 716), which was one of his favorite definitions of the

Self as “the total union of opposites” (Kelly, 1993, p. 3), is reminiscent of the

persecutory-protective daimonic figure in Kalsched’s trauma-induced self-care

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system. The Hebraic God, Kalsched (1996) says, “rages against his people,

persecutes them, . . . sadistically tortures them without provocation, all the while

demanding constant bloody sacrifices to propitiate his wrath” (p. 97). Yet this

wrathful God also provides guidance and protection to his people (p. 97). In

Answer to Job, Jung describes Yahweh as “both persecutor and helper in one, and

the one aspect is as real as the other. Yahweh is not split but is an antinomy—a

totality of inner opposites—and this is the indispensable condition for his

tremendous dynamism” (p. 369, para. 567).

The Overwhelmingly Numinous Nature of the Archetypal Psyche

The tremendous dynamism of the Self archetype as both persecutor and

helper gives the experience of the Self—in both its sublime and destructive

aspects—its overwhelmingly numinous quality. Jung often describes the

experience of an archetype in religious terms. In “A Psychological Approach to

the Dogma of the Trinity,” Jung (1942/1969s) describes archetypal experience in

terms of “holiness,” an idea or thing that

possesses the highest value, and in the presence of [which] men are, so to
speak, struck dumb. Holiness is also revelatory: it is the illuminative
power emanating from an archetypal figure. Nobody ever feels himself to
be the subject of such a process, but always as its object. He does not
perceive holiness, it takes him captive and overwhelms him; nor does he
behold it in a revelation, it reveals itself to him. . . . Everything happens
apparently outside the sphere of his will, and these things are contents of
the unconscious. (p. 152, para. 225) 32

32
This passage reflects Jung’s indebtedness to Nietzsche, from whose Ecce
Homo Jung is quoting almost word for word without attribution (R. Tarnas, personal
communication, May 14, 2009).
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 In his book The Idea of the Holy, Rudolf Otto (1958) describes the quality

of the numinous mysterium that is expressed in Job’s encounter with Yahweh.

After reviewing God’s demonstration of overwhelming power through examples

of such creations as the Leviathan and the Behemoth, Otto says:

Assuredly these beasts would be the most unfortunate examples that one
could hit upon if searching for evidence of the purposefulness of the
divine ‘wisdom.’ But they . . . do express in masterly fashion the
downright stupendousness, the wellnigh daemonic and wholly
incomprehensible character of the eternal creative power; how,
incalculable and ‘wholly other,’ it mocks at all conceiving but can yet stir
the mind to its depths, fascinate and overbrim the heart. (p. 80)

The psychological significance of an encounter with the numinosum is the

ego’s paralyzing fear of and subordination to the Self, “which feels like slavery”

(Edinger, 1987, p. 26).

Either one’s moral courage fails, or one’s insight, or both, until in the end
fate decides. . . .you have become a victim of a decision made over your
head or in defiance of the heart. . . . [T]he experience of the self is always
a defeat for the ego. (Jung, quoted in Edinger, 1992, p. 49)

Edinger also observes that this alienating experience is “a necessary prelude to

awareness of the Self ” (1992, p. 48), an insight I will return to in Chapter Six,

“Trauma, Shadow, and Psychosis: The Transformative Potential.”

Furthermore, Jung (1934/1969i) describes the encounter with the

archetypal unconscious as “the meeting with oneself” (p. 21, para. 45), which

begins with “the meeting with one’s own shadow. The shadow is a tight passage,

a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the

deep well [which leads to] a boundless expanse full of unprecedented uncertainty”

(p. 21, para. 45). Jung’s depiction of an encounter with the shadow recalls other

metaphorical characterizations of an encounter with the dark nature of our being,

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such as the descent into the underworld, the dark night of the soul, facing one’s

demons, and wrestling with the devil (Zweig & Abrams, 1991, p. 3). Such a fall

into the collective unconscious can leave one feeling “delivered up” (Jung,

1916/1966a, p. 163, para. 254), and it has brought on cases of psychosis or “a

catastrophe that destroyed life” (p. 163, para. 254).

As an illustration of Jung’s concept of the personal and archetypal

shadows, as well as their interrelatedness, I would like to give a brief illustration

from a personal psychedelic experience. I think it would be accurate to say that all

my difficult psychedelic experiences were confrontations with personal, cultural,

and archetypal levels of the shadow. I believe that this particular experience

highlights especially well the phenomenological quality of a confrontation with

the personal and archetypal levels of shadow.

After having taken LSD one evening in 1967, I came across an upright

brass clock in the middle of a coffee table. Some friends and I had stolen the

clock along with an antique Chinese bowl, a chest of silverware, and a number of

other items in a house burglary earlier that summer. As I stood looking down at

the clock, I had a vision of standing below a panel of heavenly judges. It was the

Last Judgment, and I was full of sin. Hanging my head in shame, I felt crushed by

irredeemable guilt. Not only did I feel guilty for having broken into someone’s

house and stolen their things, I felt profoundly ashamed for being a human in this

absurdly sinful world. Life in this world was, I knew then, nothing but folly.

At a beach later that night I felt myself being pulled into the ocean to my

death, and I desperately fought my way back into this world, which I knew was

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Hell; my friend and I drove to a secluded cliff, and in windswept darkness, I

threw the stolen things into the surf below. As my long overcoat flapped violently

in the wind and as I raised the chest of silver over my head and flung it into the

darkness—I was evil incarnate. A few months later, during my next difficult LSD

experience, I made a serious attempt to honor God’s demand that I kill myself in

order to free my soul from Hell.

I have been trying to come to terms with the shadow nature of life ever

since.

Resistance to and Projection of the Shadow

Returning now to Jung’s characterization of falling into the collective

unconscious, which can leave one feeling “delivered up,” and which has brought

on cases of psychosis or “a catastrophe that destroyed life;” we should recall that

Kalsched’s (1996) diabolical self-care figure can appear as “a true agent of death,

. . . a truly perverse factor in psychological life” (p. 27), which becomes a

formidable resistance to psychological growth and to life itself. Kalsched did not

attribute such archaic disintegrative energies to the personal shadow but rather to

the archetypal shadow, the dark side of the Self (p. 28). The emotional nature of

one’s inferior personality traits makes insight into one’s personal shadow

difficult, says Marie-Louise von Franz (1980); but when these projections are

linked to deeper archetypal material, insights come with “almost insuperable

difficulties” (p. 19). Lionel Corbett (1996) says that experience of the numinous

qualities of the Self can engender fears that trigger defensive or even psychotic

reactions when such experiences involve intolerably intense affect, especially

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when the person is forced to face archetypal shadow material. Terrified by

experiences of the numinosum, Corbett says, the conscious mind tends to ward

them off rather than assimilate them (pp. 29-30).

Corbett (1996) acknowledges that the ego-controls of psychologically

healthy individuals can allow archetypal experiences to unfold and at the same

time contain them within safe limits. “The more cohesive . . . the self, the more it

can safely experience the Self by reordering itself rather than by fragmenting”

(pp. 21-22). But individuals who have grown up devaluing and repressing their

own feelings and needs may resist especially strongly the numinous effects of the

unconscious because the unconscious has become so populated with

negatively-toned complexes that are experienced by consciousness as particularly

painful (pp. 31-32).

In any case, our fears become especially intense when we encounter the

shadow at an archetypal level, and resistance can become virtually inevitable.

Even though Jung’s (1952/1969w) primary subject in Answer to Job is the

evolution of God’s moral consciousness (or the evolution of the collective

unconscious at the divine level), Job’s ordeal can also be understood as

representing the resistance we all have to the archetypal shadow, or the dark side

of the Self. Seen in terms of the individual, Job expresses the fact that each of us

fears becoming conscious of the deepest level of our nature, just as Job feared

facing God’s as well as his own shortcomings. A confrontation with the dark side

of our personal unconscious contradicts our image of ourselves and is deeply

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disturbing. A confrontation with the dark side of the Self contradicts our image of

the absolute and is terrifying.

Our fear of our shadow nature at both the personal and archetypal levels is

ultimately a fear of psychological death. That is, to develop psychologically, our

ideal image of ourselves must die as we integrate the shadow side of our nature

and become whole. In our fear, and as a reflection of our resistance, we

unconsciously project our shadow qualities onto others. Or, as Corbett (1996) puts

it, when we resist the emergence of unconscious content, material that is pushing

to break through to consciousness becomes projected onto our environment

(p. 30). Such projections, which are always unconscious, can only be recognized,

says Jung (1948/1969v), with “a moral achievement beyond the ordinary. . . .

[B]oth insight and good will are unavailing because the cause of the emotion

appears to lie, beyond all possibility of doubt, in the other person” (p. 9, para. 16).

Even though those qualities may actually exist in the other person, projection of

our unconscious shadow blurs our vision of that other person (Whitmont, 1991,

p. 13). Our perception of the other person, that is, is obscured by that part of

ourselves that we are seeing in them. Further, our “affect reaction” to the

projected qualities is connected to and intensified by the “affect-toned complex”

in us, further blurring our view of the other person and making it difficult to relate

to them in a healthful way (p. 13). We experience our own shadow in our

perception of the other as strange, suspect, even evil. This experience stems from

the illusion that we know ourselves. The other becomes, then, “the carrier” of the

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evil one fails to acknowledge in oneself (p. 14). Jung (1948/1969v) describes the

mechanism and consequences of projection in this way:

It is not the conscious subject but the unconscious which does the
projecting. Hence one meets with projections, one does not make them.
The effect of projection is to isolate the subject from his environment,
since instead of a real relation to it there is now only an illusory one.
Projections change the world into the replica of one’s own unknown face.
(p. 9, para. 17)

When the psyche’s defenses block unconscious material from entering

consciousness, they also isolate us from ourselves by preventing us from knowing

ourselves more deeply. And as a consequence, these defenses preclude the

potentially healing and transformative effects that the numinosum can have

through its balancing relationship to consciousness (Corbett, 1996, p. 30).

The Self’s Defense Against Overwhelming Affect

Besides blocking awareness of shadow material that challenges one’s self

image, defenses arise when the personality feels vulnerable to fragmentation by

overwhelming feelings that it cannot integrate. (These two mechanisms are

presumedly inseparable in many cases.) As we have seen, such defenses can be

understood as a response to protect the integrity of a self that has been weakened

by an inadequate or traumatic childhood environment (see also Corbett, 1996,

p. 32). To prevent further weakening by unbearable anxiety, pain, or terror,

defenses come into play whenever the self feels threatened with fragmentation. Of

course the more vulnerable the self feels, the more extreme will be its defenses to

eruptions from the unconscious. But, as Corbett puts it, the numinosum may not

respect the needs of the vulnerable self; and if its associated affect is

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overwhelmingly intense, collapse of the self, or psychosis, may be the result

(pp. 32-33).

Corbett (1996) suggests, then, that archetypal experiences go to the heart

of the individual’s vulnerability, pathology, or psychological wounds because the

places where the self’s barrier to the unconscious is most susceptible are the very

places where healing is most needed. The psyche is attempting to balance itself, to

move toward wholeness, by connecting the personality to its own archetypal

ground (p. 33). But, as indicated, the result can also be a terrible imbalance, a

psychosis.

Reflections on the Shadow

Even though the world always feels like a hellish place during the

spontaneous recurrences I experience, as it did during my first difficult

psychedelic experiences 40 years ago, I did not fully appreciate the significance

of the shadow in my own psychedelic-induced psychotic states until recently.

Attempting to assimilate the challenging MDMA-enhanced psychotherapy

session that I mentioned above (pp. 157-158), I became fascinated by Jung’s

concept of the shadow. Reflecting on that session as I read, I felt that I was

beginning to understand Jung’s concept of the shadow for the first time.

That session took place after midnight in a yurt at the Burning Man event

in the middle of the desert. Considering the wisdom versus foolishness of doing

an MDMA-enhanced psychotherapy session in such a setting, I will say only that

before proceeding I carefully weighed the potential risks and benefits with several

experienced and knowledgeable people whom I trusted. With the thump of trance

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music and the vague cries of thousands of pagan revelers pulsating across the

desert, I was suddenly terrified to realize that I was in Hell again—and this time

with Satan himself. I was also shocked to realize that the other three people I was

working with, who had earlier radiated warmth and compassion, were actually

Satan’s demonic assistants. Their skin now seemed bluish and even cold to the

touch. It was “the night of the living dead.” I thought I could see fang tips peeking

out from the upper lips of the two women with whom I was working. I noticed the

devilish curl of another man’s eyebrow as he entered the tent dressed like some

kind of nomadic sorcerer. They were all gathering for my demise, I realized. I was

going to die a horrible death at their hands—I was to be the burning man.

Months later, after reading in more depth about the Jungian concept of the

shadow, it seemed clear that my projection of the shadow, in all its aspects—the

personal, the cultural, and the archetypal—could account for a good deal of my

drug-induced perception of this world as Hell that night. I say “a good deal”

because I think to some extent I was also confronting the reality of absolute evil.

I had also become fascinated by Kalsched’s approach to trauma during

this period. When it became clear to me that both trauma and shadow were key

elements in my own psychedelic-induced psychotic states, it was not difficult to

see how trauma and shadow each related independently to psychosis. But were

trauma and shadow related to each other; and if so, how? After some reflection, I

realized that in my case the link between trauma and shadow and psychotic states

is anger. And anger seems to be a key link between trauma, shadow, and

psychosis for others, as well. This is certainly reflected in the case of the young

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incest victim that I discussed in the section on trauma (pp. 163-165, above).

The element of shadow anger and aggression is also evident in two of the

trauma-based LSD-psychotherapy cases I mentioned.

Sandison’s (1954) traumatized patient, who suffered suicidal depression

related to her psychopathic father and the death of her mother, exhibited a

“ferocious antagonism” toward her father (p. 513). His chance visit to her at the

hospital “put her in a most hostile and irrational mood” (p. 513). During one LSD

session, she reports, “I found myself under water. I thought how remarkably

pretty this land of the unconscious was. Then the colours changed, and the water

became green and angry looking” (p. 513). The woman goes on to describe

feeling surrounded by the presence of her father in the form of a spider (p. 513).

Cutner’s (1959) traumatized patient, who suffered from severe depression

and paranoid tendencies, “became wildly hostile and aggressive” during negative

phases of transference, or projection (p. 739). Cutner reports,

One morning, about an hour after she had taken the drug, the writer found
her in a room out of which she had thrown all bedding and all furniture
with the exception of one chair. She was sitting on her bare bed,
trembling, with a face distorted with fear, hatred and horror, begging me
to leave the room as otherwise she was sure she would strangle me. She
also kept repeating, as she often did under LSD, that she must take her
own life. (p. 739)

The patient herself continues.

Then the chair began to change and I saw that it was the one that my father
had cut down for my mother to nurse my brothers in. I also remembered it
used to stand in the corner in the boys’ room where I kept my toys, and I
used to be frightened of it because I thought a witch used to sit in it. I
afterwards felt I wanted to smash everything, and again later I wanted to
tear things up and I prayed the nurse would come and bring some papers
so that I could just tear and tear. It is certainly an enlightenment to me to

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 realize that a child could feel all these things and keep them hidden inside
himself, but it was also a great shock to me when I threw the chair, but I
realized that I had indeed felt this dreadful anger as a little girl but had
never really known about it and certainly not let it out. (p. 740)

It is not possible to tell directly from this report the nature of supervision

that Cutner’s patient received during her LSD session. However, it seems

apparent that in general Cutner’s patients were supervised by specially trained

nurses when the analyst was not present (Cutner, 1959, pp. 716, 723; see also

Sandison, 2001, p. 45; Sandison, Spenser, & Whitelaw, 1954, pp. 504-507).

Patients were also allowed to have a friend present when they felt the need

(p. 718). Cutner also notes that patients were supervised for a day or longer after

the LSD session to monitor rare spontaneous recurrences (p. 718).

Considering my own case briefly, there is good reason to think that a

2-year-old child who suffered third-degree burns would feel a great deal of anger

as a consequence of such an accident. If he also felt unconsciously that he could

not express that anger, he would understandably repress it. Growing up “a good

boy,” that anger would become a big part of his shadow, which would manifest in

various destructive ways, including the physical abuse of his younger brother,

chronic stealing, and alcohol as well as drug abuse. Using psychedelics recklessly,

he becomes overwhelmed by the eruption of his own unconscious content, which

is so heavy with darkness that his conscious mind breaks under the burden of it. In

a state of psychotic reaction to the unbearable strangeness of this unconscious

shadow material, he projects his own darkness onto the world at large, has a

vision that he must kill himself to escape this evil world and prove his worth to

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God, and finally, in the act of swerving toward a set of headlights on a dark

highway, he acts out his own shadow and avoids coming to terms with it.

Psychosis in Jung’s Psychology

Jung’s early research into the nature of psychosis, and particularly his

observation of the manifestations of schizophrenia in the form of archaic and

mythological imagery, influenced the development of his pioneering theory of

psychic energy and archetypes as an alternative to existing theories emphasizing

sexual, personal, and genetic factors in psychosis. For Jung, the concept of the

archetypal unconscious became indispensable in accounting for the imagery,

psychic splitting, and distorted sense of reality accompanying schizophrenia

(Jung, 1958/1972j, p. 261, paras. 563-565; Read, Fordham, Adler, & McGuire,

1972, p. v). And as we know from Jung’s (1963) autobiographical Memories,

Dreams, Reflections, his theory developed out of his own profound personal

experiences with the depths of the archetypal unconscious as well as his clinical

practice with patients suffering from mental disease.

We get a sense of why the concept of the archetypal unconscious became

indispensable to Jung’s understanding of psychosis from the following

characterization. The archetypes, said Jung (1939/1969o),

live in a world quite different from the world outside—in a world where
the pulse of time beats infinitely slowly, where the birth and death of
individuals count for little. No wonder their nature is strange, so strange
that their irruption into consciousness often amounts to a psychosis. They
undoubtedly belong to the material that comes to light in schizophrenia.
(p. 287, para. 519)

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 As I have indicated, my particular interest in psychosis is to understand

the acute, or temporary, psychotic states that can be induced by psychedelics.

Such temporary psychotic states, or episodes, are categorized by DSM-IV as

Hallucinogen-Induced Psychotic Disorder (APA, 1994, pp. 310-311). When Jung

talks about the risks associated with active imagination, he mentions a condition

that he describes as temporarily indistinguishable from schizophrenia. Jung

(1916/1958/1969c) characterizes this condition as a “psychotic interval” that can

occur when unconscious contents with a high energy charge temporarily

overwhelm the conscious mind (p. 68).

I think that an understanding of Jung’s approach to psychosis in general

sheds light on the nature of acute psychotic states, and even more specifically

sheds light on the relationship of acute psychotic states to trauma, to

overwhelming confrontations with the shadow, and ultimately to transformation.

That is, I think that Jung’s approach to psychosis can help us understand the

strange and deeply disturbing experiences of people who would not necessarily be

classified as psychotic. Jung (1964) reminds us, after all, that otherwise intelligent

and healthy people are constantly seeking help from psychologists for peculiar

and unaccountable experiences (p. 76) and that it is not uncommon for so-called

normal people to manifest pathological symptoms (p. 34). 33 Due to our alienation

from nature and the cosmos, to our over-rational character, and to our alienation

33
Jung often refers to “normal people.” I usually transcribe this into “so-called
normal people,” a characterization Jung occasionally uses himself.
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from the primitive 34 psychic energy of “the original mind” (p. 98), Jung says, we

are too often at the mercy of “the psychic ‘underworld’” (p. 94). Our alienated

condition is manifested in symbolic messages from the unconscious that express

themselves in a strange and incomprehensible language, which cries out for

interpretation (p. 95; see also Jung, 1914/1972e, p. 209 para. 463).

As we have seen, confrontations with the shadow as well as difficult

psychospiritual experiences induced by psychedelics can engender psychotic

reactions. We have also seen the potential that traumatic events have to precipitate

psychosis (in Jung’s case of the young incest victim, for instance). And we have

seen how the experience of the numinous nature of the Self, especially its

archetypal shadow side, can trigger psychotic reactions. I will now investigate

more carefully the nature of those psychotic reactions.

Jung’s approach to the psyche can be seen as having two very different yet

integrally related emphases. From one standpoint, Jung investigated the

relationships among the psyche’s components and between those components and

the external world. From another standpoint, Jung investigated the psyche’s

fragmentation, splitting, or dissociation (Samuels et al., 1986, p. 101). If we

understand this characterization of Jung’s approach to the psyche to suggest his

concern with the process of individuation (that is, the integration of the psyche’s

component parts into a unified whole), on the one hand, and his concern with

problems associated with the frustration of the individuation process (that is, the

psyche’s lack of integration and even disintegration or pathology), on the other,

34
Jung uses the term primitive, he says, as synonymous with primordial and
without value judgment (1934/1969k, p. 104, para. 218). He seems to use the term
archaic in the same way.
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we can see why so many of Jung’s key concepts are integrally related to his

approach to psychosis in particular.

