Exploring the Value of 'Bad Trips' and Spiritual Emergencies
This article is by freelance writer and educator Jasmine Virdi. It first appeared in the Psychedelic Press print journal, issue XXXVI. If you would like to subscribe to future issues of our print journal please visit our store here. Future journal articles will only be sent to paid Substack subscribers - however, we hope you enjoy this lengthy preview.
It is a bewildering thing in human life that the things that cause the greatest fear is the source of the greatest wisdom. Carl Jung.[1]
Introduction
This essay will focus on the ‘negative’ as it relates to the use of psychedelic substances in contemporary culture and shamanic traditions. However, in order to expand upon the negative, shadow sides of psychedelic use in contemporary culture and shamanism, it is first important to give a brief introduction to each of them.
La Barre famously deemed shamanism as the ‘world’s oldest profession’,[2] and indeed, it is one of the world’s oldest religious practices. The term ‘shaman’ is believed to derive from the Siberian Tungusic word šaman meaning ‘one who knows’.[3] Although the varying traditions of shamanism are broad and diverse, shamans are unified in their ability to enter altered states of consciousness (ASCs) at will. Entering ASCs allows shamans to travel to other realms and communicate with spirit beings or entities in order to gain knowledge or power which they can use to benefit and serve their community.[4] In order to induce and skilfully navigate ASCs, shamans incorporate a wide toolkit of techniques including spirit incorporation,[5] shamanic journeying,[6] isolation and fasting,[7] singing/chanting,[8] and ritual drumming and dancing,[9] to name but a few. However, this essay will focus on the use of psychoactive plants as tools for healing and divination within shamanism.
Psychoactive plants are intimately intertwined with shamanic practices[10] and have been used by Indigenous cultures for millennia.[11] As such, shamans across cultures have incorporated the ritual use of psychedelic plants into their training, using them over extended periods of time to gain understanding into the spirit world.[12] Examples of psychedelic plants used in shamanism include ayahuasca, a psychoactive brew used in Amazonian shamanism,[13] Ndí Xijtho, or psilocybin mushrooms, used by the Mazatec curanderas (healers) in Mexico,[14] and peyote, the mescaline-containing cacti, used by the Native American Church[15] and the Wixárika peoples of Northern Mexico [16].
Moving beyond the domain of shamanism, in recent years, there has been a resurgence of research into the therapeutic potentials of psychedelic substances. Psychedelics like lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), psilocybin, and ayahuasca are being used to treat everything from treatment-resistant depression,[17] end-of-life anxiety in terminally ill patients,[18] and post-traumatic stress disorder[19]. Psychedelics are also gaining in momentum beyond clinical settings, and many individuals seek them out for spiritual purposes and attempts at self-healing[20].
The term ‘psychedelic’, first coined by psychiatrist Humphrey Osmond in 1956, means ‘soul-’ or ‘mind-manifesting’, as psychedelics have the unique capability of revealing and amplifying that which is already latent within the psyche.[21] More recently, the term ‘entheogen’ has come to be preferred by some, meaning to ‘generate the experience of the divine within’, signalling a shift toward the sacramental use of these substances.[22] For the purposes of this paper, I will use both terms interchangeably.
To some extent, the ‘negative’, shadow sides of both psychedelic use in both shamanic and contemporary contexts are plenty. One need only look to examples of shamanic warfare,[23] sexual abuse by ‘shamans’ and/or facilitators within ayahuasca ceremonies,[24] and even those rare persisting cases of mental harm in which individuals have recurrent ‘flashbacks’ following the use of psychedelic substances[25]. However, for the purposes of this paper, I will explore the ‘negative’ as it relates to so-called ‘bad trips’ and spiritual emergencies. Both bad trips and spiritual emergencies are components of the shadow side of psychedelic use which are characterised by ‘our own unacceptable, antisocial, frightening, irrational, or evil characteristics’ that present ‘a direct challenge to our conscious self-image and to our sense of rationality and mental control’.[26] In order for such experiences to be of value, it is important to understand them more deeply, and integrate them into the whole of who we are, instead of compartmentalising them into fragmented parts of our psyche.
