Stanislav Grof: the people governed by the matrix Bashny.Net

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In encyclopedia of psychology the name of Stanislav Grof comes in third, after Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, among the greatest innovators of the science of the secrets of the human soul. The revolutionary discoveries of Grof, still ignored by official medicine, inspired by cult film Directors the Wachowski brothers in the creation of the trilogy "the Matrix". World-renowned scientist gave "the Truth.Ru" an exclusive interview.

— Dear Stanislav, thank You that in the year of its 75th anniversary, You found time for such extensive conversation with us. Even Carl Jung argued that the psyche of the baby is not " tabula rasa ". You based on years of clinical research came to the conclusion that our unconscious contains perinatal (i.e. prenatal) and transpersonal region. But why does conventional medicine ignore these discoveries?

— The current research in the field of consciousness brought a lot of evidence that the model of the human psyche, dominant today in official psychology and psychiatry, superficial and inadequate. On the basis of long-term data on psychedelic research, I had to create an extremely extended model of the psyche by adding two large areas – perinatal and transpersonal.

The perinatal region is the memories of intrauterine life and the biological birth. This area consists of four basic perinatal matrices, corresponding to the four stages of childbirth — from the blessed rest in the uterus before birth. Transpersonal sphere contains the experience of identification with other people, other species, episodes from the life of our ancestors, of both humans and animals, as well as the historical collective unconscious, as Jung interpreted it.My cartography of the psyche has a huge similarity with the views of Jung, with the exception of the fundamental things. I was surprised and disappointed that Jung vehemently denied that biological birth has some psychological significance that it is a major psychological trauma. Even shortly before his death in an interview, Jung denied any possibility of such importance.

Traditional psychiatrists in America, and you know perfectly well about the existence of perinatal and transpersonal experiences as they spontaneously occur in some patients. But, unlike me, these doctors don't consider them normal component of the human psyche, and consider how the results of unknown pathological processes that affect the brain. That is, people whose unconsciousness came on the perinatal and transpersonal levels, schitayuschegosya psychosis, mentally ill.

— And do you remember your first transpersonal experience? The resistance of a significant part of the academic community to the discoveries of modern research of consciousness is clear. Revolutionary new data require a radical revision of the psychological and psychiatric thinking, similar to the one that had to go through to physicists in the early twentieth century, when they moved from Newtonian understanding of matter to the quantum-relativistic picture of the world. New information in the field of consciousness studies call into question the basic philosophical position of Western science, to undermine its materialist orientation. Based on clinical data, transpersonal psychology offers a worldview similar to the worldview of the great world religions and Eastern spiritual philosophies.

He was so unusual and striking that it is simply impossible to forget. It happened in November 1956 in the laboratory, the Czech Institute of psychiatry when I volunteer participated in an LSD session. The idea of the experiment consisted in the exposure to powerful stroboscopic lamp at the climax of my LSD experiences. My consciousness left the body, and all boundaries of the Universe disappeared. I experienced awe and to this day the thrill experience of the Cosmic Mind, has ceased to be a separate entity and became the very Universe.

This experience I describe in my book "When the impossible becomes possible. An unusual adventure in the reality", soon published in Russian translation. The experience of half a century ago was so strong that all my life caused me to have a interest in unusual States of consciousness. Of course, he could not then immediately destroy my materialistic worldview, which was grafted a study in Communist Czechoslovakia. It took years of daily observations during the psychedelic sessions as my own, and patients, and later in the sessions, holotropic breathing and nemedikamentozhnykh therapy methods, I developed together with Cristina. Today, I repeat, I am absolutely convinced – a modern system of views and notions in need of radical revision.

After twenty years of official studies that have been conducted in the USSR Maria Telishevska, psychedelics were banned. Don't be fooled by accusations that the unusual States of consciousness that give rise to the perinatal and transpersonal levels associated with psychoactive substances?

— I have thought for many years that non-ordinary States of consciousness requires a strong psychoactive substances such as LSD . And was surprised when she discovered how profound the impact on the psyche are of such simple techniques, such as faster breathing or causing memories of music. But shamans and indigenous cultures knew for thousands of years and used the technology in healing, ritual and spiritual practices. Scientific observations, including anthropologists, have shown that the gap between the so-called "normal state of consciousness" and unusual as not so great as was generally thought. Moreover, many people have these conditions may be spontaneous, arise right in the midst of everyday life.

-But traditional psychiatry is still considering conditions such as psychosis, which requires mainly medical treatment?

— This is the essence of the problem. When we realize that perinatal and transpersonal experiences – a normal part of the human psyche, then start a completely different way to ask questions about such episodes, and to respond to them. After all, the question now is not how the brain creates unusual experiences, and what is allegedly pathological processes cause them. It is clear to me that the experiences that arise in such States, represent the normal component of the human psyche. The question is why some people to dive into the depths of your unconscious, need psychedelic substances or powerful non-drug techniques and others originate spontaneously?

Transpersonal psychology believes that when non-ordinary States of consciousness properly understood and supported, they can be healing, transformative and evolutionary. Christina and I call them "spiritual accidents" because they represent not only a crisis but also an opportunity to reach the highest level of consciousness and mental actions.