It would seem possible, then, to find interrelationships between Jung’s

approach to psychosis and virtually his whole body of work. Think of the

importance of archetypes and complexes to Jung’s concept of psychosis. Or

consider that Jung (1939/1969o) once characterized psychotic content as ideas

that could not be integrated into consciousness (p. 278, para. 495). Despite the

fact that Jung’s approach to psychosis is integrally related to his whole body of

work, I will try to adequately deal with it in the limited space of this section by

focusing on those central concepts in Jung’s approach to psychosis that relate

most closely to trauma, shadow, and transformation. Having already looked at the

concepts of complexes and dissociation in the trauma section of this chapter, and

having discussed Jung’s most basic concepts and principles, including archetypes

and the archetypal unconscious, in Chapter Three, I will limit my discussion in

this section to, first, Jung’s focus on schizophrenic forms of psychosis; second,

commonalities between schizophrenia and other conditions; third, neurosis, latent

psychosis, and manifest psychosis; and fourth, the concept of an abaissement du

niveau mental as it relates to psychosis and psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Let me introduce my discussion of these concepts by first saying that, in

the broadest terms, Jung viewed psychosis as both a psychopathology and a

revealing manifestation of the psyche’s attempt to heal itself. As he developed his

concepts of the archetypes and the collective unconscious, Jung explained

psychosis in general and schizophrenia in particular as an invasion of ego-

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consciousness by the collective unconscious and as the control of the personality

by autonomous complexes resulting in psychic confusion or chaos (Samuels et al.,

1986, p. 133). Although he never refrained from viewing psychosis as a mental

disorder, Jung had the revolutionary insight that meaning could be deciphered

from apparently senseless psychotic utterances. Furthermore, Jung was the first to

view psychosis as the psyche’s attempt to heal itself (Perry, 1999, p. 63).

Psychosis may have a healing effect, he reasoned, because the content from the

collective unconscious that is invading consciousness has a potentially

regenerative effect on the personality. If the individual can understand and

integrate the metaphorical nature of this unconscious content, the opportunity for

healing is increased (Samuels et al., p. 123).

Jung’s Focus on Schizophrenic Forms of Psychosis

Jung focused on the schizophrenic forms of psychosis, which he describes

as including “all those hallucinatory, catatonic, hebephrenic, and paranoid

conditions, not showing the characteristic organic process of cellular destruction,”

and which can be distinguished from manic-depressive forms of psychosis.

(1919/1972f, p. 213, para. 471). In his earliest writings, Jung refers to

schizophrenia as dementia praecox (premature dementia). He later adopted the

term schizophrenia, which means “split mind.” The condition was given that

name by Eugen Bleuler, who was Jung’s chief physician at Burghölzli Mental

Hospital in Zurich, his teacher, and advisor on his dissertation (Jung, 1928/1972g,

p. 227, para. 497; 1958/1972j, p. 256, para. 554).

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 The schizophrenic forms of psychosis are, says Jung (1928/1972g), “the

real mental diseases; that is they supply the main population of our mental

hospitals” (pp. 226-227, para. 497). In 1907, with the publication of The

Psychology of Dementia Praecox, Jung adopted the revolutionary position that

schizophrenia was primarily a psychological disease and not, as widely believed

at the time, a disease having physiological origins (p. 227, para. 498; see also

1958/1972j, pp. 263-264, para. 570). The clinical term for the psychological

origin of the condition is psychogenesis. Thus Jung’s oft-repeated phrase “the

psychogenesis of schizophrenia” and the title of Collected Works, Volume 3, The

Psychogenesis of Mental Disease.) Following Bleuler, Jung initially suspected

that a metabolic toxin caused schizophrenia. He eventually rejected this theory,

however, in favor of the view that psychological causes were primary, even

though they had psychosomatic consequences. In his 1958 essay “Schizophrenia,”

Jung (1958/1972j) wrote,

Whereas at that time [50 years ago], for lack of psychological experience,
I had to leave it an open question whether the aetiology [of schizophrenia]
is primarily or secondarily toxic, I have now, after long practical
experience, come to hold the view that the psychogenic causation of the
disease is more probable than the toxic causation. There are a number of
mild and ephemeral but manifestly schizophrenic illnesses—which begin
purely psychogenically, run an equally psychological course (aside from
presumably toxic nuances) and can be completely cured by a purely
psychotherapeutic procedure. I have seen this even in severe cases.
(pp. 263-264, para. 570)

As indicated above, Jung (1928/1972g) steadfastly maintains that

psychotic delusions and hallucinations are meaningful psychic productions as

opposed to random nonsense (p. 227, para. 498). For Jung, then, schizophrenia

has as much of a “psychology” as normal mental life, with the notable difference

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that whereas the ego is the subject of the healthy person’s experience, the ego is

only one of a number of experiencing subjects for the schizophrenic. In

schizophrenia, Jung says, “the normal subject has split into a plurality of subjects,

or into a plurality of autonomous complexes” (p. 227, para. 498). The healthy ego,

that is, can become overwhelmed by the affectivity of a complex, which accounts

for the disease’s destructive nature (pp. 227-228, para. 500). Such a profound and

dangerous split in the psyche is brought on by what Jung characterizes as an

extraordinary “psychological moment” (p. 228, para. 501), which I interpret as a

traumatic event in the subject’s life (see also p. 229, para. 503).

In his essay “Schizophrenia” (1958/1972j), Jung describes a

mescaline-induced abaissement in the context of his description of the

pathological potential of ordinary complexes. As we have seen, for Jung, a

complex is a collection of images with a common affective tone and an archetypal

core. This archetypal core, with its archaic, chaotic affect and mythical imagery

(pp. 258-259, para. 559), is by its very nature rooted in a numinous level of the

unconscious, which by definition is potentially awe-inspiring and terrifying—and

therefore potentially traumatic in its own right. And therein lies the complex’s

potential to produce the kind of devastating psychic reactions that precipitate

schizophrenia (para. 563). In the relatively healthy person, such trauma-induced

archetypal affect and imagery has a much better chance of being integrated. “In

contrast to this,” Jung says, “the schizophrenic compensation almost always

remains stuck fast in collective and archaic forms, thereby cutting itself off from

understanding and integration to a far higher degree” (p. 262, para. 567).

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Although this kind of archaic material appears much more often in the minds of

persons suffering from schizophrenia, Jung notes that in so-called normal people

these numinous “dream-products” can appear in situations that threaten the very

foundations of the individual’s existence (p. 262, para. 566), a parallel to which I

will return shortly.

Given the impressive similarities between psychedelic-induced psychotic

states and schizophrenia that I outlined in my literature review, Jung’s focus on

schizophrenia suggests that his approach to psychosis provides a useful

foundation for understanding psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Furthermore,

Jung’s emphasis on the psychogenesis and psychotherapeutic treatment of

schizophrenia proves a useful foundation for conducting psychedelic

psychotherapy and for treating psychedelic-induced psychotic states, topics that I

will discuss in Chapters Eight and Nine.

Commonalities Between Schizophrenia and Other Conditions

An openness to the similarities as well as the differences between

psychedelic experiences and schizophrenia is reminiscent of Jung’s radical insight

into the commonalities between schizophrenia and a wide range of psychological

conditions—from occult phenomena and neuroses to dreams and “those vital

problems on which we are all engaged” (Jung, 1908/1972c, p. 178, para. 387). In

his late essay on schizophrenia, for instance, Jung (1958/1972j) characteristically

summarizes the similarities and differences between schizophrenia and the

dissociative qualities found in a young spiritualist, in whom

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 contents from the unconscious appeared that were unknown to her
conscious mind, and formed the manifest cause of the splitting of
personality. In schizophrenia, too, we very often find strange contents that
inundate consciousness with comparative suddenness and burst asunder
the inner cohesion of the personality, though they do this in a way
characteristic of schizophrenia. Whereas the neurotic dissociation never
loses its systematic character, schizophrenia shows a picture of
unsystematic randomness, so to speak, in which the continuity of meaning
so distinctive of the neurosis is often mutilated to the point of
unintelligibility. (pp. 256-257, para. 555)

In dreams, too, Jung (1958/1972j) observes a schizophrenic-like

breakdown of consciousness into “random, absurd, fragmentary” material that

“requires the same amplificatory procedure in order to be understood” (p. 257,

para. 557). Although there exists the significant difference that dreams occur in

the sleeping state, when elementary operations of consciousness are mostly

obscured, Jung became increasingly convinced that “there was a far-reaching

analogy between schizophrenia and dreams” (p. 257, para. 557).

In his descriptions of schizophrenia, Jung briefly mentions the similarities

and differences between that disorder and the effects of mescaline and related

drugs. Although the empirical evidence available at the time suggested that

schizophrenia and the disturbance of consciousness brought on by psychedelics

are not identical (Jung, 1958/1972j, p. 263, para. 570), 35 Jung recognized that

mescaline and related drugs, like schizophrenia, act by lowering the threshold of

consciousness, which as I discussed in Chapter Four, potentially overwhelms

consciousness with unconscious material (p. 263, para. 569).

35
Jung (1958/1972j) wrote, “The fluid and mobile continuity of mescaline
phenomena differs from the abrupt, rigid, halting, and discontinuous behavior of
schizophrenic apperception” (p. 263, para. 570).
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 As indicated above, another basis for the similarity between schizophrenia

and other psychological conditions such as dreams and psychedelic states lies in

the phenomenology of the complex. Jung (1934/1969k) characterizes complexes

in general as fragmentary personalities or splinter psyches that are “characteristic

expressions of the psyche” (p. 101, para. 209) and can manifest as the actors in

dreams or the voices in hallucinations. In all cases, Jung says, complexes appear

in personified form when there is no inhibiting consciousness to suppress them,

“exactly like the hobgoblins of folklore who go crashing round the house at night”

(p. 98, para. 203). Jung notes that the aetiology of complexes is often a trauma of

some kind that causes a split in the psyche, or a moral conflict that “ultimately

derives from the apparent impossibility of affirming the whole of one’s nature,”

an impossibility that presupposes a split (para. 204). In their more morbid

manifestations, Jung adds, complexes are objects of inner experience that

are not to be met in the street and in public places. It is on them that the
weal and woe of personal life depends; they are the lares and penates who
await us at the fireside and whose peaceableness it is dangerous to
extol. . . . Only when you have seen whole families destroyed by them,
morally and physically, and the unexampled tragedy and hopeless misery
that follow in their train, do you feel the full impact of the reality of
complexes. (p. 100, para. 209)

We see Jung coming back again to the fundamental insight that unusual,

altered, and pathological states of consciousness—whether manifested as dream

images, spiritual visions, psychotic delusions, or psychedelic hallucinations—can

be understood as consciousness becoming overwhelmed by unconscious content.

And as bizarre as some of the manifestations of this condition may seem, Jung

maintains that they all manifest unconscious patterns, structures, and dynamics

that have meaning when understood in the context of a person’s life. Even today,
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with new and important contributions to understanding psychosis and related

conditions (the concept of spiritual emergency, for instance), Jung’s approach to

understanding and treating the apparently random and absurd manifestations

associated with such conditions seems refreshingly insightful and especially

useful.

Neurosis, Latent Psychosis, and Manifest Psychosis

The distinctions and similarities Jung draws between neurosis, latent

psychosis, and manifest psychosis reinforce an important principle in

understanding psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Just as we came to see the

wisdom of drawing a relatively flexible distinction between personal and

archetypal levels of the unconscious, so we need to see that sharp distinctions

between neurotic, latent psychotic, and manifest psychotic conditions do not

reflect the psyche’s actual complexity. Understanding this, we are in a much

better position to appreciate the complex nature of psychedelic experiences,

which represent such an enormous range of psychological states, without reducing

a particular experience—even a psychedelic-induced psychotic state—to one

simple category.

When Jung (1958/1972j) gave up his work at Burghölzli Mental Hospital

and started his psychotherapy practice in 1909, he was surprised to discover the

relatively high number of latent schizophrenics who unconsciously avoid the

asylum and seek out psychological consultation instead. Jung estimates that there

are as many as ten latent or potential psychoses for every manifest case. These

people have schizoid dispositions, Jung says, but their psychosis has not yet

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definitively overwhelmed their conscious capacity. It is also not unusual, he

found, for a neurotic to turn out actually to be a latent psychotic in treatment; and

sometimes during treatment such patients have been known to fall into a

psychosis (p. 258, para. 558).

It is to Jung’s enduring credit that he recognized that there was nothing

abnormal about the content of the psychosis, the images of which justifiably can

be compared to the content of dreams. Jung observed, for instance, that there is no

difference between the dreams of people suffering from schizophrenia and other

people. Only when unconscious content overwhelms consciousness—and

becomes the individual’s reality—can we speak of actual psychosis (Perry, 1999,

p. 72).

With respect to treatment, says Jung (1958/1972j), latent schizophrenics

and manifest schizophrenics have essentially the same complexes and therapeutic

needs as neurotics (pp. 256, 258, paras. 554, 559). In all cases conscious

operations are disrupted by the spontaneous intervention of an unconscious

complex (albeit with different degrees of severity, of course); and the consequent

dissociation can create one or more autonomous secondary personalities. The

fundamental difference between these cases lies in the maintenance of the

personality’s potential unity. Neurotics have a more unified and coherent

personality foundation whereas potential schizophrenics have a much higher risk

of this foundation giving way to a disintegration in which their thought processes

become incoherent and their relationship to the environment breaks down (Jung,

1939/1972h, pp. 234-236, paras. 506-511). The latent schizophrenic consequently

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feels threatened by chaotic happenings and terrifying dreams of catastrophic

destruction, says Jung (1958/1972j, pp. 258-259, para. 559). “He stands on

treacherous ground, and very often he knows it” (p. 258, para. 559). The

treacherous ground the latent schizophrenic stands on is a potentially

overwhelming complex or set of complexes characterized by archaic and

apparently chaotic affect and mythical imagery (p. 261, para. 563) that can bring

about a severe and too-often irreversible dissociation (1939/1972h, p. 235, para.

507).

The neurosis, says Jung (1939/1972h), is “a relative [italics added]

dissociation, a conflict between ego and a resistant force based upon unconscious

contents” (p. 238, para. 516). In other words, despite some degree of dissociation,

the conflict between the ego and the intruding unconscious content reflects a

relatively successful attempt by the psyche to unify the personality’s split

condition. The split-off figures that emerge from the schizophrenic’s dissociation,

on the other hand, take on banal, grotesque, or highly exaggerated identities that

violently oppose consciousness. As Jung explains it,

they torment the ego in a hundred ways; all are objectionable and
shocking, either in their noisy and impertinent behaviour or in their
grotesque cruelty and obscenity. There is an apparent chaos of incoherent
visions, voices, and characters, all of an overwhelmingly strange and
incomprehensible nature. If there is a drama at all, it is certainly far
beyond the patient’s understanding. In most cases it transcends even the
physician’s comprehension, so much so that he is inclined to suspect the
mental sanity of anybody who sees more than plain madness in the ravings
of a lunatic. (pp. 235-236, para. 508)

(As this quote illustrates, Jung frequently qualifies descriptions of the chaotic,

random, and unsystematic nature of intervening unconscious content as apparent.

This qualification reflects his view that although this content is chaotic, random,
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and unsystematic for the subject in very real and painful ways, it is ultimately

meaningful.)

The overwhelmingly strange and incomprehensible visions, voices, and

characters associated with an intruding unconscious complex can pull the ego into

its orbit, says Jung (1939/1972h, p. 238, para. 516). If the ego consequently

identifies with this morbid content, it has relinquished its power to resist the

onslaught of unconscious forces and its depotentiation has reached a fatal level.

“Neurosis lies on this side of the critical point, schizophrenia on the other”

(p. 238, para. 517) says Jung. “A neurosis approaches the danger line, yet

somehow it manages to remain on the hither side. If it should transgress the line it

would cease to be a neurosis” (p. 238, para. 517).

Just as we came to recognize that the distinction between the psyche’s

personal and archetypal shadow is a matter of gradation rather than separation, so

we recognize that it is the intensity of the complex and its affect that distinguishes

the neurotic from the latent schizophrenic, and the latent schizophrenic from the

full-blown schizophrenic—not to mention the so-called normal person from the

rest. “In normal people and in neurotics,” says Jung (1958/1972j), “the affect that

binds the complex together produces symptoms which could easily be interpreted

as milder, preliminary forms of schizophrenic symptoms. This is particularly true

of the abaissement du niveau mental, with its characteristic one-sidedness of

judgment” (p. 268, para. 578).

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 “Abaissement du Niveau Mental” and Psychedelic-Induced Psychotic States

The foregoing consideration of the intensity of the complex (and by

implication the consequent changes in consciousness) leads us back to the

centrality of the phenomenon of a lowering of the threshold of consciousness in

Jung’s understanding of both psychosis and psychedelic experience.

Although an abaissement causes a decrease in the ego’s capacity to

function, as I indicated in Chapter Four, the ultimate impact of a lowering of the

threshold of consciousness depends on the stability of the subject’s personality.

Jung (1939/1972h) indicates that the unity of the personality is more likely

preserved in relatively healthy individuals, whereas individuals with less stable

egos are more likely to succumb to overwhelming unconscious eruptions. In

individuals suffering from schizophrenia or even latent schizophrenia, for

instance, these effects can seriously damage the personality’s unity. In such cases,

Jung says, “the cleavage between dissociated psychic elements amounts to a real

destruction of their former connections” (p. 236, para. 511).

The distinctions Jung makes between the capacity of different individuals

to withstand and integrate potentially dissociative invasions of unconscious

content can bring nuance and depth to our understanding of various reactions to

psychedelic experience. Of course other factors contribute to the ultimate effects

of a psychedelic experience. These factors include the individual’s set (intention,

attitude, mood, and preparation), the setting of the session, and of course the

nature and potency of the substance.

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 It seems likely that all these factors influence the intensity of the

abaissement to various degrees. To appreciate the relevance of Jung’s conception

of an abaissement to psychedelic-induced psychotic states, consider again the

general conditions that can bring about an extreme abaissement, even in

psychologically healthy people. These are conditions, says Jung (1958/1972j),

that somehow threaten the very foundations of the individual’s existence,

for instance in moments of mortal danger . . . or when psychic problems
are developing which might give his life a catastrophic turn, or in the
critical periods of life when a modification of his previous psychic attitude
forces itself peremptorily upon him, or before, during, and after radical
changes in his immediate or his general surroundings. (p. 262, para. 566)

This is an excellent description of the general psychological conditions one can

experience during a difficult psychedelic experience. People certainly can become

convinced that they are in mortal danger during a difficult psychedelic experience.

And recalling Grinspoon and Bakalar’s (1979/1997) definition of a psychedelic

substance as one that “produces thought, mood, and perceptual changes otherwise

rarely experienced except in dreams, contemplative and religious exaltation . . . ,

and acute psychoses” (p. 9), we can say virtually by definition that psychedelics

bring radical changes in the subjective experience of one’s immediate and general

surroundings. This is of course especially true of a difficult psychedelic

experience.

Recalling that the archaic and numinous “dream-products” associated with

schizophrenia can appear in relatively healthy people under conditions that

threaten the very foundations of the person’s existence (Jung, 1958/1972j, p. 262,

para. 566), and recalling that profound splits in the psyche are brought on by what

Jung (1928/1972g) characterizes as an extraordinary “psychological moment”

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(p. 228, para. 501), consider the following accounts of psychedelic-induced

psychotic states. Note that these are all accounts by or about relatively healthy

individuals, most of whom have had previous psychedelic experiences.

