Recent studies reported in the Archives of General Psychiatry [link] and the Journal of Psychopharmacology [link], reveal that hallucinogens actually have legitimate therapeutic value. Scientists now believe these agents have the potential to help patients with post-traumatic stress, drug and alcohol dependence, unremitting pain, depression and the existential anxiety of terminal illness. According to Roland Griffiths, author of the first study:
“The psilocybin experience takes away the veil of fear and enables patients to see things in a more expanded and interconnected way. It can relieve the existential anxiety of terminal illness. The psychological improvements have helped many to reverse the course of their illness, which reinforces the notion that one should never underestimate the healing power of the psyche. Scientifically, these compounds are way too important not to study.”
This sounds familiar. In college I wrote my undergraduate thesis on the Neurological Basis of Hallucinatory Experience. I had the foresight (or audacity) at the time to recommend that hallucinogens would be a useful method-of-investigation for Psychologists. I said: “.. it would be negligent not to consider the guided peyote session as portal into alternative states of consciousness” [link].
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