— Your assertion that mystical experience is available to everyone, caused a fierce debate…

— Our achievements in the field of psychedelic research and holotropic breathing convinced us that capacity for mystical experience is the primary human right from birth. In principle they can be any person, only some people this is easier than others. There are people who find it difficult, despite their desire to enter such States, and they are trying to call them in different ways. But there are those who have mystical States occur in the middle of the day, sometimes against their will, and they find it difficult to identify with conventional reality. By the way, to the second category belonged to my great predecessor Carl Jung. He used his easy access to the unconscious as the source of new, revolutionary psychology.

— In his book "Psychology of the future", released in Russia, You are again raising the issue of the need to discuss legal, social and medical aspects of psychedelics. This discussion began last year in the scientific community in the UK. It might be worth it to spend at the level the world health organization to remove plaque secrets with this theme?

I believe that for professionals with years of experience, the obvious fallacy of such a definition. Studies have shown that with proper and controlled use of psychedelic drugs have great therapeutic potential, and, from the point of view of psychology, not addictive. Moreover, throughout growing dissatisfaction with the official psychiatric therapy, which reduces to the standard suppression psychiatric symptoms tranquilizers. The symptoms are suppressed, but the main psychological problems are not solved. Besides, people are becoming more knowledgeable about the side effects - the world health organization takes an important part in the control of psychoactive substances, and all member countries who are obliged to implement its recommendations. Psychedelic drugs, including LSD, are currently included in the "List No. 1" the definition of "drug with no medical value and high abuse potential" use obsolete methods.

It is encouraging that in recent years in the scientific climate had started to change. The desire to find alternatives to the stalled methods of traditional psychiatry led to a formal resolution of the research programs of psychedelic therapy in some centers in the United States, Switzerland, Israel and several other countries. As far as I know from articles in the Western press, in particular, in the newspaper "the guardian", officially launched the research program methods of therapy using LSD, psilocybin, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), methylene-widespread-methamphetamine (MMDA) and ketamine.

— That is, the researchers return to the research experience the 50-ies of the last century?

— I think that Western society is now better prepared to make psychedelic therapy than half a century ago. As I remember, then all psychotherapy was limited to verbal that is verbal communication between doctor and patient. Strong emotions and active behavior during the session was called "an outward expression of subconscious mental processes" and evaluated as violations of the rules of therapy.

Psychedelic sessions also called psychomotor agitation, dramatic emotions, vivid cognitive changes. They were more like film stills in anthropology, where he talked about the healing ceremonies and rituals of native cultures than that traditionally seen in the office of a therapist.

In addition, many observations obtained after the psychedelic session, threatened the materialistic ideas about the human psyche and the Universe, based on mutnovsko-Cartesian paradigm. Remember that in the period of Czechoslovakia, one of the patients Richard after an LSD session told me that during the "travel" from some of the entities received information with a request to pass the relatives of a Ladislav that with him in another world all right. They gave him the name of the city Kramerica that in Moravia, where relatives live, and even a phone number. I recorded this information in the medical records and then, more materialistic considerations, leaving them unattended. When curiosity took over and in a couple of weeks I called the recorded number Kramerica and called heard by patient name, then on the other side of the tube came the sobs and the words: "We lost Ladislav three weeks ago…»

Yes, over the last decades, psychotherapy has been a real revolution. Was developed powerful experiential techniques, which emphasize deep regression, direct expression of intense emotions and exercises, leading to a surge of physical energy. Among the new approaches I have identified Gestalt practice, bioenergetics, primitive therapy, rebirthing (rebirth through breath) and holotropic breathing. And for doctors practising in these areas, the introduction of psychedelics would not be the sudden change in the practice, and the next logical step. I hope that the renewed interest in psychedelic research, which is, of course, require careful legal and medical consideration, return this unusual instrument in the hands of doctors.

— But if it helps to save humanity, which every year seems more and more immersed in the quagmire of chaotic destructiveness, greed and animal instincts?

— Psychedelic research and experiences with holotropic breathing, the treatment of people who are in a "spiritual accident", definitely confirmed Jung's teaching about the black and sinister sides of the human psyche. Their Jung aptly called Shadow. I wrote a lot about the perinatal and transpersonal roots of human violence and greed. In particular, in the book "Psychology of the future" has a Chapter "the Evolution of consciousness and human survival: transpersonal perspective of the global crisis".Based on years of clinical studies of transpersonal psychology came to the conclusion that all aspects of the modern world crisis – economic, political, military, religious, and ecological – has one common denominator.

And that denominator is. The roots of human cruelty and greed run deep in the perinatal and transpersonal regions of the unconscious. That is a lot deeper than classical psychiatry imagines. Traditional forms of verbal (verbal) psychotherapy operate exclusively at the level of post-Natal biography and does not reach the level at which real problems occur. If a person goes to these levels spontaneously, as a result of "spiritual accident", he announced suffering from psychosis and delay the natural process of transformation the use of tranquilizers.