Walter Houston Clark (1983), dean and professor of psychology at the

Hartford School of Religious Education, co-founder of the Society for the

Scientific Study of Religion, and author of The Psychology of Religion,

participated in a group psychedelic session under the supervision of Dr. Salvador

Roquet, whose psychosynthesis method I described briefly in my literature review

(see pp. 100-101, above). After a brief period of exercise to pleasant music, the

session room was darkened and images from multiple projectors were presented

on the walls. “They included every aspect of life from pictures of nature and

handsome men and women, sometimes nude, to every imaginable ugliness, with

an emphasis on violence and death” (p. 73). Following administration of the

drugs, a film with death as its subject was shown as the tempo of the projected

pictures was stepped up. Clark, who was in his early sixties and was given “a low

to moderate dose of LSD” (p. 73), writes,

The music, at first soft and harmonious classical works, was raised in
volume until it became a cacophony accompanied by blinking strobe lights
to magnify the confusion and sensory overload. At that time a paranoia
that I had never before experienced grew upon me. The expressions on the
faces of Dr. Roquet and his assistants became demonic. I conceived the
idea that they had been specially appointed by the Inquisition to drive me
out of my mind—incidentally their precise purpose for the aim of the
therapy was to fragment the defenses of the patients through a temporary
psychosis. I strode to confront the therapeutic team and denounced them in
no uncertain language—hardly my usual style. Another patient pounded
his fists on the table with force so violent that he was in danger of
destroying the expensive electronic equipment set on it. The other patients
expressed their agitation by similar demonstrations, some weeping, others
gesticulating, some embracing others, one or two vomiting; a few were

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 quiet throughout. A visitor spirited in from the outside world would have
concluded that it was the disturbed ward of a mental hospital. (pp. 73-74)

After describing another period of soothing music and rest, following which the

participants were encouraged to exercise or dance as they liked, Clark says,

I began vaguely to feel that I had learned something, yet the whole affair
seemed a kind of descent into Hell. The therapeutic team had not yet
completely lost its demonic quality when a patient next to me vomited
over himself and the floor. As I was considering what I should do to help,
the doctor’s wife and a clinical psychologist armed themselves with vomit
bags and towels and proceeded to the scene. To my amazement, tears were
running down their faces. Instantly I concluded that those I had mistaken
for demons were really angels. All the time I had been in Heaven rather
than Hell. (p. 74)

Between 1990 and 1995, Dr. Rick Strassman (2001) conducted

government-approved clinical research at the University of New Mexico on the

effects of DMT, an especially powerful psychedelic substance that induces

especially sudden effects. Strassman limited his study to psychologically stable

volunteers with previous psychedelic experience. Nevertheless, 25 out of 60

volunteers had adverse reactions ranging from minor and extremely brief to

terrifying, dangerous, and lingering (p. 247). He notes that the majority of these

problems, although not minor, were very brief (p. 248). Strassman also notes that

although great care was taken to provide a psychologically warm and supportive

environment, the research setting and attitude (questionnaire administration, blood

drawing, and experimental manipulations) could not help but predispose his

volunteers to negative responses (p. 248). This conclusion assumes that DMT

itself does not predispose subjects to such responses. This question could be

clarified through a study administering DMT to a control group in circumstances

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more conducive to positive responses (R. Tarnas, personal communication, May

14, 2009).

Strassman (2001) describes the powerfully upsetting experience of Ken, a

23-year-old student at an alternative health college. Strassman reports that 14

minutes into the DMT session Ken looked shaken. Ken reported,

There were two crocodiles. On my chest. Crushing me, raping me anally. I

didn’t know if I would survive. At first I thought I was dreaming, having a
nightmare. Then I realized it was really happening. . . . It was awful. It’s
the most scared I’ve ever been in my life. I wanted to ask to hold your
hands, but I was pinned so firmly I couldn’t move, and I couldn’t speak.
Jesus! (p. 252)

In an essay titled “On Being Mad,” Humphry Osmond (1970) describes a

session taking place under more beneficial circumstances with a 34-year-old

psychiatrist in good health. I quote the psychiatrist’s own report at some length

because it is an especially good example of a psychedelic-induced psychotic state

experienced by an apparently stable individual. The psychiatrist reports that about

40 minutes after taking 400 milligrams of mescaline

a sense of special significance began to invest everything in the room;

objects which I would normally accept as just being there began to assume
some strange importance. . . . In the many thousand stitches of a
well-worn carpet, I saw the footprints of mankind plodding wearily down
the ages. Barbed wire on a fence outside was sharp and bitter, a crown of
thorns, man’s eternal cruelty to man. It hurt me.
. . . . I ran my fingers over my old corduroy slacks and, as I did so,
the most vivid memories began to well up in my mind of dangerous times
in the past when I had worn them. Memories of the London blitz, of
seagoing during the war. . . . Gradually I began to feel that I was not
merely recalling, but re-experiencing the past. The room had peeling white
wallpaper, and behind this was a patch of green, a milky jade green. I was
much interested in this patch of green until I realized that I was looking at
the winter sea, and that if I stayed there any longer, I would see a ship
sinking in a storm, and that once again our ship would plow through those
unhappy survivors in pursuit of a submarine. . . .
John, sitting in the chair opposite, became the focus of my
attention, and as I gazed at him he began to change. I might have been
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 looking at an impressionist portrait of him and, as I thought of this, he
leered at me in an unpleasant way. The lighting changed, the whole room
was darker and more threatening and seemed to become larger, the
perspectives changing. . . .
Edward came with the recording machine, and by the time they
had set it up I was in the full flood of the psychosis. I hadn’t met Edward
before, and when he brought the machine to me, the unfamiliarity made
me afraid. He urged me not to be afraid of it, but as he brought it closer it
began to glow, a dull purple which turned to a deep cherry red, and the
heat of it overwhelmed me as when a furnace door is opened in your
face. . . .
I also noticed that my hands tingled and had a curious dirty feeling
which seemed to be inside my skin. I scrutinized one hand and it appeared
shrunken and clawlike. I realized that beneath the dried leathery skin was
bone and dust alone—no flesh. . . .
I asked for some water. I drank the glass which John brought, and
found that it tasted strange. I wondered if there might be something wrong
with it: poison crossed my mind. . . . I looked into the glass of water. In its
swirling depths was a vortex which went down into the center of the world
and the heart of time. My companions dragged me away from the water
for a walk. . . .
One house took my attention. It had a sinister quality, since from
behind its drawn shades, people seemed to be looking out, and their gaze
was unfriendly. . . . Then we came to a window in which a child was
standing, and as we drew nearer, its face became piglike. I noticed two
passers-by who, as they drew nearer, seemed humpbacked and twisted,
and their faces were covered with wens [cysts]. The wide spaces of the
streets were dangerous, the houses threatening, and the sun burned me.
(pp. 24-26)

These are only a few of the many accounts of psychedelic-induced

psychotic states I could include here. I will close this section by drawing from

Osmond’s (1970) conclusion to his essay “On Being Mad.” “We should listen

seriously to mad people,” he says,

They tell us of a purgatory from which none returns unscathed. They tell
us of another world than this; but mostly we don’t hear, because we are
talking at them to assure them that they are mistaken. Sometimes, when
they might make their escape, we do not heed, or even unwittingly drive
them back into hell. The least we can do for these far voyagers is to hear
them courteously and try to do them no harm. (p. 28)

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 CHAPTER SIX: TRAUMA, SHADOW, AND PSYCHOSIS:
THE TRANSFORMATIVE POTENTIAL

In insanity we do not discover anything new and unknown;

we are looking at the foundations of our own being,
the matrix of those vital problems on which we are all engaged.
The Content of the Psychoses
Carl Jung
(1908/1972c, p. 178, par. 387)

Despite the compatibility between Jung’s and Grof’s understanding of the

mind-manifesting character of psychedelics, 36 their views of the therapeutic value

of such drugs differ considerably. In addition to Jung’s criticism of using

psychedelics for therapeutic purposes, he criticized the use of abreaction as a

psychotherapeutic technique for treating trauma. Grof, on the other hand, highly

values abreaction as an important component of LSD psychotherapy.

Although it is not possible to measure the extent to which Grof’s view of

abreaction is representative of those interested in the value of psychedelics for

therapeutic or transformative purposes, Grof’s distinguished standing among

those seriously interested in psychedelics (as indicated by conferences on

psychedelics, for instance) indicates that an appreciation of the abreactive quality

of psychedelics is not unusual in that community. This is supported by

Strassman’s (2001) observation that people who use psychedelics for personal

growth commonly prefer to “blast through” problems they encounter (p. 160).

This implies, Strassman explains, that these people appreciate “the purifying and

36
See “Abaissement du Niveau Mental in Psychedelic Experience” in Chapter
Four.
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relieving value of catharsis. A powerful, earth-shattering emotional experience

might prove more useful than lengthy verbal analysis of the same conflict”

(p. 354). (In Strassman’s view, however, both approaches to working with

emotional blocks are necessary [p. 354]).

Given the prominence of the abreactive approach to psychedelic

psychotherapy, the contribution of an in-depth examination of Jung’s psychology

vis-à-vis psychedelic experience will become especially apparent when we

examine Jung’s objection to abreaction. I will look at the significance of this

difference between Jung’s and Grof’s views in the second half of this chapter.

First, I address two other important concepts that go to the heart of a Jungian

approach to healing: the transformative potential of psychotic experiences and the

transformative potential of confrontations with the shadow.

The Healing Potential of Psychotic Experiences

Even though Jung always regarded schizophrenia as a mental disorder, he

was the first to recognize it as the psyche’s effort to heal itself and as a pathology

amenable to psychotherapy (Perry, 1999, p. 63). Jung started to recognize the

healing potential of acute psychotic episodes as early as 1914, and one finds

traces of this insight as early as 1911 (Perry, 1976, pp. 11-12). In his essay “The

Importance of the Unconscious in Psychotherapy,” Jung (1914/1972e) describes

the compensating function of the unconscious, a balancing of conscious

tendencies that plays out in so-called normal people and psychotics alike. “In

normal people the principal function of the unconscious is to effect a

compensation and to produce a balance” (p. 205, para. 449), he says. “[Such]
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manifestations of the unconscious in actually insane patients are just as clear, but

are not so well recognized” (p. 206, para. 452). The borderline between the

“normal” and “abnormal” person seems further blurred by the fact that delusions,

hallucinations and the like can be found in healthy people as well as people

suffering from psychosis (para. 453). These unconscious, corrective

manifestations in the mind of the person suffering psychosis are not so readily

recognized because they typically present themselves in a form that one-sided ego

consciousness—in doctor and patient alike—finds unacceptably disturbing. The

unfortunate consequence of such disturbing manifestations is the common

obstruction of what should be “the beginning of the healing process” (paras. 458,

465).

For Jung (1931/1969h), the fundamental principle that must be recognized

in this regard is that “the symptomatology of an illness is at the same time a

natural attempt at healing” (p. 149, para. 312). If the therapist can engage in an

authentic, caring way with the patient and the patient’s inner experience, says

Perry (1999), the therapist may be able to see a deeply meaningful process in

what at first appears to be only a fragmented barrage of strange ideas. And with

the support of an enlightened and engaged therapist, the patient may be able to

make the critical turn from projecting this process onto the world to recognizing it

as an expression of his or her own unconscious self. If this is possible, Perry says,

healing can begin (p. 26ff.).

We can see the genesis of Jung’s open-minded approach toward psychosis

in his early essay “Two Kinds of Thinking” (1911-1912/1967), where he says

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“the dream is a series of images which are apparently contradictory and

meaningless, but . . . it contains material which yields a clear meaning when

properly translated” (p. 7, para. 6). This view of dreams—and by extension,

psychotic visions—is apparent in Jung’s (1964) late essay, “Approaching the

Unconscious,” in which he observed that the psyche’s symbol-producing function

bridges modern, differentiated consciousness with the primitive psychic energy of

the early mind from which the modern psyche has become alienated. It is, Jung

says, as if the unconscious seeks through dreams and visions to bring

consciousness back to those “old things from which the mind freed itself as it

evolved—illusions, fantasies, archaic thought forms, fundamental instincts, and so

on” (p. 98). Such relict contents are so highly charged that they frighten us, he

says; but the more they are repressed, the more they pervade and haunt the

personality. Dreams—and again, by extension, psychotic visions—can bring these

primitive images back to consciousness, and this accounts for their healing

potential (p. 99).

Jung validates the non-rational, receptive mode of studying and

understanding the symbolic content of the unconscious, says Perry (1999). This

form of “nondirected thinking” leads away from external reality into the imagery,

symbolism, and metaphor of the deep, archaic unconscious with respect for its

subjective value (pp. 65-66).

Reading through Jung’s (1914/1972d) essay “On Psychological

Understanding” in The Psychogenesis of Mental Disease (Jung, 1972a), one can

appreciate the creative intelligence of Jung’s “prospective,” or

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synthetic-constructive, approach to understanding psychosis. Jung maintained that

this approach does more justice than the conventional analytical-reductive

approach to “the almost overpowering profusion of fantastic symbolization”

manifested in schizophrenia (pp. 179-180, paras. 389-390). Jung’s

synthetic-constructive method seeks to understand not so much how and why the

psyche has come to its current condition but rather to understand that the psyche

is going through a process of becoming. “The constructive standpoint asks how,

out of this present psyche, a bridge can be built into its own future” (p. 183, para.

399), Jung explains. “The question is: What is the goal the patient tried to reach

through the creation of his [delusional] system?” (p. 186, para. 408). Jung

encourages us, that is, to look at the person’s delusions without prejudice and to

appreciate that through them the patient is in fact attempting with all his or her

might to bring something to completion (para. 410), albeit unconsciously. Jung

distinguished the content of the patient’s delusions from his or her confusion of

that content with reality; and Jung maintains that such delusions are not in

themselves pathological. They are subjectively valid and therefore justifiable

within subjective limits (p. 187, para. 412). The synthetic-constructive method,

Jung says, “must follow the clues laid down by the delusional system itself” (p.

191, para. 421). Working with highly complex material, this approach traces the

individual’s psychological development and builds towards an unknown goal

(p. 192, paras.422-423). Jung (1940/1969q) also suggests the psychological

benefit of psychotic eruptions when he says that the unconscious psyche must

contain its own “‘myth-forming’ structural elements” (p. 152, para.259), which no

209
doubt lend “a certain hidden coherence” to even irrational and often-unintelligible

psychotic visions (p. 153, para. 260).

Perry (1999) points out that Jung’s approach to the unconscious laid the

way for what would become known as the “growth” or “developmental crisis”

model, a model that views the psyche’s tumultuous activation of non-rational,

unconscious material as a sign of psychological reorganization (p. 67). In his

essay “On Psychic Energy,” Jung (1928/1969g) hypothesized that, seen

subjectively, the symbols of the unconscious are agents for transforming energy

out of the tension of opposites. This hypothesis led to Jung’s important

formulation of the regressive process, which adapts to the inner world instead of

the outer world and thereby serves the vital demands of the individuation process.

We might call this “regression in the service of the Self,” says Perry (p. 68). In his

essay “The Transcendent Function,” Jung (1916/1958/1969c) presents a

theoretical foundation for the integration of activated unconscious material, which

essentially involves bringing it into a constructive relationship to consciousness, a

process that is usually mediated by the analyst for the patient but which can also

be done independently (as Jung did himself). By bringing consciousness to

unconscious content, by bringing together the opposites, Jung would say, the

unconscious is allowed to compensate for the one-sided tendencies of

consciousness, thereby creating an awareness that embraces, and transcends, both

(Perry, p. 69).

Perry (1999) attributes the brilliance of Jung’s work to his daring openness

to the unknown and to his willingness to come into relationship with what he did

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not understand as well as to his inclination to always validate subjective

experience as potentially meaningful. “He let his empathetic participation in the

subjective experience of persons and historical eras speak their own meanings to

him” (p. 71), Perry says.

The Painful Passage Through the Shadow Towards Wholeness

Only by coming to terms with the darkness in oneself represented by the

shadow, can we come into the kind of relationship with the Self that makes

possible the psychological wholeness of which Jung speaks. The shadow concept

plays a vital role in Jungian psychology, says Joseph Henderson (1964), not just

because it represents the personality’s rejected aspect but because the resulting

tension between ego and shadow lies at the heart of what Jung characterized as

“the battle for deliverance” (quoted in Henderson, p. 118), the individual’s

struggle to overcome unconsciousness. This psychological struggle is portrayed

symbolically as the mythical hero’s struggle against destructive or evil powers.

Hero myths often represent in various ways a symbolic confrontation with a

dangerous force that must be faced, just as the ego must encounter and integrate

the unconscious shadow for the personality to be complete (Henderson, pp. 118-

121). “There is, in fact, no access to the unconscious and to our own reality but

through the shadow,” says Whitmont (1991, p. 16). “It is not until we have truly

been shocked into seeing ourselves as we really are . . . that we can take the first

step toward individual reality” (p. 16).

Recalling Kalsched’s (1996) discussion of the personal spirit’s archetypal

defenses against trauma, we come now to the transformative potential of those

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mysteriously ambivalent figures like the Devil, which represent the paradoxical

potential of the Self’s dark side to heal as well as destroy. Given Jung’s lifelong

fascination with the paradoxical potential for evil to deliver people from darkness

and suffering (Kalsched, p. 38), we can think of these dark archetypal figures as

representing what I call diabolical forces of transformation.

We can better understand the paradoxical nature of these dark aspects by

considering Jung’s (1964) observation that repressed unconscious tendencies, and

the psychic energies associated with them, form the potentially destructive

shadow side of our nature. “Even tendencies that might in some circumstances be

able to exert a beneficial influence are transformed into demons when they are

repressed” (p. 93). It follows that bringing such tendencies to consciousness could

transform their destructive nature. Think, for instance, of the value of bringing

repressed anger to consciousness. This insight is consistent with the

understanding that complexes represent the unlived, split-off parts of ourselves.

And from this perspective, we can appreciate that to be heard, so to speak,

complexes create distress—they rebel against the established order to make

themselves conscious. (I am inclined to rewrite the previous sentence to read:

And from this perspective, we can appreciate that complexes only become objects

of consciousness when their effects cause distress. This change would remove the

suggestion that complexes are willful or personal agents. Yet Jung repeatedly

characterizes complexes as autonomous, willful, agents.) The internal tensions

caused by autonomous unconscious complexes can be seen as essential to

developing consciousness, says Corbett (1996, p. 197). And the goal of therapy in

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relation to the shadow is to increase consciousness of it because consciousness

reduces the power of autonomous shadow complexes (p. 200).

We can see the confrontational dynamics of unconscious complexes

personified mythologically as Satan the rebel, who challenges the established

order, and as Lucifer, the bringer of light, says Corbett (1996, p. 197).

Marie-Louise von Franz characterizes the shadow as the “devilish element” in the

individuation process because the shadow is comprised of affects and autonomous

drives that disrupt the superficial unity of the personality (quoted in Zweig &

Abrams, 1991, p. xxii). Similarly, Rivkah Schärf Kluger describes Satan’s

psychological role as the disturber of worldly peace and comfort and thus as the

foe of unconsciousness. Only suffering and misery drives one inward, she says,

“into the ‘other world,’” into the world of God (quoted in Edinger, 1992, p. 93).

In the book of Job, Edinger says, Yahweh and Satan can be interpreted as

representing two aspects of the Self; and in this light, Satan’s provocation can be

understood psychologically as the impelling force that leads to insight and

development through a crisis involving destructive and liberating effects (pp. 80-

81). “When we recognize the devil as an aspect of ourselves, then this deity can

function as teacher and initiator,” says Metzner (1998b, p. 135). “He shows us our

own unknown face, providing us with the greatest gift of all—self-understanding.

The conflict of opposites is resolved into a coincidentia oppositorum” (p. 135).

The book of Revelation is another symbolic account of the individual’s

confrontation with the archetypal Self, or the psyche in its totality. In Jung’s

(1952/1969w) assessment, Revelation arises out of the one-sided consciousness of

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the author of the Epistles of John, who previously saw only the light and love in

God’s nature.

Under these circumstances a counterposition is bound to grow up in the

unconscious, which can then irrupt into consciousness in the form of a
revelation. If this happens, the revelation will take the form of a more or
less subjective myth, because, among other things, it compensates the
one-sidedness of an individual consciousness. (p. 435, para. 698)

In Archetype of the Apocalypse, a Jungian analysis of Revelation, Edinger

(1999) discusses the apocalypse as a symbolic representation of the Self’s

emergence into consciousness within the individual as well as collectively, the

“shattering of the world as it has been, followed by its reconstitution” (pp. 5-7).

Edinger affirms as well that an expanded relation to the transpersonal dimension

of the psyche through the individual’s encounter with the Self, although

inherently disruptive, is also potentially transformative (pp. 12-13).

Edinger (1999) describes manifestations of the apocalypse archetype as

representing the individuation process, which can be symbolized by the

archetype’s four characteristic aspects: (a) Revelation, (b) Judgment,

(c) Destruction and Punishment, and (d) the New World. With the emergence into

consciousness of transpersonal images from the unconscious, the individual

experiences shattering insights that can result in a new conscious relation to the

Self. In the process, however, one can experience a potentially overwhelming and

destructive awareness of the shadow as represented by the archetype’s aspects of

judgment and punishment (p. 7). The great image of the Last Judgment, says

Edinger, represents the psychological experience of “a decisive encounter with

the Self that requires specifically a thorough assimilation of the shadow” (p. 149).

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 When used responsibly, I would argue that psychedelics can serve the

beneficial function of, as Kluger would say, driving one into the other world, into

a “conscious submission to God’s will” (quoted in Edinger, 1992, p. 93). Given

the archetypal, or spiritual, cores of the negative shadow complexes, says Corbett

(1996), psychotherapeutic engagement with one’s primitive rage, destructiveness,

terror, and the like is as much a spiritual practice as attending to the positive

aspects of the numinosum (p. 30). The question is, of course, what would be the

nature of such a psychotherapeutic engagement? To start to answer that question,

I now consider Jung’s approach to healing the profoundly disturbing and

dissociative consequences of trauma.