Revisiting and Redefining ‘Bad Trips’
Although psychedelic substances are considered to be physiologically safe and do not lead to dependence or addiction,[27] many maintain concern about the psychological risks that they pose. The ‘bad trip’, clinically characterised by anxiety, fear/panic, dysphoria, and/or paranoia and the manifestation of distress on sensory, somatic, psychological, and metaphysical levels,[28] is considered to be one of the greatest risks associated with psychedelics. For example, on the somatic/psychological level, someone having a bad trip may feel as though they are dying, whereas on the metaphysical level an individual may feel as though they are being pursued by evil entities or demonic figures.
Psychedelics have the ability to induce mystical experiences,[29] and a common feature of the mystical-type experiences they elicit is that of transcending egoic boundaries, known as ego death. Experiences of ego death, or ego-dissolution as it is scientifically referred to, are but one type of mystical state in which the ordinary sense of self fades into an experience of unity with ultimate reality, producing an experience of ‘cosmic consciousness’[30]. Ego-dissolution has been thought to parallel shamanic dismemberment, a psychic process in which old ego structures that are no longer of service fall apart.[31] Both fearful and enlightening, ego-dissolution is one of the most well-known challenges that psychedelic journeyers face, and fighting against the fear of this experience is often one of the main causes of a bad trip.
Giving up control and surrendering to the experience is often advocated as a way of transforming challenging trips. The late underground psychedelic therapist Leo Zeff suggested that bad trips were an inherent part of psychedelic use and could be exacerbated when an individual having a hard time in a psychedelic state was interrupted. For example, calling medical personnel in the height of a challenging psychedelic experience may result in being given psychiatric drugs which dampen the experience and do not allow an individual to process or work through their difficulty. Rather, Zeff’s method for supporting his clients was to help them through their fears so that they were able to surface from the experience ‘reborn’.[32]
Whether it be in clinical or community contexts, there is tacit knowledge among the psychedelically literate to approach bad trips and the demonic figures they might contain with courage, walking towards the darkness whilst asking the question, ‘What do you have to teach me?’ However, taking an interfaith approach to psychedelic exploration, conversing with demonic figures might not be the right approach for everyone. Ortigodraws upon the experiences of retreat facilitator and Buddhist interfaith chaplain, Daan Keiman, who believes it is important to offer ‘alternative approaches based on one’s personal intentions and cultural background’. [33]
Although psychedelics may produce frightening experiences, these experiences are, perhaps counter-intuitively, considered among the most meaningful by psychedelic users. For example, in a survey of almost 2,000 individuals who had challenging experiences after ingesting psilocybin outside of a clinical context, 39% reported the experience to be among the five most challenging events of their lifetime. In spite of these challenging experiences, 84% of respondents reported positive, long-term effects.[34] Similarly, a recent qualitative study interviewed 50 psychedelic users[35] and found that the majority of users expressed that their challenging psychedelic experiences ‘had enabled them to face and resolve deep-rooted emotional barriers, interpersonal relationships or taught them to control their life’.
Psychologist of religion and former participant in Timothy Leary’s research at Harvard with psychedelics, Walter Houston Clark, recounted his 1974 LSD experience with psychedelic therapy pioneer, Dr. Salvador Roquet, at his underground clinic in Mexico City, Instituto de Psicosintesis. Clark detailed his experience with Roquet in an article entitled ‘“BAD TRIPS” May Be the BEST TRIPS’.[36] The setting which Roquet curated was deliberately set up to overwhelm patients, filling the room with ‘cacophonous’ music, lights that alternated between neon strobing, brightness, and total darkness, as well as sound movies which portrayed ‘scenes of violence, death and crude pornography, apparently designed to shock and disturb the sensibilities of the average patient’.[37] Clark describes the first trip with Roquet as ‘a descent into hell’. However, Clark described a second LSD experience that he took part in a few days later as one of his richest psychedelic experiences, crediting the positive outcome to his previous descent into hell. Reflecting on his experience, Clark concluded that when handled with care ‘bad trips’ are the best trips.
Having experienced this state of ego-dissolution myself, I can vouch for how terrifying it is. In 2014, I intentionally ingested a high dose of Psilocybe semilanceata, a psychedelic mushroom that is indigenous to Britain, alone in my apartment which induced a state of ego-dissolution.
I initially felt a sense of awe and wonder for the way in which the world around me took on a new complexity; dancing with the living, breathing ‘isness’ of interconnected sentience. However, awe quickly dissipated into terror as the environment grew complex beyond expression. I lay down on the floor incapacitated by the outer world and my inability to interact with it, feeling that all the language that I previously had to describe the world had become obsolete. Further, all biographical information fell away, and despite my best efforts, I could not remember anything about myself.