That's why for the survival of the human species requires systematic work on the spiritual revelation of the personality, especially those who are in a state of psychospiritual transformation.

— Stanislav, Your views on the decisive role of the spiritual, not the animal dominant in the human psyche in many ways similar to the attitudes of the great Russian philosophers and writers. Whom would You single out of them for himself? And how close to our mentality of Your revolutionary ideas, proves the complete bankruptcy of pure materialism? It seems that we are involved in a terrible race for time, a precedent which was not in the history of mankind. If we stick to old strategies that are horrendously destructive, the human race will not survive this century. We can save only a profound inner transformation of a sufficiently large number of people, and the official psychology and psychiatry here has shown its complete inability.

When Christine and in 1989 was officially invited to the Soviet Union, we were shocked how our Russian colleagues were open to new ideas, including in academic circles. The meeting with us and people came from distant places – from Georgia, from Siberia...I was very touched when I was approached for an autograph with the translation "human unconscious", released through underground publishing houses in samizdat. Of course, since I was raised in a Communist country, then self-publishing for me was not unusual. But it was not a political book, and purely scientific! I saved this book as an expensive souvenir of my visit to Russia. But it is, unfortunately, burned down in February 2001 during a fire in our home along with all my library and other property.

I think there are many reasons for the openness of Russians transpersonal psychology. And above all, a deep spirituality inherent in the Russian people. My close friend and a prominent psychologist in Russia Vladimir Maikov included in his book on the history of transpersonal psychology a huge number of people of Russian origin, who played an invaluable role in the development of a new science of the human soul. Among them are many renowned names such as Helena Blavatsky, Georgy Gurdjieff, Vladimir Solovyov, Nikolai Berdyaev, Lev Tolstoy and Vasily Nalimov.

Another reason for the growing popularity of transpersonal psychology in Russia, I see that during the Soviet era psychology and psychiatry was limited to a small number of philosophically acceptable approaches, for example, based on the work of Ivan Pavlov. When the old system fell, there was the spiritual vacuum, and Russian specialists have expressed sincere desire to join the most recent advances in the study of consciousness.

And unlike American universities, most of which the Department of psychology and psychiatry for many decades headed by the conservatives of biological, behavioral neopaganismo and directions in Russia is much more scientists that support transpersonal psychology. I felt it and during a trip to St. Petersburg in the summer of 2001. Very soon I hope to visit again in the great of Russia and is ready to take part in the most acute and candid discussions on the topics of study of the human unconscious, psychedelic and holotropic therapy.

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Stanislav Grof was born July 1, 1931 in Prague. From 1956 to 1967, was a practicing psychiatrist-Clinician. In the years 1961-66, he headed the research laboratory for the use of LSD and other psychedelic drugs to treat mental disorders, Institute of psychiatry of Ministry of health of Czechoslovakia. In 1959 Gropu awards of Kuffner — award of the Academy of Sciences of Czechoslovakia "for the most outstanding contribution in the field of psychiatry."

In 1967, Stanislav Grof went to the United States in Johns Hopkins University. In 1968-1973 the laboratory research of psychedelics at the Maryland psychiatric research center – the only place in the US, where officially continued research with LSD.

From 1973 to 1987 Stanislav Grof and his wife Christina are working in the world famous Esalen Institute (big sur, California) to create a unique holotropic psychotherapy, based on special techniques of breathing, bodywork and specially selected music. Currently, Grof training in holotropic breathing, lecturing, taking an active part in the work of the International Transpersonal Association.The huge popularity Stanislav Gropu brought his scientific works — "human unconscious", "Beyond the brain", "the Journey in search of himself", "Psychology of the future" and other... the global bestseller "the Man in the face of death" (with Joan Halifax) Grof has published clinical data on mystical insights, which were recorded in terminally cancer patients during sessions with LSD-25. This book has been the focus of many religious figures – so references to it are in the famous book the largest Orthodox thinkers of father Seraphim (rose) "the Soul after death."

For the first time in our country Grof visited in 1963, and came in the 70th years to find the studies of neuroses in monkeys at the Sukhumi nursery. But the real sensation was the arrival of the spouses Grof in April 1989 at the invitation of the Ministry of health of the USSR. In Psychoendocrinological center on Arbat Stanislav and Christina gave a lecture on holotropic breathing in front of thousands of fans of the ideas that came from all over the Union. At the same time the publishing house of the USSR issued a number of Grof's books in an edition of 500 copies. Currently, the Russian language is released almost all the works of the scientist, with the exception of "LSD psychotherapy". The TNT is finalizing a four-episode documentary on the life and works of the great innovator, which will be released this year.

From the editor: Please note that the substance referred to by Stanislav Groom (LSD, psilocybin, DMT, MDMA and ketamine), now officially banned at the international level for the production, distribution and consumption in any capacity. According to data and insights of conventional medicine, the use of these substances, particularly uncontrolled, is a threat to human health, can cause mental disorders and destructive behavior. published 



Source: science.pravda.ru/mysterious/human/12-01-2007/209514-grof-3/