Treating Trauma: Integration Versus Abreaction in Jung’s Psychology

In the section on trauma we saw that Jung proposed that if the alien

content from the archetypal unconscious can be translated somehow into the

language of consciousness, it can have what Jung characterized as a redeeming

effect, which suggests the transformative potential of the negative complexes

rooted in the archetypal unconscious. Now I would like to look more carefully at

Jung’s approach to treating trauma, which I think gives us a clearer idea of what

he means when he speaks of translating in some form the alien content from the

archetypal unconscious into the language of consciousness.

According to Kalsched (1996, p. 13), Jung’s only essay explicitly

discussing trauma was “The Therapeutic Value of Abreaction” (1921/1966e).

Even here Jung does not discuss trauma at great length. What he says, however, is

significant for two reasons. First, Jung’s conception of trauma in terms of

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complexes and dissociation supports Kalsched’s characterization of trauma and

his hypothetical daimonic self-care system. And second, Jung’s critique of the

therapeutic value of abreaction further confirms the value of an in-depth

examination of Jung’s psychology vis-à-vis treating psychedelic-induced

psychotic states. That is, Jung’s doubts about the effectiveness and

appropriateness of abreaction as a technique for treating trauma suggest that a

Jungian framework for treating psychedelic-induced psychotic states could well

add something unique and valuable to Grof’s psychedelic psychotherapeutic

model, which emphasizes abreaction.

Jung’s Definition of Trauma and Abreaction

Jung (1921/1966e) defines trauma as “either a single, definite, violent

impact, or a complex of ideas and emotions which may be likened to a psychic

wound” (p. 130, para. 262). Clearly, in the light of Kalsched’s model of trauma,

we can appreciate that a complex or set of complexes can arise from a single

traumatic experience. And Jung notes that trauma can be viewed “as a complex

with a high emotional charge” (p. 130, para. 262). Jung acknowledges the logical

conclusion that “because this emotionally effective charge seems at first sight to

be the pathological cause of the disturbance, one can accordingly postulate a

therapy whose aim is the complete release of this charge” (p. 130, para. 262). He

is referring of course to therapy that relies on abreaction, which Jung defines as

the dramatic reenactment of the emotions associated with a traumatic experience

for the purpose of completely releasing the emotional charge at the core of the

complex (pp. 130-131, para. 262). Such a release is understood to depotentiate the

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affects associated with the traumatic experience and thereby dissipate its

disturbing influence (p. 131, para. 262). Before looking at Jung’s critique of

abreaction and his alternative approach to treating trauma, I will review Grof’s

view of abreaction.

Grof’s View of Abreaction

Because abreaction has been so seriously questioned in the field of

psychiatry, Grof is careful to qualify his view that abreaction is a valuable

therapeutic technique. He therefore makes clear that abreaction is valuable not as

an isolated technique but as one of many important therapeutic elements within a

carefully structured and psychologically supportive environment (Grof,

1980/1994, pp. 30, 32; Grof, 1985, pp. 381-382). Grof nevertheless puts

considerable emphasis on the therapeutic value of abreaction. Based on his

extensive experience with psychedelic psychotherapy and holotropic breathwork,

Grof (1985) attributes the failure of abreaction reported in the psychiatric

literature to its limited and unsystematic use, to “its not having been carried far

enough” (p. 381). Abreaction, Grof says, “was not encouraged or allowed to go to

the experiential extremes that usually lead to successful resolution” (p. 381).

Grof (2000) also addresses the related issue of retraumatization. Because

abreaction often involves the extremely painful reliving of a traumatic experience,

Grof explains, many people question its therapeutic value. It seems to these

people that such intense reliving of a trauma would carry a high risk of

retraumatization. Grof says that the best response to this issue is provided by Ivor

Browne, an Irish psychiatrist, who suggests that

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 we are not dealing here with an exact replay or repetition of the original
traumatic situation, but with the first full experience of the appropriate
emotional and physical reaction to it. This means that, at the time when
they happen, the traumatic events are recorded in the organism, but not
fully consciously experienced, processed, and integrated. (p. 196)

The person who is reexperiencing the trauma is no longer the helpless victim he

or she was at the time of the original event, says Grof. “The holotropic state

induced in powerful experiential forms of psychotherapy thus allows the

individual to be present and operate simultaneously in two different sets of

spacetime coordinates” (p. 196). The nonordinary state induced by powerful

experiential forms of psychotherapy allows the individual to experience again all

the emotions and physical pain of the original trauma while at the same time

analyzing and evaluating the experience from the safe distance of the therapeutic

environment and “from a mature adult perspective” (p. 196). Grof (1980/1994)

also stresses the therapeutic importance of the therapist’s or attendant’s

committed presence during the entire session. “An atmosphere of security,

privacy, and full commitment is absolutely necessary for a successful psychedelic

session” (p. 140), he says.

Given Grof’s assessment that the correct use of abreaction usually leads to

a successful resolution, it should be beneficial to consider Jung’s approach to

therapy as a potential adjunct if not an alternative to Grof’s abreactive approach.

Moreover, although both Jung and Grof trust the unconscious to guide the healing

process, and although both warn against imposing theoretical presuppositions

upon the healing process, Grof is more radical than Jung in this regard. Grof

(2000) says that therapies emphasizing verbal exchange between the therapist and

the client are generally very disappointing as tools for treating serious problems
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(pp. 178-179). “Because of their conceptual and technical limitations,” Grof says,

“these methods are unable to reach the deeper roots of the conditions they are

attempting to heal” (p. 178). Furthermore, he adds, “although the client’s

cooperation is an essential part of the therapeutic process, it is the therapist who is

seen as the active agent and the source of knowledge necessary for successful

outcome” (p. 179). Grof’s holotropic approach to psychotherapy, on the other

hand, employs nonordinary states of consciousness to temporarily activate,

intensify, and subsequently resolve symptoms. “The facilitator then simply

supports the process that has been spontaneously set in motion” (p. 179). Grof’s

pessimistic view of verbal therapies contrasts with Jung’s emphasis on the

integration of dissociated psychic elements through one-on-one verbal therapy, to

which I will return shortly.

To fully appreciate the value Grof places on the experiential qualities of

abreaction, it is important to recognize the crucial somatic component in his

approach to healing. “There is,” says Grof (1980/1994), “no emotional distress or

disturbing and incomplete psychological gestalt that does not show specific

somatic manifestations” (p. 144). Effective physical intervention, Grof (2000)

maintains, can release blocked energies from the body that are associated with

trauma. “This makes it possible for the previously repressed content of these

memories to emerge into consciousness and be integrated,” Grof says (p. 192).

Jung’s work predates knowledge of the somatic element in trauma, says Richard

Tarnas (personal communication, October 8, 2008). Jung therefore did not

appreciate the extent to which the body contains collective as well as personal

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memories of trauma at the cellular level that need to be worked through

physically (see also Grof, 2000, pp. 32, 191-194).

Jung’s Critique of Abreaction

Although Jung’s criticism of abreaction is apparently aimed at its more or

less exclusive use, as opposed to Grof’s support of it as one of many important

therapeutic elements, Jung’s views may be useful nevertheless in establishing a

significant difference between his approach and Grof’s to integrating

psychedelic-induced disorders. In “The Therapeutic Value of Abreaction,” Jung

(1921/1966e) criticizes the reasoning that one can relieve the disturbing influence

of a trauma-induced complex by the complete release of its emotional charge. He

maintains that “in quite a large number of cases abreaction is not only useless but

actually harmful” (p. 131, para. 263).

Addressing the argument that abreaction should not be considered a

panacea and that every method has its refractory cases, Jung (1921/1966e) replies

that it is precisely in the careful examination of refractory cases that we gain the

most valuable insight into the method in question because they expose the

method’s limitations. While such an examination does not disprove the efficacy of

the method, Jung concludes, it can at least lead to improvements in its use (p. 131,

para. 265).

The essential factor in trauma, says Jung (1921/1966e), “is the dissociation

of the psyche and not the existence of a highly charged affect” (p. 131, para. 266).

“The main therapeutic problem is not abreaction but how to integrate the

dissociation [because] a traumatic complex brings about dissociation of the

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psyche” (p. 131, para. 266). Given the overwhelmingly powerful autonomy of

split-off trauma-induced complexes and their tyrannical invasion of the conscious

mind, says Jung, abreaction appears to be “an attempt to reintegrate the

autonomous complex, to incorporate it gradually into the conscious mind as an

accepted content, by living the traumatic situation over again” (p. 132, para. 268).

Jung questions the assumption that reliving the experience is curative, and he

suggests that other factors are necessary—especially the intervention of an

understanding, sympathetic, and trusted doctor. “No longer does [the analysand]

stand alone in his battle with these elemental powers. . . . [but rather] the

integrative powers of his conscious mind are reinforced” (paras. 269-270). Jung

concludes his criticism of abreaction by saying,

The rehearsal of the traumatic moment is able to reintegrate the neurotic

dissociation only when the conscious personality of the patient is so far
reinforced by his relationship to the doctor that he can consciously bring
the autonomous complex under the control of his will. (pp. 132-133,
para. 271)

I do not want to set up a straw man here, because as indicated above, Grof

emphasizes the importance of other factors, including the individual’s conscious

perspective during nonordinary states, a supportive therapeutic environment, and

post-session integration of the experience. I think, nevertheless, that Jung’s

critique of abreaction—with his careful analysis of the dissociative nature of

trauma-induced complexes, and with his emphasis on the individual’s conscious

integration in relationship to a therapist—provides a valuable perspective to the

treatment of psychedelic-induced disorders. I think we have only to consider the

ubiquitous references in the psychedelic literature to the importance of

“integrating” psychedelic experiences, on the one hand, and the lack of discussion
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of what is meant by the “integration” of psychedelic experience, on the other, to

appreciate the value of Jung’s psychology in relation to integrating psychedelic

experiences in general and to treating psychedelic-induced disorders in particular.

Rather than discuss the nature of integration in psychotherapy, Jung

(1921/1966e) continues his essay on abreaction with an assessment of the relative

value of the transference phenomenon in the psychotherapeutic relationship

(pp. 133-138, paras. 275-293). In opposition to Freud’s focus on transference and

the historical origins of the patient’s neurosis, Jung emphasizes (as does Grof)

that the creative element in the patient’s unconscious material helps him or her

move out of the disorder (p. 134, para. 277). Equally important, Jung says, the

patient must have the opportunity to form a person-to-person relationship with the

therapist on equal terms (pp. 136-138, paras. 286-290). In another essay, “A

Review of the Complex Theory,” Jung (1934/1969k) concludes that any dialogue

involving fear and resistance demands the therapist as well as the patient integrate

his or her own wholeness (p. 102, para. 213). As opposed to “the slavish and

humanly degrading bondage of the transference” says Jung (1921/1966e), this

kind of relationship fosters in patients the discovery of their own unique

personalities, their own worth, and their ability to adapt themselves to the

demands of life (p. 137, para. 290). The building of such a personal relationship,

concludes Jung, demands much more of the therapist than the “mere application

of routine technique” (p. 138, para. 291).

This requires a fundamental change of vision. Not only must the patient be
able to see the cause and origin of his neurosis, he must also see the
legitimate psychological goal towards which he is striving. We cannot
simply extract his morbidity like a foreign body, lest something essential

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 be removed along with it, something meant for life. Our task is not to
weed it out, but to cultivate and transform this growing thing until it can
play its part in the totality of the psyche. (para. 293)

Drawing From Both Grof and Jung

Even though I am highlighting here the differences between Jung’s and

Grof’s approaches to treating trauma, it is not my intention to set one against the

other. I am convinced that the work of both of them has great value for

understanding the nature and transformative potential of the psychedelic

experience. A knowledge of Grof’s approach to psychedelic psychotherapy could

prove valuable to Jungian analysts seeking to understand more deeply the nature

of psychedelic experience. Such knowledge would also be valuable to Jungian

analysts working with individuals who have experienced psychedelic-induced

psychotic states.

I can imagine that a Jungian framework for integrating psychedelic

experiences could become a useful adjunct to Grof’s more comprehensive

framework for psychedelic psychotherapy, just as Grof’s framework could one

day find its place in an even more global psychotherapeutic framework. I can also

imagine that Jung’s integrative approach could be used in combination with

Grof’s experiential approach to psychedelic psychotherapy. And in cases where

Grof’s more experientially aggressive approach to treating trauma seems

inappropriate or proves unproductive, Jung’s integrative approach could provide a

valuable alternative.

In justifying his approach to psychotherapy, Jung (1935/1966i) expresses

the balance I am trying to establish as I develop a Jungian framework for

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understanding and dealing with psychedelic experience. Jung says that his

particular approach to psychotherapy

is certainly not meant to condemn the existing methods as incorrect,

superfluous, or obsolete. The more deeply we penetrate the nature of the
psyche, the more the conviction grows upon us that the diversity, the
multidimensionality of human nature requires the greatest variety of
standpoints and methods in order to satisfy the variety of psychic
dispositions. (p. 9, para. 11; see also 1929/1966f, p. 36, para. 66)

Furthermore, I think that a Jungian framework for understanding the

nature of psychedelic experience could encourage an even more conscientious and

respectful attitude toward the use of psychedelics. The fact is that psychedelics to

a large extent still are used recreationally and ritually with little preparation and

only the most superficial psychological support. An awareness of Jung’s insights

into the complexity and importance of integration could help future professionals

using psychedelics in their practice and could benefit anyone using psychedelics

for personal growth and transformation without professional support. Before

turning to a more careful examination of Jung’s approach to integration, I would

like to highlight two case study accounts that indicate the potential for

transforming trauma, shadow, and psychotic states through psychedelic

psychotherapy.

The Transformative Potential of Psychedelic Psychotherapy: Two Case Studies

Dr. Rick Strassman’s Report

One of the volunteers in Strassman’s DMT study (see p. 202, above) was a

woman, Andrea, who as a child had “sleep paralysis,” a condition in which one

sees frightening scenes while sleeping and cannot move. Strassman (2001) reports

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that as a child the woman had been told by her mother that Satan was coming to

torture her during her sleep and that she needed to pray to Jesus for protection.

Andrea was apprehensive about the DMT sessions, despite the fact that she had

taken psychedelics over 100 times. Given her chronic inability to fall asleep

comfortably, she feared she would not be able to relax into the rush of effects, she

thought she might have a near-death experience, and she worried that she might

not be able to let go (p. 254). Describing one of Andrea’s high-dose sessions,

Strassman reports,

She sighed deeply a time or two while the flush was going in.
She then bellowed, NO! NO! NO!
For the next minute, she cried, No! No! No!
Andrea’s legs kicked and flailed. Her husband rested his hand on
her leg, gently patting and massaging her. I placed my hand on her other
foot. (pp. 254-255)

Her sobbing lasted five minutes. She gradually settled down, and she asked if she

had screamed. Strassman told her she had screamed a few times.

I thought so. It was hard to let go.

“There’s a lot of feelings in there.”
She laughed quietly. . . .
I never really left my body. I fought it all the way. I thought I was going to
die. I didn’t want to die. I was afraid. I realized that I had a body for a
reason and that I have work to do in this body.
Andrea now turned her fear into a challenge, rather than a defeat.
When I was coming down, I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to do this
again, but now I think I do. I don’t think it will be as scary next time. It
was death. I saw myself in that void, the void. It was just black, just too
much. I’ve never had anything like that happen before. . . . I was just
totally unprepared and startled and scared.

Preparing her for her last series of high-dose sessions a month later, Strassman

spoke to Andrea about her fear and encouraged her to let go. At the start of the

session,

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 she let out a brief muffled cry as the first 0.3 mg/kg dose went in.
However, anticipating this, her husband, Laura [an assistant], and I
quickly responded by placing our hands on her arms and legs. She calmed
quickly, and throughout the morning she worked on developing the theme
that had emerged on her first high dose: fear of death related to the fear of
how to live her life fully.
As was the case with so many of our tolerance study volunteers,
Andrea broke through into an ecstatic resolution of her anxiety and
confusion during her fourth session.
Eighteen minutes into this session, she said,
That was a real gift, this last one. . . .
There was literally a flood of beings saying, “Okay, remember
when you were young and idealistic and wanted to learn how to do body
work?” There’s no reason I can’t do that now.
When we spoke by phone later that week, she said, “I am really
grateful for the experience. I really wanted to blow things out. It’s changed
my perspective. It’s helped me focus on my interest in healing work.
There is so much I want to do. . . .”
Andrea could have continued fighting against painful and
frightening feelings, making a bad situation worse. We knew she might
have difficulty letting go after she told us about her mother’s comparing
her sleep-related symptoms to demonic attacks. Nevertheless, with her
husband’s and our support, she continued on through her fear and found
the sadness and confusion that lay behind it. Facing her anxiety and fears,
giving up resistance, she emerged with a clearer sense of who she was,
what she desired, and plans for carrying our her goals. (pp. 256-257)

Dr. Margot Cutner’s Report

Discussing a patient who suffered from severe depression and paranoid

tendencies (see pp. 157, 183-184, above), Cutner (1959) describes the progress

the woman made during LSD psychotherapy, which was supplemented by

ongoing analytic work outside the LSD sessions.

The following quotations from some of her reports exemplify how certain
archetypal images changed their meaning for the patient during an LSD
session through the impact of the transference, so that within seconds,
images assumed a positive instead of a negative character.
“I began to feel that I was lying at the bottom of a pit. I felt that
rubbish was being thrown in on top of me and I had to fight my way out.”

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 I suggested that she should stop fighting and I reminded her of the
story of Joseph, thrown into a pit. 37 She then relaxed and again
experienced a feeling of growing small. Then she heard the ringing of a
sawmill saw, and then remembered that she was born near a sawmill. “As
I lay, I had the growing conviction that I was going to be born and that it
was absolutely essential that Dr. C. should be with me.” She then felt that
she was “attached to something by a cord, and I could feel my limbs
beginning to swell, then I began to feel that life was flowing into me and
that I was fed by this cord. I was not actually born, but the feeling I had
was that, if I could retain this feeling, I could ultimately break away from
my mother . . . and that people would have to accept me and my ideas
instead of my always trying to conform to theirs.”
And here is another occasion where, through the transference, an
experience of horror became transformed into one of integration during
the LSD session. At the beginning:
“I felt I must run away and kill myself. . . . I felt I wanted to jump
off a cliff . . . then I wanted to smash my way out through the window, and
Sister locked the shutters. I begged Sister to leave me and lock me in so
that I could bash myself to death. I felt inferior, inadequate, and felt that
there was nothing worth living for, and there also came a fear of men. I
remember Dr. C. coming and telling me to lie down and just let things
come. While she was with me, I felt that something was coming from her
into my body and that it was giving me strength. . . . When my eyes were
closed I felt that there was a room inside me, with red plush carpets and
dark red velvet cushions and something inside me went into this room and
rested for a while.”
As the pit had turned from a place of utter humiliation into an
archetypal “womb,” so her inner storm center had turned into a center of
stillness. In both these instances the presence of the analyst as the “good”
and “nourishing” mother had still been necessary; later it was the process
of introversion, with or without the actual presence of the analyst, which
provided the “womb” inside which rebirth experiences could take place.
In this way a pattern, frequently repeated under LSD, had evolved
for this patient. She used to start the day in a panic, with frightening
pictures projected onto the walls, the furniture or the people around her,
and moods of paranoid aggression or abject depression. If then she
succeeded in letting go—and by remembering experiences like that of the
changed character of the pit—adopted an attitude of “giving up fighting”

37
Cutner no doubt is referring to the Biblical story of Joseph (Genesis 37:24),
who was thrown into a pit (variously translated as a pit, a dry well, or a cistern) by his
brothers. For Jungians the story, like stories of being swallowed by a whale or monster,
represents the myth of the hero’s perilous descent, which in turn symbolizes the
conscious mind’s descent into the unconscious. This involves “a diminution or extinction
of consciousness, an abaissement du niveau mental” (Jung, 1937/1968b, p. 333, para.
437, fig. 170).
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 (which under LSD she could do much more easily than at other times),
these moods were usually followed by images similar to that of the “inner
room.” There were inner gardens of great beauty, caves into which a light
was shining, fountains inside herself, or experiences of “God coming into
her,” these last usually connected with perceptions of golden light or with
sudden feelings of “a great love” taking hold of her. (pp. 741-742)

Cutner discusses the progression of this case in detail, during which she

concludes that

LSD, by reinforcing introversion (initiated through analysis anyway),

brought her up not only against her own, previously unconscious,
aggression, hate, and jealousy (stemming from childhood experiences);
but it also evolved archetypal (healing) symbolism through which her
psychotic tendencies could be overcome. (pp. 743-744)

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 CHAPTER 7: JUNG'S APPROACH TO INTEGRATION

Jung’s approach to psychological integration is central to the application

of his psychology to psychedelic psychotherapy and to the treatment of

psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Before discussing Jungian psychotherapy

and its practical implications vis-à-vis psychedelic experience, it is necessary to

examine Jung’s approach to integration.

