Would one happen to me? Was there some dimension of existence or consciousness I was missing out on? Was it really possibly to change one’s mind as an adult? My journalistic curiosity soon morphed into a personal quest to explore some of the uncharted territory of both the mind and my mind.Ĭan you explain what the “default mode network” is, and how it figures in your story? I wasn’t sure I had ever had a spiritual experience. The experience had changed them in lasting ways. I wanted to find out why.Īnd then I began hearing about a renaissance of research into psychedelics by scientists hoping to treat cancer patients suffering from “existential distress,” addicts, people struggling with depression and so-called “healthy normals.” These researchers had found that psilocybin, the psychoactive compound in magic mushrooms, could reliably occasion a “mystical experience” in people that they deemed one of the two or three most significant experiences in their lives-comparable to the birth of a child or death of a parent. Why do we want to do this potentially risky thing, and why did plants and fungi evolve these remarkable chemicals that affect us in this way? What do these experiences do for us, as individuals or as a society? Psychedelics are the most extreme case of this curious phenomenon, and they have been a central part of human societies for thousands of years. Food and beauty are two of the human desires other species have evolved to gratify, but there are other, more mysterious desires, and the human drive to change consciousness, whether mildly and routinely with plant drugs such as caffeine, or more dramatically with psychoactive mushrooms, has always fascinated me. It’s true I’m best known for my books about food and agriculture, but that work grew out of a deeper fascination with the human engagement with the natural world, and the species we co-evolved with, a fascination I explored in earlier books like The Botany of Desire and Second Nature. How did you get interested in writing about this topic, after all of your work on food? He answered questions from Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook. Eventually Pollan decides to try psychedelics himself - and documents, beautifully, a number meaningful experiences and the way his own mind has changed.
#Altered consciousness how to#
This is the fascinating territory that the journalist Michael Pollan explores with his new book, “ How to Change Your Mind.” Pollan dives into brain science, the history of psychedelics (and our tortured attitudes towards them) but his larger subject is the nature of human consciousness. After decades of stigma, impressive research is showing the power of these substances to help sufferers of depression and addiction, or to comfort patients with a terminal cancer diagnosis, struggling to face their own end. Among scientists, there are tentative signs of a psychedelics renaissance.
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