I had the sudden feeling that I was going to die, or that if I didn’t die, I would invariably be stuck in this ‘psychotic’ state of consciousness in which I saw more than what language would allow me to grasp. I thought of calling a friend, but there was an inner voice which laughed at the idea. It said, ‘You are the one who is going to die! Even if this friend is present, what will they do? They cannot die with you’. In this realisation, I felt a sense of deep trust. It didn’t matter what happened in the end, all I knew is that I had to let go and surrender. All terror dissolved, and I felt an exploding sense of ecstasy. I awoke for the first time in a new realm in which ‘I’ didn’t exist, rather I was aware of myself as pure, boundless consciousness, feeling a sense of ineffable bliss wash over me.
Whether it is the change of seasons, or the deterioration of the body, death processes are inevitable and accepting this simple fact could serve to help us make more meaning of the limited time that we have on this planet. According to Winkelman, ‘These encounters of images of one’s own death are central to shamanic initiations, and developments are characterized by a “death and rebirth” experience’.[38] Further, Winkelman suggests that this death-and-rebirth cycle enables a process of psychological transformation, allowing for the fragmentation of the ego and its more integral reconfiguration. The descent into the unknown realm of death in the psychedelic experience echoes the mythic structure of the hero’s journey illustrated by Joseph Campbell.[39]
In order to undergo transformation and bring the gifts of knowledge and wisdom back to their community, psychedelic explorers and shamans alike must enter the abyss and undergo an experience of death and rebirth. In this way, bad trips are best reframed as rites of initiation that present themselves as important thresholds on the way to knowledge and healing. Lucas (2005) argues that from a shamanic perspective, bad trips are viewed as a natural hurdle on the path to acquiring knowledge, and that they are a product of the dark, shadow side of our nature and culture that we cannot avoid if we intend on healing ourselves.
Within Indigenous, shamanic cultures psychoactive plant medicines such as ayahuasca are viewed as ‘plant teachers’ with their own sense of agency and intention,[40] having the capacity to influence human life in significant ways. This view is jarring to the Western mind in that we tend to ascribe meaning to psychedelic experiences from psychological perspectives. Although not always benevolent, these beings or plant spirits are often present to convey information or reveal a teaching. Viewing a psychoactive substance in this way could serve to change the meaning of a negative psychedelic experience, as the experiencer might be driven to examine why a plant teacher chose to provide them with such an experience, instead of looking to themselves as the reason for the challenging episode. This shamanic notion of psychedelics as autonomous agents has unwittingly leaked out into the contemporary psychedelic culture and is reflected in the common dictum that ‘you get the trip you need, not the trip you want’.
In early psychedelic research, Metzner and Leary believed bad trips to be a consequence of the wrong ‘set and setting’.[41] ‘Set’ generally refers to a person’s mindset and ‘setting’ refers to the container of the experience. However, this view is problematic in that it implies that if set and setting are appropriately controlled for, a bad trip will not occur. Today set and setting are still considered of paramount importance, although contemporary researchers place emphasis on controlling for set and setting in the context of psychedelic harm reduction.[42] Winkelman also suggests that the attention to set and setting in contemporary psychedelic use is loosely modelled on their ritualised, ceremonial use in shamanic traditions.[43] On the one hand, it is true that the potential for adverse effects can be mediated by being mindful of screening, preparation, and integration as well as dosing. However, challenging experiences can occur in any context, no matter how much preparation went into the experience. According to Lucas this set-and-setting attitude panders to the Western idea that we can control what happens to us; which is simply not true.[44] Rather, he suggests that bad trips alongside challenging life situations are inevitable, and instead of asking how to avoid them we should better ask how to understand them and grasp their meaning.
Exploring the historical evolution of the concept of bad trips, Dyck and Elcock suggest that the conception of bad trips as ‘inherently destructive’ is bound up with the American war on drugs, and was co-opted by zero tolerance drug policies that demonised these substances.[45] Even so, it is commonly held amongst psychedelic journeyers and certain mental health practitioners that ‘there are no bad trips, only challenging ones’.
As we move deeper into entheogenic, shamanic work, we are able to transcend the duality of the good/bad distinction, moving towards a conception of challenge as a natural part of the journey towards transformation. When managed skilfully, challenging psychedelic experiences can result in personal insight and transformation. However, even positive experiences are not without risks as they can trigger spiritual emergencies, a phenomenon which I will go on to discuss in the following section.