Samuels et al. (1986) point out that Jung used the term integration in three

main ways: Integration characterizes the psychological interaction between

various parts, or opposites, of the personality, such as consciousness and the

unconscious, or ego and shadow. In this first sense, integration is diagnostically

and functionally the converse of dissociation. Integration can also be understood

as a sub-process of individuation, suggesting the groundwork for individuation

without the emphasis on self-realization. And, finally, integration can represent a

stage of development in which these various dynamics reach an optimal level of

tension (pp. 83-84). My discussion of integration is concerned most directly with

the first sense of the word, but also, by implication, with the second and third.

To consider more carefully what he means by integration, I now turn to

Jung’s (1916/1958/1969c) essay “The Transcendent Function.” As indicated

above, this essay presents a theoretical foundation for the integration of activated

unconscious material, which essentially involves bringing activated unconscious

material into a constructive or synthetic relationship to consciousness. In so

doing, suggests Perry (1999), the psyche creates an awareness that embraces—

and thus transcends—both its conscious and unconscious aspects (p. 69). Jung

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introduces his later, 1958, edition of “The Transcendent Function” by saying that

it deals with the psychic process involved in analytic treatment, a problem that

can be stated in the form of the question, “How does one come to terms in

practice with the unconscious?” (p. 67, Prefatory Note). Implicitly, says Jung, this

is “the fundamental question, in practice, of all religions and all philosophies. For

the unconscious is not this thing or that; it is the Unknown as it immediately

affects us” (p. 68). Furthermore, he says, the meaning and value of unconscious

contents “are revealed only through their integration into the personality as a

whole” (p. 68). Elsewhere Jung (1934/1969i) says that “coming to terms with the

contents of the collective unconscious. . . . is the great task of the integration

process” (p. 31, para. 64n).

Jung (1916/1958/1969c) 38 opens “The Transcendent Function” with a

review of the compensatory relationship between consciousness and the

unconscious, and he notes that the directed and controlling functions of

consciousness are relatively late developments in the human species (p. 69,

paras. 131-134). These functions, as discussed above, are relatively impaired in

the neurotic, in whom the partition between consciousness and the unconscious is

more permeable than in healthier persons. The psychotic, by contrast, is directly

influenced by the unconscious (para. 134). As should be obvious by now, there

are clear parallels between the controlling functions in neurotics and psychotics,

on the one hand, and individuals affected to various degrees by the abaissement

effects of psychedelics, on the other.

38
All the remaining citations in this chapter are to “The Transcendent Function.”
(Jung, 1916/1958/1969c).
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 One can’t help but wonder if Jung would have eventually warmed to the

therapeutic potential of psychedelics, at least when used with appropriate

precautions by current standards. There are good reasons to suspect that he might

have. He points out, for example, that the stability of consciousness and the

rigidity of its defense mechanisms tend to exclude psychic elements that under

certain conditions could beneficially enrich the conscious mind (pp. 70-71,

paras. 136-137). He also warns that the concentrated consciousness of civilized

life seriously increases the risk of a dissociation of the conscious mind from the

unconscious, a dissociation that in turn increases the risk of an overwhelming

counterposition breaking through into consciousness with unfortunate

consequences (p. 71, para. 139). Whatever the case may be, in his psychology in

general, and in his approach to the archetypal unconscious and the individual’s

occasionally turbulent progress towards individuation in particular, Jung has lent

us invaluable insights into the nature of psychedelic experience. And he has

helped us understand that even the disturbing qualities of psychedelic experience

are potentially beneficial.

As if addressing these matters, Jung asks a fundamental therapeutic

question that I view as central to helping someone integrate difficult psychedelic

experiences: “What kind of mental and moral attitude is it necessary [for the

analyst] to have towards the disturbing influences of the unconscious, and how

might they be conveyed to the patient?” (p. 73, para. 144). The answer, Jung says,

is to understand the inseparable relationship between consciousness and the

unconscious, and to thereby appreciate that these two opposite yet complementary

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factors constitute the fundamental aspects of the psyche’s transcendent function.

In understanding the relationship of these two factors in the structure and

dynamics of the psyche, the analyst comes to recognize the value of the

unconscious in compensating one-sided consciousness. Jung’s approach to

treatment presupposes the analyst’s acquaintance with these insights to begin

with, and it assumes that these insights are at least potentially available to the

analysand and can therefore be realized by him or her (pp. 73-74, para. 145).

Analysts who have experienced the integrative process themselves might be able

to mediate the transcendent function for their clients, might be able, that is, to

help their clients “bring conscious and unconscious together and so arrive at a

new attitude” (p. 74, para. 146). (Although Jung initially defines the transcendent

function as an attitude, he ultimately describes it as a process [p. 75, para. 147].)

Recalling that the synthetic-constructive method deals with psychological

meaning and purpose, Jung explains that this method is based on evaluating

symbols from the unconscious, which, as I discussed in Chapter Three (p. 131,

above), he sees as “the best possible expression for a complex fact not yet clearly

apprehended by consciousness” (p. 75, para. 148). Jung considers dreams and

other forms of unconscious material as products of the unconscious that transmit

symbolic expression to consciousness. Such products bear the characteristics of

an abaissement du niveau mental: logical discontinuity, analogy formation,

irrational expressions, confusion, and the like (p. 77f., para. 152f.). Again, there

are clear parallels to psychedelic experience when psychedelic-induced visions

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are understood as symbolic expressions of the unconscious that rise to

consciousness because of a lowered threshold of consciousness.

Yet, for reasons to which I will return shortly, Jung cautions that

self-observation and intellectual analysis cannot be relied upon as approaches to

the unconscious. One must start with one’s emotional state and become as aware

as possible of one’s mood, sinking into it unreservedly and noting on paper all

possible associations with it. One must take care, however, not to let one’s

associations stray beyond one’s affect and thereby displace it. Out of this kind of

attention to affect, or “feeling-toned content” (p. 86, para. 178), comes a picture

of unconscious material and tendencies related to one’s condition. This whole

procedure clarifies the affect to consciousness, enriches its content, and thereby

makes it more understandable (p. 82, para. 167). Such work can be beneficial and

invigorating in its own right. In any case,

it creates a new situation, since the previously unrelated affect has become
a more or less clear and articulate idea thanks to the assistance and
cooperation of the conscious mind. This is the beginning of the
transcendent function, i.e., of the collaboration of conscious and
unconscious data. (p. 82, para. 167)

After reviewing various methods of bringing unconscious material to

consciousness (including drawing, painting, body movement, and automatic, or

spontaneous, writing), and thereby laying a foundation for the transcendent

function, Jung poses another fundamental question: What are we to do with the

unconscious material once we obtain it? When consciousness confronts the

contents of the unconscious, he suggests, “a provisional reaction will ensue which

determines the subsequent procedure” (p. 84, para. 172). Jung identifies two

tendencies, which are largely a function of an individual’s personality: creative

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formulation and understanding. While in the case of creative formulation the

process is dominated by aesthetic concerns, understanding is dominated by

intense efforts to grasp the meaning of unconscious material (pp. 84-85, paras.

173-176). There are, not surprisingly, advantages and disadvantages to each

approach. One may become sidetracked by purely aesthetic matters, on the one

hand. And, on the other, one may overvalue the intellectual analysis and

interpretation of content and miss the unconscious material’s symbolic character

(para. 176). As I have indicated, this unconscious material is an expression of

complex facts that are to some degree beyond conscious comprehension. In

general, Jung suggests, aesthetic formulation and the understanding of meaning

supplement each other in the transcendent function (p. 85, para. 177). Ideally one

exists beside the other in “an alternation of creation and understanding,” in which

unconscious content first is freely given shape and then interpreted (p. 86, para.

179).

In either case, the conscious means of expression must serve the

unconscious content without influencing it unduly. “In giving the content form,”

says Jung, “the lead must be left as far as possible to the chance ideas and

associations thrown up by the unconscious” (p. 85, para. 178; see also pp. 86-87,

para. 180). Given the irrational and unexpected nature of such content, this

process is understandably experienced as difficult and painful by

ego-consciousness, despite its exceptional value (pp. 85-86, para. 178). Because

of this difficulty, it is natural that ego-consciousness avoids such a painful process

until it faces a psychological crisis. But once the contents of the unconscious have

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been given form and their meaning is understood, the second and most important

stage of the process has been reached. At this stage, another fundamental question

arises: How will the ego relate to this reality, to this meeting with its opposite?

Will it be able to transcend its limited position? (p. 87, para. 181)

I would like to pause here for a moment to rephrase these questions in

terms of an individual who has experienced psychedelic-induced psychotic states

in the past. Strange and terrifying content from the unconscious had overwhelmed

the individual’s ego to such an extent that the ego radically dissociated itself from

that content and retreated into a temporary psychosis. Working later with a

therapist, the individual happens to confront this same alien unconscious content.

With the support of the therapeutic situation, the individual’s ego may be able to

relate to that unconscious material in a new way. For the psyche to heal and

transform itself, ego-consciousness must face and integrate a reality that is

contrary to its very nature, a reality that transcends its own limited reality. How

will the ego relate to that alien reality this time? Will it be able to transcend its

limited position this time? “This standpoint,” Jung says, “is essential in coming to

terms with the unconscious” (p. 87, para. 183).

At this point Jung issues a warning that has particular significance, first,

for the use of psychedelics in general, and second, for attempts to integrate

unconscious material that was released in association with an earlier

psychedelic-induced psychotic state. Just as the conscious mind has a restrictive

effect on the unconscious, Jung says, “so the rediscovered unconscious often has a

really dangerous effect on the ego. . . . A liberated unconscious can thrust the ego

235
aside and overwhelm it” (pp. 87-88, para. 183). If the ego can’t defend itself from

the affective powers of the unconscious, a schizophrenic-like condition arises.

This danger would be less acute if the ego’s encounter with the unconscious could

be divested of its emotional force, which is what happens when unconscious

material is aestheticized or intellectualized. But the ego’s confrontation with the

unconscious, and the psyche’s consequent transcendent function, “is not a partial

process running a conditioned course” (p. 88, para. 183). It is rather, Jung says,

a total and integral event in which all aspects are, or should be, included.
The affect must therefore be deployed in its full strength. Aestheticization
and intellectualization are excellent weapons against dangerous affects,
but they should be used only when there is a vital threat, and not for the
purpose of avoiding a necessary task. (p. 88, para. 183)

Such a “total and integral event” involves a renewal of the whole

personality, which penetrates every aspect of one’s life. It means that the

unconscious must be taken seriously (which, Jung points out, does not mean that

it be taken literally), so that the unconscious can cooperate with consciousness—

instead of disturbing it (para. 184). This process becomes, then, a kind of

constructive confrontation that “generates a tension charged with energy and

creates a living, third thing. . . . So long as these are kept apart—naturally for the

purpose of avoiding conflict—they do not function and remain inert” (p. 90,

para. 189).

“Consciousness is continually widened through the confrontation with

previously unconscious contents, or—to be more accurate—could be widened if it

took the trouble to integrate them” (p. 91, para. 193), concludes Jung. With

sufficient guidance by the therapist and with intelligence, self-confidence, and

will-power on the part of the patient, the transcendent function offers one “a way
236
of attaining liberation by one’s own efforts and of finding the courage to be

oneself” (p. 91, para. 193).

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 CHAPTER 8: JUNGIAN PSYCHOTHERAPY

Beyond criticizing the therapeutic use of psychedelics, Jung does not

discuss the relationship between psychedelics and psychotherapy. Nevertheless,

Jung’s discussion of psychotherapy in general is relevant to my investigation.

Given the common characteristics that I have established between

psychedelic-induced psychotic states and psychosis, latent psychosis, and neurosis

as Jung conceives them, Jung’s approach to treating these conditions is inevitably

relevant to treating psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Furthermore, his

approach to psychotherapy provides insights into the practice of psychedelic

psychotherapy.

My intention in this chapter is to highlight briefly those aspects of Jung’s

approach to psychotherapy that are most relevant to psychedelic-related treatment.

This chapter therefore initiates my discussion of the implications of Jung’s

psychology for psychedelic-related treatment, a discussion that becomes more

specific in Chapter Nine. This chapter serves as a transition, then, between Jung’s

theoretical discussion of integration in Chapter Seven and my discussion of the

practice of psychedelic psychotherapy in Chapter Nine.

The Method and Purpose of Psychotherapy

Jung’s therapeutic method can be seen as involving two general stages

(Chodorow, 1997, p. 10). The first stage is to gain access to unconscious content

and thereby become aware of it. The second stage is to come to terms with or

integrate the released unconscious content (p. 10). I do not mean to suggest that

238
therapy in practice is a discrete, linear, or necessarily even logical process.

However, this two-stage conceptualization does provide a useful means for

examining the complex process of psychotherapy as Jung conceives it.

Gaining Access to the Unconscious

Reading through Jung’s writings, I often come upon statements that recall

Leary, Metzner, and Alpert’s (1964/1995) characterization of Jung as a man who

had committed himself “to the inner vision and to the wisdom and superior reality

of internal perceptions” (p. 23). An instance of this is a statement by Jung

describing the observation of intrapsychic activity. The first aim in

psychotherapeutic treatment, says Jung (1929/1966g),

is to observe the sporadic emergence, whether in the form of images or

feelings, of those dim representations which detach themselves in the
darkness from the invisible realms of the unconscious and move as
shadows before the inturned gaze. (p. 59, para 134)

Jung’s conception of those dark and invisible realms of the unconscious

recalls the vastly expanded cartography of the psyche that Grof (1980/1994)

created to account for the seemingly infinite range of experience opened up by

psychedelics (pp. 66-87; see also Grof, 2000, chap. 2). For Jung (1945/1966n), the

unconscious reflects existence as a whole (p. 90, para. 203). The unconscious

cannot be circumscribed, Jung says. It must be approached as “something

boundless: infinite and infinitesimal” (p. 91, para 206). Jung’s depiction of the

extraordinary breadth and depth of the unconscious is compatible therefore with

the transpersonal levels of psychedelic experience. And like psychedelics, Jung’s

psychotherapeutic methods can initiate one into a vast psychic universe.

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 Jung (1945/1966n) implies such breadth and depth when he says that the

focus of psychotherapy is not the neurosis but “the distorted totality of the human

being” (p. 88-89, para. 199). “Through the assimilation of unconscious contents”

says Jung (1934/1966h),

the momentary life of consciousness can once more be brought into

harmony with the law of nature from which it all too easily departs, and
the patient is led back to the natural law of his own being.
. . . . The way of successive assimilations goes far beyond the
curative results that specifically concern the doctor. It leads in the end to
that distant goal which may perhaps have been the first urge to life: the
complete actualization of the whole human being, that is, individuation.
(p. 160, paras. 351, 352)

Jung’s concept of individuation, as I discussed in Chapter Three, entails nothing

less then the personality’s transformative engagement with the archetype of

psychological wholeness, or the Self, the experience of which engenders a sense

of timelessness and eternity.

Coming to Terms With the Unconscious

Chodorow (1997) points out that the expression “coming to terms with the

unconscious” is the usual translation of Jung’s use of the German word

auseinandersetzung, which implies a dialectical relationship between

consciousness and the unconscious. This dialectic between consciousness and the

unconscious has the effect of differentiating one from the other while honoring

both as complementary psychic elements. (pp. 10-11). Jung’s own conscious

engagement with the unconscious, which I described in Chapter Four, illustrates

this dialectical process. In Jung’s account we can see him striving for a balanced

relationship between the psyche’s two opposing aspects (Jung, 1963, chap. 6).

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 Chodorow (1997) explains that Jung used many names to describe his

therapeutic method, including the transcendent function, active imagination, the

dialectical process, active fantasy, the picture method, differentiation,

introspection, and descent (pp. 3-4). This multiplicity of names suggests the

development and complexity of Jung’s thinking about an inevitably complicated

process. This multiplicity also indicates that, as one would expect, Jung’s

fundamental therapeutic method found expression in many different forms, some

more meditative, others more intellectual, intuitive, artistic, dramatic, physical, or

playful (p. 4). Contrasting Jung’s use of the terms transcendent function and

active imagination, Chodorow identifies common elements in all these various

forms of Jung’s therapeutic method.

The term “transcendent function” encompasses both a method and an

inborn function of the psyche. In contrast, the term “active imagination”
refers to the method alone. But, obviously, the method (active
imagination) is based on the image-producing function of the psyche, that
is, imagination. Both the transcendent function and the dynamic function
of the imagination are complex psychic functions made up of other
functions. Both combine conscious and unconscious elements. Both are
creative, integrative functions that shape and transform the living symbol.
(p. 5) 39

When Chodorow speaks of creative, integrative functions, she is alluding

to Jung’s emphasis on the active quality of active imagination. Jung (1921/1976a)

distinguishes between active and passive imagination. Active imagination, or

active fantasy (as he often calls it), is initiated when one turns attention toward

unconscious content with an attitude of expectation (p. 427, para. 711; Chodorow,

1997, p. 6). The ego’s active engagement, or “positive participation” (Jung,

39
See also page 17, where Chodorow briefly summarizes the development of
Jung’s view of active imagination vis-à-vis dream interpretation, self-knowledge,
psychotherapy, and individuation.
241
p. 428, para. 713), with unconscious material invests energy into that material that

potentially transforms its relationship to consciousness. Moreover, when that

unconscious material is consciously associated with analogous material such as

mythological symbols (through the technique of amplification), it becomes more

clearly formed in consciousness (p. 428, para. 712; Chodorow, p. 6). Jung says

that passive imagination, on the other hand, “is an irruption of unconscious

contents into consciousness” (p. 427, para. 711). Passive fantasies require no

conscious investment to take shape. They appear “as a result of a relative

dissociation of the psyche, since they presuppose a withdrawal of energy from

conscious control and a corresponding activation of unconscious material”

(p. 428, para. 712).

Jung (1921/1976a) considered active imagination an especially advanced

form of psychic activity (p. 428, para. 714). “For here the conscious and the

unconscious personality of the subject flow together into a common product in

which both are united” (p. 428, para. 714). Because passive imagination is marked

by a dissociative opposition between consciousness and the unconscious, “the

fantasy that irrupts into consciousness from such a state can never be the perfect

expression of a unified individuality, but will represent mainly the standpoint of

the unconscious personality” (p. 429, para. 714).

The distinction Jung makes between active and passive forms of

imagination, or fantasy, is central to Fordham’s Jungian-oriented criticism of

psychedelic psychotherapy (see pp. 107, 109-110, above). Hallucinogenic drugs,

says Fordham (1963),

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 can stimulate a profusion of what is known as archetypal imagery and
Cutner (1959) has suggested that the LSD experience can be used as an
“aid to deep analysis.” One manifestation which seems to support her
thesis is that imagery, stimulated by hallucinogens, can be compared with
that brought into consciousness during active imagination—a procedure
playing a considerable part in the synthetic symbolic process observed and
described by Jung [in “The Transcendent Function” (1916/1958/1969c)].
(p. 125)

Leaving aside for now the fact that Cutner (1959) actually compared

psychedelic-induced imagery with the imagery manifested in dreams as well as

active imagination (pp. 716, 720), Fordham’s criticism of psychedelic

psychotherapy ironically suggests a more objective way to evaluate the

effectiveness of psychedelic psychotherapy in Jungian terms.

Fordham maintains that the similarities between the archetypal imagery

released in psychedelic psychotherapy and the archetypal imagery brought to

consciousness in active imagination are only superficial, while the differences are

considerable (1963, p. 125). Psychedelics, Fordham says, “produce archetypal

imagery by involuntary biochemical means; in active imagination the archetypes

in the unconscious are given form by the patient’s deliberate activity” (p. 125).

Fordham (1956) explains that active imagination is a term developed by Jung to

characterize a method whereby archetypal images “can be formed by bringing the

ego into relationship with the ‘inner world’ of archetypes” (p. 207). Fordham

says, correctly I think, that the term active imagination is inappropriate when it is

used indiscriminately to describe creative activity in general. Creative activity

often involves “imaginative activity,” he says, rather than “the active induction of

the imagination by the ego” (p. 208).

Painting pictures, fantasying, etc., may just as well be imaginative activity

as active imagination, the distinction depending upon the activity of the
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 ego [italics added]. In favorable circumstances imaginative activity leads
to growth of the ego, active imagination to consciousness of the self.
Therefore each form of imagination leads to different conclusions and to
different treatment of the material. (p. 208)

The distinction Fordham notes here (that is, determining weather a

creative activity is psychologically passive or active based on the ego’s

participation) suggests a way to objectively assess the value of psychedelic

psychotherapy from a Jungian standpoint. 40 Contrary to Fordham’s assessment of

psychedelic psychotherapy, I don’t think the critical issue should be whether or

not the psychedelic-released unconscious content is an irruption into

consciousness (i.e., a psychological event in which the ego is passive). As

Fordham’s distinction between imaginative activity and active imagination

suggests, I think an objective assessment of psychedelic psychotherapy must take

into account the manner in which ego-consciousness relates to the released

unconscious content. If the ego subsequently comes into conscious relationship to

unconscious material that initially emerged without conscious intention or

participation, that is ultimately a valid integrative process.

The soundness of this approach to assessing psychedelic psychotherapy

becomes evident when the process of integrating unconscious material that comes

to consciousness by way of a psychedelic experience is compared to the process

of integrating unconscious material that comes to consciousness by way of a

dream. Jungians of course give great weight to the interpretation of unconscious

content released into consciousness during the dream state. And yet for Jung

40
There are other criteria, of course: the readiness of the subject to integrate the
material, the knowledge and skill of the therapist, the relationship between subject and
therapist. I discuss these in Chapter Nine.
244
(1921/1976a) dreams are “nothing but passive fantasies” (p. 429, para. 715). Even

if we accept that ego-consciousness is always passive in relation to unconscious

material as it is released during a psychedelic experience, this should not be the

basis on which we assess the value of psychedelic psychotherapy. The

effectiveness of psychedelic psychotherapy, that is, does not depend on the ego

playing an active role during the psychedelic experience itself any more than

analysis depends on the ego playing an active role during a dream. As I indicate in

Chapter Nine, psychedelic psychotherapy usually involves the integration of

psychedelic-induced unconscious content subsequent to the psychedelic session.

Furthermore, according to Cutner and Sandison (as I indicate in Chapter Nine), it

is in fact possible for the individual to form an active, conscious relationship to

unconscious material as it emerges during a psychedelic experience.

The Relationship Between Analyst and Analysand

The Analyst

Unlike physical diseases, which generally call for specific treatments, the

only valid principle when treating a psychopathology, says Jung (1945/1966n), is

that its treatment must be psychological (p. 87, para. 198). Despite all the methods

and approaches, “the remarkable thing is that any given therapeutic procedure in

any given neurosis can have the desired result” (p. 87, para. 198). All skillful

psychotherapists will consciously or unconsciously draw from theories beyond

their own school, Jung says. Ultimately, every therapist not only has his or her

own method, he or she is that method. “The great healing factor in psychotherapy

245
is the doctor’s personality,” Jung says (p. 88, para. 198). And he repeatedly

cautions against relying on theoretical suppositions.

As far as possible I let pure experience decide the therapeutic aims. This
may perhaps seem strange. . . . But in psychotherapy it seems to me
positively advisable for the doctor not to have too fixed an aim. He can
hardly know better than the nature and will to live of the patient. The great
decisions in human life usually have far more to do with the instincts and
other mysterious unconscious factors than with conscious will and
well-meaning reasonableness. (Jung, 1929/1966f, p. 41, para. 81)

It follows that Jung (1951/1966o) emphasizes the importance of therapists

undergoing analysis themselves before treating others. To begin with, therapists

who have not undergone analysis have a tendency, Jung says, to project their own

unconscious characteristics onto the patient, or to not see those unconscious

characteristics at all in the patient (p. 115, para. 237). It also seems evident that

therapists who have done deep inner work themselves will more likely be able to

appreciate and deal with irrational material emerging from their patient’s

unconscious. This would be especially true for therapists practicing psychedelic

psychotherapy. Clearly they should have an intimate firsthand knowledge of

psychedelic experience.

When therapeutic progress proves unsatisfactory through rational

treatment, says Jung (1929/1966f), therapists should let themselves be guided by

“the patient’s own irrationalities” and thereby allow their patient’s latent creative

potential to develop (p. 41, para. 82). Jung finds dream interpretation a useful

guide to the unconscious in such cases (p. 42, para. 86). For those who have found

no meaning or satisfaction in the rational domain of life, Jung says, “it is

enormously important to be able to enter a sphere of irrational experience” (p. 45,

para. 96).
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 The Dialectical Relationship

In addition to characterizing the intrapsychic integration of consciousness

and the unconscious as a dialectical process, Jung views the ideal relationship

between analyst and analysand as being a dialectical one. “Treatment is an

individual, dialectical process, in which the doctor, as a person, participates just

as much as the patient,” says Jung (1951/1966o, p. 116, para. 239). “Difficult

cases, therefore, are a veritable ordeal for both patient and doctor” (p. 116, para.

239). Therapists must have as much insight into their own psyches as they expect

from their patients, Jung says. Only when they have healed themselves can they

hope to heal their patients (p. 116, para. 239). “If I wish to treat another individual

psychologically at all,” says Jung (1935/1966i), “I must for better or worse give

up all pretensions of superior knowledge, all authority and desire to influence. I

must perforce adopt a dialectical procedure consisting in a comparison of our

mutual findings” (p. 5, para. 2). Such a therapeutic relationship supports the

process of individuation, says Jung, (p. 20, para. 25), presumedly in analysand

and analyst alike.

The Transference

Projection seems to be a ubiquitous characteristic of psychological life. As

indicated above (p. 68), Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979/1997) found that

projections were a prominent feature of psychedelic experience. Grof (1985)

describes the “exteriorization of the process” and “excessive use of the

mechanism of projection” as primary characteristics of the psychotic style in

confronting one’s psyche (p. 303; see also p. 76, above). And as I discussed in
247
“Resistance to and Projection of the Shadow,” above, Jungians regard projection

as a universal psychological factor that becomes especially persistent when the

individual is confronted with material from the archetypal unconscious. It is

therefore no surprise that Jungian psychotherapists consider projection, in the

form of transference, a significant factor in the relationship between analyst and

analysand. It follows that transference is also an important factor in psychedelic

psychotherapy.

Transference can be defined generally as the projection of unconscious

content onto the therapist by the analysand (Jung, 1917/1966b, p. 62, para. 94n).

Transference is usually understood more specifically as the projection of

unconscious parental images onto the therapist. Jung (1941/1966l) identifies the

roots of the transference phenomenon in the patriarchal or hierarchical orientation

of the Western psyche. This deep-seated psychic orientation, Jung suggests,

causes individuals to unconsciously seek parental or authoritative qualities in the

analyst (p. 99, para. 217). The detachment of these projected images, he says,

“belongs to the stock in trade of psychotherapeutic success” (para. 218).

In “Jung’s Conception of Transference,” Fordham (1974) observes that

Jung, like Freud, recognized the infantile and erotic characteristics of transference

and its resistance to treatment (p. 5). The nature of the transference, says Jung

(1929/1966g), corresponds more or less to the relation between parent and child.

“The patient falls into a sort of childish dependence from which he cannot defend

himself even by rational insight,” Jung says. “The fixation is at times

248
extraordinarily powerful—its strength is so amazing that one suspects it of being

fed by forces quite outside ordinary experience” (p. 61, para. 139).

Jung, in contrast to Freud, emphasized the purposeful function of the

transference, and he saw that the recognition and resolution of the patient’s

projections could create a bridge to reality and individuation (Fordham, 1974,

pp. 5-6). In the process of interpreting the transference for the patient and

explaining what he or she is projecting, says Jung (1929/1966g), the therapist has

the opportunity to bring unconscious material to the patient’s awareness (pp. 62,

63, paras. 141, 144). This process is potentially dangerous, Jung (1941/1966l)

explains, and therefore the analyst should proceed carefully. The danger arises as

energy that was previously split off into the transference is shifted back to the

unconscious material from which the projections originated (p. 101, para. 218).

Those unconscious images, Jung says,

are charged with all the energy they originally possessed in childhood. . . .
Their integration [with consciousness] therefore means a considerable
afflux of energy to the unconscious, which soon makes itself felt in the
increasingly strong coloration of the conscious mind by unconscious
contents. . . . There now appear in dreams and fantasies impersonal,
collective contents which are the very material from which certain
schizophrenic psychoses are constructed. . . . The releasing of the ego
from its ties with the projection—and of these the transference to the
doctor plays the principal part—involves the risk that the ego, which was
formerly dissolved in relationships to the personal environment, may now
be dissolved in the contents of the collective unconscious. (p. 101, para.
218)

Yet working through the transference can be ultimately transformative,

says Jung (1941/1966l). The opportunity for psychological transformation occurs

during the ego’s dangerous dissolution in the collective unconscious. At this

point, Jung says,

249
 a healthful compensatory operation comes into play which each time
seems to me like a miracle. Struggling against that dangerous trend
towards disintegration there arises out of this same collective unconscious
a counteraction, characterized by symbols which point unmistakably to a
process of centering. This process creates nothing less than a new
personality, which the symbols show from the first to be superordinate to
the ego and which later proves its superiority empirically. The centre
cannot therefore be classed with the ego, but must be accorded a higher
value. Nor can we continue to give it the name of “ego,” for which reason
I have called it the “self”. . . . The experience of the self has nothing to do
with intellectualism; it is a vital happening which brings about a
fundamental transformation of personality. I have called the process that
leads to this experience the “process of individuation. (pp. 101-102,
para. 219)

Cutner (1959), as I have indicated, observed such transformative archetypal

imagery emerge during one of her patient’s psychedelic-induced confrontations

with the unconscious (pp. 226-228, above).

Sandison (1959) confirms that transference phenomena occur just as often

in LSD treatment as in conventional analysis (p. 500). The transference in

psychedelic psychotherapy is potentially more complicated and intense, however.

The session may be complicated by psychedelic-induced illusions or paranoid

feelings that patients have about, for instance, the drugs the therapist is

administering to them. Sandison (1954) notes that some patients are convinced at

first that they will be cured by merely taking LSD. This illusion can potentially

reduce their psychological commitment to the session and thereby diminish its

effectiveness (pp. 513-514). We can also recall the psychiatrist who was the

subject in his own mescaline experiment and who experienced a paranoid feeling

that his colleague had given him a poisoned glass of water during his session (see

p. 204, above). Given the potential intensity of psychedelic-induced unconscious

content, especially when archetypal content is released, it is understandable that

250
individuals make, as Sandison (1959) puts it, “violent psychological projections

on to the analyst” (p. 500). In spite of the complications and intensity of the

transference during psychedelic treatment, Sandison maintains that the

transference is susceptible to analysis and interpretation by the patient with the

guidance of the therapists (p. 500; see also Cutner, 1959, p. 722ff.; Sandison,

1954, p. 514).

Dreams and Their Interpretation

Dreams make up the greatest part of the psychic material interpreted in

Jungian analysis because they are the most prevalent expression of the

unconscious (Jung, 1945/1969t, p. 287, para. 544; see also von Franz, 1993, p. 2).

Given the significant parallels that Jung identifies between dreams, schizophrenia,

and by implication psychedelic experience (see pp. 133, 193-196, above), 41

Jung’s approach to dreams and their interpretation provides an excellent basis for

applying his psychology to psychedelic-related treatment.

The Sphere of the Irrational

As I indicated above, Jung (1929/1966f) places great importance on the

ability “to enter a sphere of irrational experience” (p. 45, para. 96) through dream

work or active imagination. In so doing, Jung says, “the habitual and the

commonplace come to wear an altered countenance, and can even acquire a new

glamour” (p. 45, para. 96). In the sphere of the irrational, Jung suggests, common

41
Recall that Jung (1907/1972b) characterized dreams as hallucinatory
representations of unconscious material, or “the hallucinations of normal life” (p. 148,
para. 308).
251
things also take on new meaning. Considering Jung’s emphasis on the dangers of

psychedelic psychotherapy, it is notable that he mentions here the dangers of

subjecting oneself to the irrational through dream work and active imagination.

“I do not think I underestimate the risk of this undertaking. It is as if one began to

build a bridge out into space” (p. 45, para. 97). Yet Jung does not hesitate to

encourage imagination, or fantasy, through dream work and active imagination.

Truth to tell, I have no small opinion of fantasy. To me, it is the maternally

creative side of the masculine mind. When all is said and done, we can
never rise above fantasy. . . . All the works of man have their origin in
creative imagination. (p. 45, para. 98)

Jung (1945/1969t) describes dreams as fragments of spontaneous psychic

activity that are just conscious enough to be recalled in the waking state (p. 282,

para. 532). Some of his descriptions of dreams suggest remarkable parallels to

psychedelic experience. The combination of ideas in dreams, he says,

is essentially fantastic; they are linked together in a sequence which is as a

rule quite foreign to our ‘reality thinking,’ and in striking contrast to the
logical sequence of ideas which we consider to be a special characteristic
of conscious mental processes. (1916/1969b, p. 238, para. 445).

Of all psychic phenomena, says Jung (1945/1969t), the dream seems to present

the most “irrational” elements (p. 282, para. 532). The dream appears to have, he

says,

a minimum of that logical coherence and that hierarchy of values shown

by the other contents of consciousness, and is therefore less transparent
and understandable. . . . Usually a dream is a strange and disconcerting
product distinguished by many ‘bad qualities,’ such as lack of logic,
questionable morality, uncouth form, and apparent absurdity and
nonsense. People are therefore only too glad to dismiss it as stupid,
meaningless, and worthless. (p. 282, para. 532)

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 The Purpose and Value of Dreams

Despite the apparent senselessness of dreams, Jung (1934/1966h) asserts

that it is “we who lack the sense and ingenuity to read the enigmatic message

from the nocturnal realm of the psyche” (p. 151, para. 325). When we judge

dreams to be meaningless, says Jung (1916/1969b), we are projecting our lack of

understanding onto them. But that, he says, does not prevent dreams from having

their own inherent meaning (p. 238, para. 446).

Questions concerning the purpose and effect of dreams are applicable to

every form of psychic activity, Jung says. “Everywhere the question of the ‘why’

and the ‘wherefore’ may be raised,” he says, “because every organic structure is a

network of purposive functions” (1916/1969b, p. 243, para. 462). Anyone who

appreciates the critical role that the unconscious plays in the causes and origins of

psychopathology, says Jung (1934/1966h), “will attribute a high practical

importance to dreams as direct expressions of the unconscious” (p. 139,

para. 294). The aim of dream analysis is to uncover and understand unconscious

content that can help elucidate and treat the pathology (pp. 139-140, para. 294).

The Compensatory Function of Dreams

When we interpret a dream, says Jung (1934/1966h), it is always useful to

consider what conscious attitude the dream is compensating (p. 153, para. 330).

The compensatory significance of dreams is often not readily apparent, and at

times it can be quite remote. But Jung (1916/1969b) maintains that all dreams

compensate consciousness in one way or another (p. 250, para. 483). The dream is

ultimately a reflection of those unconscious contents that complement the current

253
conscious situation (pp. 248-249, para. 477). That is, the dream provides

consciousness with a completely different view, which can give the individual a

balanced perspective on the current situation (p. 245, para. 469). The contrast can

be especially striking when the conscious viewpoint threatens the individual’s

vital needs. The more one-sided the conscious attitude, Jung says, the greater is

the possibility that especially intense dreams with contrasting, purposeful content

will arise as manifestations of the psyche’s self-regulation (p. 253, para. 488).

“The unconscious is quite capable of bringing about all kinds of unwelcome

disturbances,” says Jung (1945/1969t, p. 288, para. 546). “These disturbances are

due to lack of harmony between conscious and unconscious” (p. 288, para. 546).

We need only consider the unsavory imagery that reportedly tends to manifest in

the dreams of those who have no awareness of their own shadow.

Compensation usually helps establish psychological balance, says Jung

(1945/1969t). But in some cases (where, for instance there is a latent psychosis),

compensation may lead to destructive action and even suicide (p. 288, para. 547).

This may account to some extent for the risk of suicide during psychedelic

sessions (see pp. 144-145, above). It is also important to note that dreams

containing archetypal content may represent more than a personal compensation.

Archetypal themes sometimes “express an eternal human problem that repeats

itself endlessly, and not just a disturbance of personal balance,” Jung says (p. 292,

para. 556).

Jung (1951/1966o) finds especially significant the shift in the collective

psychic situation that has accompanied modern civilization’s loss of contact with

254
those mythological symbols upon which all religion is ultimately based.

Psychologically, these symbols form a bridge to the archetypal unconscious, Jung

maintains; but these bridges are currently in a state of collapse, and we need to

understand that no individual is personally responsible for this disaster

(pp. 122-123, para. 251). At the same time, Jung says, we need to appreciate that

the individual’s unconscious will try to rebuild these broken bridges, we need “to

understand the attempts at restitution and cure which nature herself is making”

(p. 123, para. 252).

Jung (1935/1966i) characterizes this process of restitution in his essay

“Principles of Practical Psychotherapy.” “The psychic development of the

individual produces something that looks very like the archaic world of fable,” he

says.

The individual path looks like a regression to man’s prehistory, and . . .

consequently it seems as if something very untoward is happening which
the therapist ought to arrest. We can in fact observe similar things in
psychotic illnesses, especially in the paranoid forms of schizophrenia,
which often swarm with mythological images. The fear instantly arises
that we are dealing with some misdevelopment leading to a world of
chaotic or morbid fantasy. . . .
Now, it would seem that the recuperative process mobilizes these
powers for its own ends. Mythological ideas with their extraordinary
symbolism evidently reach far into the human psyche and touch the
historical foundations where reason, will, and good intentions never
penetrate; for these ideas are born of the same depths and speak a
language which strikes an answering chord in the inner man, although our
reason may not understand it. Hence, the process that at first sight looks
like an alarming regression is rather a reculer pour mieux sauter, an
amassing and integration of powers that will develop into a new order.
(pp. 15-16, para. 18)

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 CHAPTER 9: IMPLICATIONS
FOR PSYCHEDELIC-RELATED TREATMENT

As I indicated in my dissertation’s introduction, it is beyond the scope of

this investigation to propose a comprehensive set of Jungian guidelines for

psychedelic-related treatment. My intention here therefore is to discuss briefly

only the most significant treatment implications suggested by my Jungian

interpretation of psychedelic experience. These are implications for the practice of

psychedelic psychotherapy and the treatment of psychedelic-induced psychotic

states that are particularly related to Jung’s psychology.

When I refer to “the treatment of psychedelic-induced psychotic states,” I

mean psychotherapy for the purpose of treating the effects of psychotic states that

occurred during a previous psychedelic experience. As I have discussed,

psychedelic-induced psychotic states very rarely cause a full-blown, long-term

psychosis. However, the effects of a psychedelic-induced psychotic state can

manifest as PTSD symptoms (see “Psychedelic-Induced Trauma,” p. 50, above).

These are symptoms such as brief spontaneous recurrences of a psychotic state

(flashbacks), diminished participation in significant activities, and exaggerated

startle response. Treatment for psychedelic-induced psychotic states may include

psychedelic psychotherapy. And psychedelic psychotherapy may induce

temporary psychotic states in its own right or induce the recurrence of psychotic

states originally brought about by a previous psychedelic experience.

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 Subject Readiness

Throughout this dissertation the complexity inherent in a Jungian

interpretation of psychedelic experience has become apparent. This complexity

becomes especially evident when examining the different views of psychedelic

experience represented by Jung and Fordham, on the one hand, and Sandison and

Cutner, on the other. Perhaps nowhere is the incongruity between their views

more apparent than when considering the controversial question of an individual’s

readiness for psychedelic psychotherapy.

This issue strikes at the core of Jung’s criticism of psychedelic

psychotherapy. The psychedelic substance, Jung (1975b) said, “uncovers such

psychic facts at any time and place when and where it is by no means certain that

the individual is mature enough to integrate them” (p. 222; see also p. 12, above).

Jung feared that the overwhelming nature of the psychedelic experience could

even release a latent psychosis in some individuals (p. 224). Seen in the context of

his many papers on psychotherapy, it is clear that Jung’s criticism of psychedelic

psychotherapy is a specific instance of his concern for the risks inherent in

psychotherapy in general. During the process of individuation, says Jung

(1935/1966i), there is always a risk that the unconscious can overwhelm

consciousness and bring about a psychotic reaction.

A development of this kind may be dangerous with a person whose social

personality has not found its feet; moreover any psychotherapeutic
intervention may occasionally run into a latent psychosis and bring it to
full flower. For this reason to dabble in psychotherapy is to play with fire,
against which amateurs should be stringently cautioned. It is particularly
dangerous when the mythological layer of the psyche is uncovered. (p. 15,
para. 18)

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 The concerns expressed here by Jung are consistent with the commonly

practiced safeguard that only individuals with a strong, healthy ego should be

allowed to undergo psychedelic psychotherapy (Vaughan, 2001, p. 194). Yet

some experienced psychedelic therapists have found that under certain

circumstances, this precaution may be unnecessarily restrictive. While Grof

(1980/1994) acknowledges that it takes much less time to prepare a

psychologically stable individual for psychedelic psychotherapy (p. 124), he

maintains that “under optimal circumstances, which involve a specially structured

treatment facility and an experienced therapeutic team, LSD psychotherapy can

be experimentally conducted with any psychiatric patient whose condition is

clearly not of an organic nature” (p. 153). Sandison (1963) reports that his

analytically-oriented LSD clinic (which fulfilled Grof’s standards) specifically

selected individuals for treatment who had psychiatric problems that were

untreatable by orthodox methods (p. 33). “They were all in danger of becoming

permanent mental invalids, life-long neurotics or of ending their lives by suicide”

(Sandison et al., 1954, p. 501).

Both Grof (1980/1994) and Sandison (1963) acknowledge that transient

psychotic symptoms, aggressive behavior, and suicidal tendencies can arise in

patients undergoing psychedelic treatment, especially mentally ill patients. They

both maintain, however, that these adverse reactions can be successfully managed

when appropriate therapeutic support is available. This requires a “situation where

no limits are placed on the number of sessions,” Grof explains. “Experienced

258
therapists, trained nurses, and the supportive atmosphere of a therapeutic

community are necessary prerequisites for such an endeavor” (p. 153).

Sandison’s and Grof’s practice of LSD psychotherapy with mentally ill

patients is predicated upon the fact that it can be extremely difficult to overcome

some individuals’ resistance to facing difficult unconscious material. Jung

(1929/1966g) addresses this common problem, saying,

It is not always possible to bring the patients close enough to the

unconscious for them to perceive the shadows. On the contrary, many of
them . . . are so firmly anchored in consciousness that nothing can pry
them loose. They develop the most violent resistances to any attempt to
push consciousness aside. (p. 60, para. 137)

In the early 1950s there was no theoretical basis for supposing that

psychedelics could be used as a practical tool in combination with psychotherapy,

says Sandison (2001). Reviewing earlier LSD research, Sandison understood that

the drug “produced a loosening of mental associations, that it facilitated the

transference, and that forgotten and sometimes painful memories could be

released” (p. 38). Two years after initiating an LSD treatment program for

mentally ill patients at Powick Hospital in 1952, Sandison concluded that LSD

treatment offered hope to patients who could not be helped by conventional

psychiatric methods. For many of these patients analytical treatment would have

been the best solution, Sandison says. Yet the time and expense required for

analysis was prohibitive for the vast majority of them. Furthermore, says

Sandison (1954),

in so many cases the rigid conscious barriers and resistances offered by the
patient are too great to overcome. LSD gives these people some real and
tangible experience of their own unconscious and re-kindles their faith in
their own spirit at a comparatively early stage of treatment, and helps it to
proceed more readily. (p. 509)
259
Sandison found that after LSD treatment had shown his patients the contents of

the unconscious, psychotherapy more effectively helped them assimilate the

released material (p. 509). In the early 1960s, Sandison coined the term

psycholytic therapy to indicate the ability that psychedelics have to loosen

unconscious mechanisms and thereby release unconscious content (Sandison,

1997, p. 65).

Sandison (1963) addresses the issue of whether or not it is appropriate to

use psychedelic substances to overcome the resistance individuals have to facing

difficult unconscious material, or as he says, to “breaking down the mind’s natural

barriers between the external ego and the unconscious” (pp. 34-35).

The attitude of LSD therapists has undergone an interesting change

through the years. It was at first thought that the principal dangers of
treatment would reside in breaking down resistances too quickly, and this
view must to some extent still be sustained. . . . It may be dangerous to
break down resistances in the absence of suitable home conditions or in
the presence of an inadequate, insecure, rigid and hostile hospital
environment, suicide and psychosis being the principal results. On the
other hand it cannot be stressed too much that, on the whole, more
disservice is done to patients by overcaution dictated by an unsatisfactory
environment than has resulted from the vigorous prosecution of treatment
in a carefully designed therapeutic situation. (p. 35)

Cutner (1959) agrees that psychedelic psychotherapy, when properly

integrated into the analytic process as a whole, may be necessary when treatment

is urgent or when a person is not considered treatable by conventional means

(pp. 717, 725). She acknowledges, nevertheless, that any analyst who practices

psychedelic psychotherapy must remain alert to a number of issues:

Should not resistances be worked through in patient analytical work: is

there perhaps an obstacle in the transference situation which prevents the
progress of the analysis; or are there perhaps times of seeming barrenness
which in truth may be periods of incubation or assimilation in the

260
 unconscious, the rhythm of which should not be disturbed by violent
action? Or is it perhaps a simple insufficiency on the part of the analyst
that causes the analysis to come to a standstill? (p. 717)

Cutner also acknowledges that the failure to integrate unconscious material

released by psychedelic substances can raise barriers to further psychological

development (p. 717). And Sandison says that to some extent Fordham’s criticism

of LSD treatment in the early 1950s was valid (see pp. 109-110, above). “We

hadn’t fully refined at that time the distinction between those patients who would

do better with LSD and those who really would be far better going into

conventional therapy” (R. Sandison, personal communication, April 8, 2009).

Nevertheless, Sandison contends, given the realities of available healthcare, where

only a very small proportion of patients have the opportunity for long-term

psychotherapy, it would be irresponsible to not take advantage of other

treatments. “If LSD is available and effective,” says Sandison, “why not use it?”

(personal communication, April 8, 2009)

Ultimately, then, Sandison and Cutner (like Grof, Cohen, and many other

psychedelic psychotherapists) maintain that when patients are treated with

appropriate therapeutic support during psychedelic therapy, the benefits far

outweigh the risks. The unconscious will release what it is ready to reveal, says

Cutner (1959). Material that is released prematurely (i.e., before the patient is

mature enough to integrate it), will be forgotten after the psychedelic session, just

as prematurely-released material is forgotten in conventional analysis (p.717).

Sandison and Whitelaw (1957) report that their clinical studies of the

therapeutic value of LSD in mental illness resulted in notable successes with

obsessional neurotics and patients with psychopathic personalities. They also

261
report that LSD treatment failed to help patients diagnosed with an actual or latent

psychosis or with “inadequate personality” (p. 336), the latter of which they note

is notoriously difficult to assess. These early treatment results, in addition to the

overall complexity of issues concerning subject readiness, clearly suggest the

need for further study of the relationship between personality traits, subject

readiness, and successful psychedelic psychotherapy.

Regarding subject readiness in relation to treatment for

psychedelic-induced psychotic states, similar issues would of course arise if the

treatment involved psychedelic substances. When treatment for

psychedelic-induced psychotic states does not involve psychedelic substances,

questions concerning subject readiness would seem to fall within the scope of

criteria considered for psychotherapy in general and for the treatment of PTSD in

particular.

A more immediate implication of Jungian theory for psychedelic-induced

psychotic states is the likelihood that such adverse reactions are a consequence of

the individual’s lack of readiness for the experience in the first place. Yet here,

too, the issue is a complex one. Other factors can certainly contribute to and

perhaps even largely account for psychedelic-induced psychotic states. An

inappropriate setting is the most obvious factor. During my review of the

literature on psychedelic psychotherapy, I was struck repeatedly by reports of

difficult psychedelic experiences that could have precipitated a psychotic reaction,

yet did not do so. (See, for instance Cutner’s report, pp. 183-184, 226-228, above,

or Sandison’s report, pp. 267-270, below.) It seems that the vast majority of

262
individuals—including individuals who are not psychologically mature—are able

to not only cope with but even benefit from potentially traumatic psychedelic

experiences when they are in an appropriate setting with skilled and committed

interpersonal support.

The Therapist and the Dialectical Relationship

As I have indicated (pp. 240, 247, above), Jung places great importance

upon the dialectical relationship between analyst and analysand. I have also

discussed the critical role that therapeutic, interpersonal support plays in

successful psychedelic psychotherapy (see, for instance, pp. 47, above). It

follows, then, that the relationship between the individual and the therapist in

psychedelic treatment is of central importance.

Jung’s imperative that all analysts must have themselves undergone

analysis 42 is analogous to the prevalent expectation that responsible psychedelic

therapists should be personally familiar with the psychedelic experience. How can

therapists who themselves have not experienced the trials and transformations of

the psychedelic experience understand let alone assist individuals undergoing

psychedelic psychotherapy? (I do not mean to suggest that persons who have

extensive personal knowledge of the psychedelic experience necessarily have the

skill, knowledge, and compassion needed to be an effective psychedelic therapist.

That is, psychedelic experience is a necessary but not sufficient prerequisite for

being a psychedelic therapist.) When conducting non-psychedelic therapy with

42
See for instance Jung (1951/1966o), “Fundamental Questions of
Psychotherapy,” p. 115, para. 237.
263
individuals suffering from the effects of psychedelic-induced psychotic states that

occurred during a previous psychedelic experience, it would seem helpful but not

necessary for a therapist to have personal psychedelic experience.

It is also certainly true that the mutual influence between analyst and

analysand of which Jung speaks is especially significant in psychedelic

psychotherapy. The mutual relationship as Jung characterizes it has many specific

implications for psychedelic psychotherapy. To begin with, following Jung’s

(1951/1966o) suggestion, the psychedelic therapist should be prepared to exercise

self-criticism, especially when it is possible that the patient’s resistances are

warranted. “The view that the patient’s resistances are in no circumstances

justified is completely fallacious,” Jung says. “The resistance might very well

prove that the treatment rests on false assumptions” (p. 115, para. 237). This of

course speaks to the complexity of using psychedelics to overcome an

individual’s resistance, as I discussed in the previous section. Jung (1929/1966f)

says more about this issue in “The Aims of Psychotherapy.”

The resistances of the patient may be valuable signposts. I am inclined to

take deep-seated resistances seriously at first, paradoxical as this may
sound, for I am convinced that the doctor does not necessarily know better
than the patient’s own psychic condition, of which the patient himself may
be quite unconscious. This modesty on the part of the doctor is altogether
becoming in view of the fact that there is not only no generally valid
psychology today but rather an untold variety of temperaments and of
more or less individual psyches that refuse to fit into any scheme. (pp. 39-
40, para. 76)

In reference to dream interpretation, Jung (1934/1966h) points out that

analysts can reach a point where they don’t understand their patients’ dreams.

Rather than projecting their own confusion onto their patients, and accusing them

of resistance, therapists would do well to admit their lack of understanding, Jung

264
says. When the patient puts too much reliance on his or her therapist’s

understanding, Jung says, he or she “loses all sense of reality, falls into a stubborn

transference, and retards the cure” (pp. 145-146, para. 313). For Jung

(1935/1966i), the individuality of the patient is central, and consequently “every

development in the patient is to be regarded as valid” (p. 10, para.11). Doctors

need to provide their patients with the necessary psychological knowledge to free

themselves from medical authority as quickly as possible, says Jung (1935/1966j,

p. 27, para. 43).

As idealistic as Jung’s statements may be, I think his views are especially

worth bearing in mind when the individual’s dependency upon the therapist is

intensified by the use of psychedelic substances. The relationship between

therapist and patient becomes even more susceptible to imbalance when the

psychedelic therapist is accepted by the patient as the expert in whom all authority

and trust must be bestowed. Jung (1929/1966g) reminds us that by no means

can the treatment be anything but the product of mutual influence, in

which the whole being of the doctor as well as that of his patient plays its
part. In the treatment there is an encounter between two irrational factors:
that is to say, between two persons who are not fixed and determinable
quantities but who bring with them, besides their more or less clearly
defined fields of consciousness, an indefinitely extended sphere of non-
consciousness. . . . For two personalities to meet is like mixing two
different chemical substances: if there is any combination at all, both are
transformed. . . . You can exert no influence if you are not susceptible to
influence. It is futile for the doctor to shield himself from the influence of
the patient and to surround himself with a smoke-screen of fatherly and
professional authority. (p. 71, para. 163)

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 The Compensatory Function

Jungian analyst Margot Cutner’s rare 1959 article discusses at length her

use of LSD as an aid to analysis. 43 During 3 years of conducting LSD-assisted

psychotherapy, Cutner observed that the unconscious material emerging during

LSD sessions reveals a clear compensatory relationship to the patient’s current

psychological needs (p. 720). 44 Cutner notes that the manner in which

unconscious material complements consciousness during LSD sessions is similar

to the way that unconscious material functions in dreams, visions, active

imagination, and other manifestations of the unconscious in conventional analysis

(p. 720). Indeed, Cutner maintains that the phenomena observed during LSD

psychotherapy with many patients over several years seem to confirm Jung’s

concept of the psyche as a self-regulating system striving toward wholeness even

more clearly than the phenomena observed in conventional analysis (p. 720).

Looking at the psychedelic-induced material, Cutner says,

it appears as if something like an autonomous selective process is at work,

determining the sequence of the emerging material in a purposive way—as
if whatever emerges is just what is “needed” for any particular patient at
any particular time, as a factor complementing the conscious personality.
(p. 720)

Therapists who are helping individuals integrate material that has emerged during

a psychedelic experience need to consider Jung’s directive that it is always useful

to consider what conscious attitude the dream is compensating (1934/1966h,

43
As far as I am aware, Cutner’s article is the only paper written by a Jungian
analyst who practiced psychedelic psychotherapy.
44
I have discussed the psyche’s compensatory function in “The Relationship
Between Consciousness and the Unconscious,” pp. 117-120, and in “The Compensatory
Function of Dreams,” pp. 253-255.
266
p. 153, para. 330; see also p. 253, above). Because psychedelic experiences, like

dreams, are occasions for the emergence of compensatory unconscious material to

emerge into consciousness, this would surely be a fruitful line of inquiry for

anyone attempting to understand and integrate a psychedelic experience.

The Significance of the Archetypal Unconscious

“The most healing, and psychologically the most necessary, experiences

are a ‘treasure hard to attain,’ and its acquisition demands something out of the

common,” says Jung (1943/1966m, p. 82, para. 187). “This something out of the

common proves, in practical work with the patient, to be an invasion by

archetypal contents” (para. 188). After observing patients undergoing LSD

psychotherapy in the early 1950s, Sandison (1954) reported that, in addition to

experiencing sensory impressions and hallucinations, and reliving forgotten

childhood memories, his patients were experiencing archaic, impersonal images

exactly similar in nature to those experiences of the collective unconscious

which patients undergoing deep analysis experience in their dreams, visual
impressions, and fantasies. All these images are, moreover, felt with a
degree of vividness and a sense of certainty concerning their reality and
personal importance which is remarkable and convincing. Furthermore,
these more primitive LSD experiences are accompanied by a sense of their
agelessness and timeless quality which is the hallmark of the great
archetypes of the collective unconscious. (p. 508).

Despite the importance of coming to terms with personal material that

LSD can release from the unconscious, Sandison (1954) maintains that other

factors influencing the patient’s disorder can be found in the “conscious

relationship to the more universal aspects of the psychic life” (p. 508). He gives

267
an example of this level of treatment for a 25-year-old woman suffering from

depression and suicidal tendencies.

Sandison’s patient had undergone electroconvulsive therapy 4 years earlier

and 18 months of psychotherapy with another therapist before undergoing LSD

psychotherapy. She had a history of morbid thoughts about any man with whom

she became involved. She was convinced, for instance, that one of her partners

was a murderer who meant to harm her. She had tried to counteract these thoughts

by participating in church life, but she found that her very worst thoughts came to

her in church. During her LSD sessions, the young woman had dramatic

encounters with archetypal imagery. The most important of these images was the

snake, says Sandison (1954), which the woman came to recognize as part of

herself (p. 509). “The snake tended to behave autonomously, as the unconscious

does when it is not accepted and integrated into consciousness” (p. 509), Sandison

says. He goes on to present the woman’s own account.

I had the sensation as in my first LSD treatment of a snake curling up

round me. I felt very sick and dizzy. I then began to see serpents’ faces all
over the wall—then I saw myself as a fat, pot-bellied snake slithering
gaily away to destruction. I felt horrified and thought “whose
destruction?” I then realized it was my own destruction—I was destroying
myself. . . . [I realized how I was destroying myself] by carrying on this
affair with this married man—how all the better side of me was gradually
being destroyed through carrying on this affair and I knew it must cease
and knew that I must never see him again. (p. 510)

The unconscious is not a demonic monster, says Jung (1934/1966h). It is a

natural entity that is morally neutral. It only becomes dangerous when our

conscious attitude to it is wrong (p. 152, para. 329). “To the degree that we

repress it, its danger increases,” Jung says. “But the moment the patient begins to

assimilate contents that were previously unconscious, its danger diminishes. The
268
dissociation of personality, the anxious division of the day-time and the night-

time sides of the psyche, cease with progressive assimilation” (p. 152, para. 329).

The patient who saw herself as a snake continues to describe how

Sandison helped her consciously relate to her LSD visions by asking her questions

that led her to see connections between her visions and her childhood experiences

and feelings. Continuing her account of the psychedelic session, she says,

I then had the feeling of being back in ancient Egypt lying at the bottom of
a well with high walls round and Egyptian faces all round the walls and
something hovering over me. I said to the Doctor, “Something terrible is
going to happen to me”—I felt as though a huge whitish snake was
hovering over the top of me and might drop on me at any minute. Then I
had the feeling that I was the Devil—I could see my long, pointed tail
curling round the back of the Doctor. I thought, “Poor Doctor, he doesn’t
know he is sitting with the Devil. (Sandison, 1954, p. 510)

Sandison comments that the young woman’s experience of actually becoming the

serpent and the Devil shows how easily one can become possessed by and

identify with an archetype (p. 511; see also Sandison, 2001, p. 45). The ease with

which the individual can fall into unconscious identification with an archetypal

complex during a psychedelic experience suggests the important role the therapist

plays in representing the function of ego-consciousness for the individual.

Powerful moments of identification with an archetype are characteristic of LSD

therapy, Sandison (2001) says. At times like these, he says, “it was all too easy to

enter the patient’s mythical world and thus lose one’s ability to represent the one

stable, sane point in the patient’s experience” (p. 45). (I will return to this topic in

the next section on integration.) Sandison was able to successfully guide his

patient to a clear conscious understanding of her difficult experience. “Much had

to be integrated which involved several months of psychotherapy,” he says, “But

269
the process had started” (p. 45). The woman’s progress is reflected in her own

account:

After the Doctor had gone, I had a vision of myself in Hell—of being
dragged out by chains—the Doctor and other people were pulling me out
and I was very reluctant to come out. I had all sorts of queer dizzy
feelings—of patterns and colours all whizzing round in circles and I felt
very tired but also a sense of happiness—as though I had sorted out quite a
lot of problems under this LSD. (p. 510)

Sandison (1959) says that it is of the greatest importance for the

psychotherapist to help the individual understand that even though these

psychedelic-induced experiences are illusions, they paradoxically are at the same

time images of something real. Furthermore, he says, the therapist needs to help

patients understand that if they are committed to the process of integrating the

material that has emerged from their unconscious, their experiences can bear fruit

(p. 500). Clearly, any therapist assisting a person during a psychedelic session or

subsequently treating a person who has experienced a psychedelic-induced

psychotic state would benefit from an intimate understanding of Jung’s

psychology of the archetypal unconscious and its role in psychological

development. Such knowledge would help counteract any presumption that

psychedelic-induced psychotic states are merely the reflection of a psychological

disorder or a personal deficiency.

Integration and the Role of Ego-Consciousness

Sandison (1954) reports that at one point in the LSD treatment of his

patient (which I just described in the previous section, pp. 262-265), the young

woman wished she could resume the electroconvulsive therapy that she had

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received 4 years earlier. Sandison interprets this as “probably a desire to avoid the

unconscious, a wish to be made well from outside which is quite contrary to the

need for understanding and accepting the unconscious which LSD or analysis

demands” (p. 511). Sandison’s observation is relevant to the defenses that can

arise when the unconscious is opened by psychedelic substances. It is

understandable that anyone would bolt from the terrifying experience of

unexpectedly confronting the archetypal unconscious. Yet, as I have discussed, 45

these very defenses can provide the opportunity for psychological development.

Cutner (1959) believes that the intensity and form of LSD-induced defense

mechanisms reveal something about the individual’s psychopathology (pp. 725-

726). “In fighting the drug, defense mechanisms, which play a part in the patient’s

make-up anyway, seem usually to become reinforced and thus made more clearly

distinguishable for the analyst,” she says (p. 726). If interpreted for the patient,

Cutner maintains, these mechanisms can become more distinctly perceived by

him or her as well (p. 726).

This brings us to the important role that the therapist plays in mediating

and supporting ego-consciousness on behalf of the individual undergoing

psychedelic psychotherapy or treatment for psychedelic-induced psychotic states.

Cutner points out that some patients have a clear awareness that their experiences

are drug-induced. They are able to maintain the role of onlooker within a part of

themselves, she says, similar to the attitude taken in active imagination (p. 718).

Sandison (1954) confirms that sometimes individuals are able to consciously

45
See Chapter Six, above, “Trauma, Shadow, and Psychosis: The Transformative
Potential.”
271
relate to material released from the unconscious during the psychedelic

experience. The ability to move actively amongst unconscious images, Sandison

says, “is one of the most useful properties that LSD may confer on a patient”

(p. 512).

Cutner (1959) explains, however, that the closer patients are to a psychotic

condition, the more they tend to identify with and become absorbed by their

psychedelic-induced visions and hallucinations. In such cases (which I describe as

a psychedelic-induced psychotic state), someone must be present to keep the

patient from acting out inappropriately, she says (p. 718). Jung’s description of

the mind’s inability to assimilate unconscious material characterizes well the

condition occurring in a psychedelic-induced psychotic state.

If the conscious mind proves incapable of assimilating the new contents

pouring in from the unconscious, then a dangerous situation arises in
which they keep their original, chaotic, and archaic form and consequently
disrupt the unity of consciousness. The resultant mental disturbance is
therefore advisedly called schizophrenia, since it is a madness due to the
splitting of the mind. (1911-1912/1967, p. 408, para. 631; quoted in
Sandison, 1959, p. 500)

The danger that a psychedelic experience will push one from a temporary or a

latent psychosis into an overt psychosis is less than one might expect, Cutner

maintains, “as long as the analyst is present during the crucial experiences and can

represent the integrating ego-function for the patient” (p. 717). If the therapist can

also give the patient the reassurance that he or she so greatly needs at these times

(which may include the most elementary comfort, physical touch), Cutner says,

the transition from the personal to the healing archetypal sphere may take place

(p. 722; see also p. 744). Cutner is referring of course to what Jung (1943/1966m)

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characterizes as the emergence of archetypal content, the most healing, and

psychologically the most necessary, of experiences (p. 82, paras. 187-188).

Cutner’s observations on the value of the therapist’s reassurance and

physical touch lead to considerations beyond the scope of my inquiry. Her

observations are worth noting, however, because they remind us of the

complexity of the psychotherapeutic process, and they remind us that my present

focus on ego-consciousness and integration inevitably omits other aspects of that

complex process. Cutner (1959) explains that in a psychedelic-induced state,

individuals have a unique opportunity to experience and integrate sense

impressions (including touch and sensual experiences) with emotional

experiences. “In this way,” she says, “a reorientation in [the individual’s] object

relationships can take place on a level more archaic than that of language”

(p. 723). Cutner’s observations regarding touch and sense impressions bring to

mind the value Grof places on the physical component of psychedelic

psychotherapy, which I discuss in “Grof’s View of Abreaction” (p. 219, above).

Sandison (1954) says that even after the successful LSD-induced

abreaction of a psychological trauma, the factors that originally condition an

individual’s psychopathology must be worked out in a conscious relationship to

the archetypal level of the psyche (p. 508). And thus arises the fundamental

question: How shall the therapist take the individual through the “long drawn out

process of coming to terms with and assimilating the unconscious?” (p. 509). This

question is fundamental to treating psychedelic-induced psychotic states as well

as to the practice of psychedelic psychotherapy. And Sandison’s question brings

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us back to Cutner’s statement that the danger involved in psychotic reactions to

archetypal material is less than one might expect, “as long as the analyst is

present during the crucial experiences and can represent the integrating ego-

function for the patient [italics added]” (1959, p. 717; see also p. 723). For, as

Sandison says, the individual requires “a strong and lively consciousness to

absorb his discoveries” (1959, p. 502). If he or she is not able to bring a strong

and lively consciousness to the material emerging from the unconscious, then the

therapist may need to mediate this function.

The psychedelic therapist is confronted with an especially difficult task at

this point. The individual may be able to retain enough consciousness for

integration to take place simultaneously, says Cutner (1959, p. 723). Sandison

(1959) confirms this, saying that reliving a traumatic event and associated

emotions during LSD-assisted therapy can take place “in a clear setting of

consciousness, which can be discussed between patient and therapist at the time

and subsequently” (p. 499). Cutner thinks that it is generally best for the analyst

not to offer interpretations to the individual during the psychedelic session, so as

not to interrupt or influence the individual’s inner process. There is always time

for interpretation in subsequent interviews, she says (p. 718). On the other hand,

experiences of a predominantly archaic character may persist for a certain

length of time; it is, in the main, the task of the analyst to find the right
time for breaking the archaic experience and integrating it, by
interpretation or action, into the patient’s consciousness. (p. 718)

A poignant example of a therapist breaking an overpowering

psychedelic-induced experience in an attempt to mediate consciousness for his

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patient can be found in Shivitti: A Vision (Ka-Tzetnik 135633, 1998). 46 The book

is Yehiel De-Nur’s account of his LSD-assisted treatment for trauma associated

with his internment by the Nazis at the Auschwitz concentration camp. In the

midst of his tormenting psychedelic-induced images, his therapist attempts to

intervene by asking De-Nur to vocalize what he is seeing and feeling: “Who do

you see, Mr. De-Nur? What do you see? Speak, tell me—” (p. 7). “What are you

feeling, Mr. De-Nur? Let me in, Mr. De-Nur” (p. 8). “Tell us, Mr. De-Nur, what’s

frightening you?” (p. 42). “What do you see, Mr. De-Nur? What hurts?

What—do—you—see?” (p. 44). “What is frightening you, Mr. De-Nur? Whom

do you see? Whom are you crying to?” (p. 83). “Who are you screaming at, Mr.

De-Nur?” (p. 97).

De-Nur explains that the LSD treatment required a conscious effort on his

part to “raise the events from subconscious to memory and from memory to

vision and from vision to speech” (p. 33). Dr. Jan Bastiaans, De-Nur’s therapist

and a specialist in treating what he calls “Concentration Camp Syndrome,”

explains in the book’s postscript that LSD treatment offers his patients the

opportunity of “reliving the inferno of their trauma of decades ago, with a

difference: this time they will not go it alone in hell. This time, if they consent to

the process, they will have a chance to free themselves from the prison of their

memory” (pp. 117-118; see also Bastiaans, 1983).

46
The author’s use of the name Ka-Tzetnik 135633 is initially confusing. The
author’s actual name is Yehiel De-Nur. The name Ka-Tzetnik 135633 combines the
Yiddish Ka-Tzetnik, for inmate of a Nazi concentration camp, with the number 135633,
De-Nur’s identification number at Auschwitz.
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 The process Bastiaans refers to clearly entails becoming conscious of the

most horrific and painful unconscious content. “Each image, each fantasy and

each feeling is not only important to the patient,” Sandison (2001) says, “but must

be explored by the therapist for it to be understood and integrated by the patient”

(p. 39). Sandison (1959) describes the integration process in psychedelic

psychotherapy as a “thrusting to and fro from outer (i.e., normal) consciousness to

inner consciousness (the experience of the unconscious during LSD treatment)

and back again” (p. 499). This process, he says, is inherently healing for the

individual (p. 499). Jung (1934/1966h) describes this back and forth movement

from outer to inner consciousness as a “mutual penetration of conscious and

unconscious, and not a one-sided evaluation, interpretation, and deformation of

unconscious contents by the conscious mind” (p. 152, para. 327).

Sandison (1954) also thinks that psychedelic therapists should attempt to

guide their patients to the point where they can “actively influence the images

produced under LSD” (pp. 512-513). This allows them to consciously explore

their mind and thereby “learn something from the great wisdom of the

unconscious” (p. 513). Cutner (1959), we may recall, helped a depressed and

paranoid patient learn to consciously relate to psychedelic-induced imagery that

initially overwhelmed her. Cutner explains that

as the pit had turned from a place of utter humiliation into an archetypal
“womb,” so her inner storm center had turned into a center of stillness. In
both these instances the presence of the analyst as the “good” and
“nourishing” mother had still been necessary; later it was the process of
introversion, with or without the actual presence of the analyst, which
provided the “womb” inside which rebirth experiences could take place.
(p. 742; see also pp. 226-228, above)

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Jung (1935/1966i) describes the fundamental process this way: “The work done

by the patient through the progressive assimilation of unconscious contents leads

ultimately to the integration of [his or her] personality and hence to the removal of

the neurotic dissociation” (p. 20, para. 27).

Sandison (1963) says that the resolution of the neurotic dissociation

through psychedelic psychotherapy only comes after a period of integration. The

process of integration, he reports, may continue for months or even years after the

conclusion of the psychedelic treatment itself (p. 36 ). It seems that the treatment

of psychedelic-induced psychotic states would entail essentially the same process

of integration that is involved in subsequently coming to terms with unconscious

material that had emerged during earlier, drug-assisted, stages of psychedelic

psychotherapy. The prolonged nature of this integrative process is consistent with

the advice Jung gave his patients to live with, relate to, and be with expressions of

unconscious affect or imagery during the practice of active imagination

(Chodorow, 1997, p. 14).

The ongoing integrative process that Sandison and Cutner describe is of

course also consistent with the practice of dream interpretation. In “The Practical

Use of Dream-Analysis,” Jung (1934/1966h) says that dreams provide

information about the psyche’s hidden inner life and reveal aspects of the

personality that underlie the individual’s neurotic symptoms. To effectively treat

an individual, Jung says, “we must bring about a change in and through the

unconscious” (p. 151, para. 326). Yet treatment “can be achieved only by the

thorough and conscious assimilation of unconscious contents” (p. 152, para. 326).

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As I indicated in Chapter Eight, to a great extent Sandison and Cutner predicate

their approach to LSD psychotherapy on Jung’s approach to the interpretation and

integration of unconscious material brought to consciousness during the dream

state. “The material produced under the influence of LSD,” says Sandison (1954),

“bears a striking similarity to the dream and fantasy material of patients

undergoing deep analysis” (p. 514). Furthermore, he says, patients undergoing

LSD psychotherapy “start to dream, and these dreams frequently reveal material

showing continuity with the LSD experience itself” (1959, p. 499).

Sandison (2001) presents an account given by one of his patients, a

29-year-old woman who was born in Germany. (By my calculations, based on her

age and the approximate years of her treatment by Sandison, the woman was

probably a teenager during the rise of German fascism.) The kinds of images

described in this woman’s account, and portrayed in the paintings she made

following her LSD sessions, led Sandison to conclude that LSD opens up the

deeper and archetypal levels of the unconscious just as do the dreams of some

patients during analysis. “[The images] are not an end in themselves,” he says,

“but they are indications that individuation is an attainable goal” (p. 42).

The woman’s account of her LSD sessions begins with her seeing a face

of a one-eyed man with a moustache and a cynical, threatening smile. “I tried to

connect him to something which had happened to me a long time ago. It was then

that he got mixed up with Hitler and I saw nothing but swastikas. For one brief

moment it was my father’s face” (Sandison, 2001, p. 40). She then remembers an

actual occasion when a German officer took her to his flat and seduced her.

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 In her account she explains that under LSD she was most disturbed by the

realization that she was forced by the officer against her will without showing the

slightest resistance.

As I pondered over this, Hitler appeared again and I saw the connection.
He too, in a very subtle way, together with his powerful personality, made
me do things against my will without my resisting. Then I had a feeling of
falling down deeper and deeper and yet I felt detached just as if I was
watching it all happen. (Sandison, 2001, p. 40)

In subsequent LSD sessions, the woman sees more images of Hitler, hostile faces,

skulls and crossbones. “Suddenly,” she says, “I felt the flesh falling off my bones”

(p. 40). Similarly disturbing experiences continued through several LSD sessions,

and she became depressed and suicidal. She described her tenth LSD session as

follows:

There is tremendous confusion within me. There is no harmony. The

muddled faces had terrific mouths and tried to swallow me up. I feel that
they would swallow me up only as long as they were in such a muddle and
it was therefore necessary to find order in this confusion. I then found that
there was order in this confusion insofar as there were two sides to it each
opposing the other and pulling in two directions. I tried to find out about
the two parts and discovered that they must be the good and evil in me.
(pp. 40-41)

She then had a dream in which she could not make love to her lover. In the dream,

she says, something inside her told her that she could not make love because she

had “not picked up the five heavy stones from the bottom of the sea” (p. 41).

During the next LSD session, Sandison reports, she decided to investigate what

she felt was the solution to all her problems. “I felt I must overcome my fear and

go to the bottom of the sea,” she says. “Then I started going down,” she

continues,

but under the water I met alligators who were eating me up and I could
feel their teeth in my body. I went down under the water again and as I
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 went deeper the fear grew less. I could see the stones, but now they were
only four in number. It was as if the fifth had represented the fear which
was now gone. With this stone gone I had a better view of the others. I
came closer and closer and suddenly it was as if I was looking in a mirror.
These four stones formed a face. I cannot describe its ugliness and
horribleness. At the same time the face was beautiful. I could not say what
piece was ugly and what was beautiful, for in it were both extremes
completely merging and forming a whole. I felt that these were my
anchors and on these I had to build up my personality. I knew too that this
was the same in all of us and everything alive. I had a feeling that what I
had just seen was part of God. (pp. 41-42)

As Sandison suggests, the images depicted here are not an end in themselves, but

in Jungian terms they indicate a movement toward psychological wholeness

(p. 42).

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 CHAPTER TEN: CONCLUSION

Our debt to Jung cannot be repaid, says the prominent Jungian analyst

Michael Fordham (1974), “unless we show that we have studied his work, used

criticism fruitfully, built on what he left for us and discovered aspects of it which

were not fully developed and taken these further by carrying on his

investigations” (pp. 20-21). In that spirit, I have suggested in this dissertation that

the time is ripe for a critical re-assessment of Jung’s conception of psychedelic

experience, and of his views regarding the potential risks and benefits entailed in

using psychedelic substances for psychological healing and transformation.

Like so many others who are indebted to Jung for his penetrating and

profound insights into the nature of the psyche, I have felt impelled to question

some of his views and to build on his work in ways he perhaps would neither have

imagined nor approved. It seems likely, in any case, that Jung would appreciate

the inevitable development of divergent views around his psychology. Remarking

on the vitality that divergent interpretations, views, and theories bring to any field

of inquiry, Jung (1951/1966o) asserts, that “disagreements are, as always,

incentives to a new and deeper questioning” (p. 119, para. 244).

Concluding his 1963 review of LSD therapy, Sandison observes that

despite increasing certainty among therapists that psychedelic psychotherapy is a

valuable form of treatment, much uncertainty still exists (p. 36). As a result of

widespread irresponsible use of psychedelics, hostile public attitudes fed by

sensational media coverage, and, especially, legal prohibition of psychedelic

281
research with human subjects, much uncertainty still exits today, almost half a

century after Sandison’s assessment. Nonetheless, recent developments in

psychedelic research indicate new opportunities to revive the inquiry into

psychedelic experience and its potential for psychological healing and

transformation.

This dissertation demonstrates that a Jungian framework can make a

significant contribution to the renewed investigation of psychedelic experience in

general, and of psychedelic-induced psychotic states and psychedelic

psychotherapy in particular. Jung’s fundamental explanation of psychedelic

experience in terms of a lowering of the threshold of consciousness, which allows

unconscious material to enter consciousness and potentially overwhelm it,

provides an excellent foundation for a nuanced and in-depth understanding of

psychedelic experience in its various forms. The framework I propose here builds

on Jung’s approach to this dynamic interaction between consciousness and the

unconscious by showing how Jung’s understanding of trauma, dissociation,

complexes, archetypes, and psychosis elucidates the nature of adverse, even

psychotic, reactions to psychedelic experience. Jung’s conception of the

numinous material that can emerge into consciousness from the archetypal

unconscious, and his explanation of the way in which this material can

overwhelm consciousness, provides especially valuable insights into

psychedelic-induced psychotic states. Turning the psychotomimetic paradigm on

its head, I have drawn on Jung’s understanding of schizophrenia and related

concepts to elucidate the nature of psychedelic-induced psychotic states. At the

282
same time, as Cutner (1959) has demonstrated, Jungians can use knowledge about

psychedelic experience to shed light on the dynamics of psychological processes

in general. As new research on psychedelic experience expands that body of

knowledge, Jungians will have an increasingly rich source of data from which to

draw.

Perhaps the most important implication of this dissertation is that Jung’s

approach to integrating unconscious material into consciousness provides a

uniquely sophisticated and systematic method of working with unconscious

material that has emerged during previous psychedelic experiences. Furthermore,

as Sandison and Cutner have demonstrated, Jung’s method of therapeutic

integration can be used at appropriate times by discriminating therapists to

encourage greater conscious participation by individuals during psychedelic

psychotherapy sessions, potentially enhancing the inherent healing effects of the

psychedelic experience itself. And Jung’s perceptive observations on the

dialectical relationship between the analyst and the analysand suggest valuable

considerations for establishing a beneficial relationship between the therapist and

the individual undergoing psychedelic psychotherapy, a relationship which

inevitably becomes more intense during a psychedelic session.

Over the course of my work on this dissertation, I have gained valuable

new perspectives on my personal experiences with psychedelics and with

psychedelic therapy. At the same time, I have developed increased respect for

Jung’s concerns regarding the potentially overwhelming nature of psychedelic

experience. A turning point in my attitude toward Jung’s assessment of

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psychedelic psychotherapy occurred when I realized that Jung’s concerns

regarding the risks involved in psychedelic psychotherapy were a reflection of his

concerns regarding the risks involved in psychotherapy generally. That is, I

realized that Jung’s concern for the dangers inherent in psychedelic

psychotherapy reflected much more than a prejudicial reaction to a complex

phenomenon he did not fully understand.

Nonetheless, it is also clear that Jung’s views on psychedelic experience

were prejudiced, and his bias unfortunately seems to have placed the investigation

of psychedelic experience beyond the pale of respectable Jungian inquiry. I find

this regrettable because over the course of this investigation I have also come to

respect even more deeply the knowledge and experience Jungian analysts

embody. And I believe that Jungians could make a valuable contribution to

ongoing attempts to understand the nature of psychedelic experience and to

assessing the relative risks and benefits of psychedelic psychotherapy.

I am not implying that Jungians should become proponents of psychedelic

substances or psychedelic psychotherapy. Although I think this dissertation leads

to valuable implications for psychedelic psychotherapy, and although I think

psychedelic psychotherapy has significant therapeutic potential, its practice is too

complicated for me to make a general assessment of its value from this initial

investigation. Too many issues call for further study. Indeed, one of the most

important lessons I take away from this investigation is the appropriate and useful

complexity inherent in a Jungian interpretation of psychedelic experience. As I

indicated in the last chapter, this complexity seems to become most apparent

284
when considering issues regarding the risks versus the benefits associated with an

individual’s readiness for psychedelic psychotherapy. Yet complexity runs all

through this Jungian interpretation of psychedelic experience. It is apparent in the

destructive versus transformative potential of psychedelic-induced psychotic

states. It is apparent in questions about the passive versus active role of

consciousness during psychedelic experiences. And it is apparent in Jung’s

approach to therapeutic integration, which is central to a Jungian framework for

understanding psychedelic experience.

In “The Transcendent Function,” Jung (1916/1958/1969c) says that the

ego’s confrontation with the unconscious, and the psyche’s consequent

integration, “is not a partial process running a conditioned course; it is a total and

integral event in which all aspects are, or should be, included. The affect must

therefore be deployed in its full strength [italics added]” (p. 88, para. 183). Jung

seems to be asserting here that the process of integration must be taken to the

same experiential extremes that Grof maintains are necessary for the successful

healing of psychological trauma. This suggests a fruitful line of inquiry into the

ways in which Jung’s method of therapeutic integration could be combined with

Grof’s method of psychedelic-induced abreaction. Recalling Cutner’s (1959)

observation that future psychological development can become blocked when

material that arises during psychedelic psychotherapy is not fully integrated

(p. 725), and recalling Grof’s (1985) assertion that the best way to resolve

uncompleted gestalts associated with psychological trauma is through full

experiential engagement with the traumatic material (p. 381), one can imagine an

285
approach to resolving and integrating difficult psychedelic experiences that draws

from Cutner’s analytic therapy with LSD and Grof’s use of LSD to intensify

abreaction. Cutner relies heavily on Jung’s method of therapeutic integration. Her

approach, she says, is “to use [LSD] as sparingly as possible and to keep the main

accent on the analysis itself [Cutner’s italics]” (p. 716). Grof relies heavily on the

inherent healing potential of psychedelic-induced abreaction. Such abreaction,

says Grof (1985), needs to be “encouraged [and] allowed to go to the experiential

extremes that usually lead to successful resolution” (p. 381; see also Grof,

1980/1994, pp. 282, 285). An approach that takes both Cutner’s and Grof’s

methods into consideration would offer therapists a broader range of treatment

options to match the diverse needs of individual’s undergoing psychedelic

psychotherapy or working through previous psychedelic experiences. Clearly, the

process of resolving and integrating psychedelic-induced unconscious material is

a complex process that deserves much more attention.

I opened this dissertation with the following passage from Jung’s

Psychological Commentary to The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation. Usually,

says Jung (1939/1954/1969p),

the conscious standpoint arbitrarily decides against the unconscious, since

anything coming from inside suffers from the prejudice of being regarded
as inferior or somehow wrong. But in the cases with which we are here
concerned it is tacitly agreed that the apparently incompatible contents
shall not be suppressed again, and that the conflict shall be accepted and
suffered. At first no solution appears possible, and this fact, too, has to be
borne with patience. (para. 780)

This passage takes on new significance, I believe, when one has studied Jung’s

approach to the terrifying darkness that one sometimes encounters in the

286
unconscious, and when one has at least grappled with, if not fully integrated,

Jung’s insights into the transformative potential of that difficult confrontation.

287
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