The History of Psychonautics: Ancient, Aboriginal, and Modern Technologies of the Sacred

Excerpt-Stan Grof

Shamanism is not only ancient, it is also global; it can be found in North, Central, and South America, in Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. The fact that so many different cultures throughout human history have found shamanic techniques useful and relevant suggests that the holotropic states engage what the anthropologists call the “primal mind,” a basic and primordial aspect of the human psyche that transcends race, gender, culture, and historical period. In cultures that have escaped the disruptive influence of Western industrial civilization, shamanic techniques and procedures have survived to this day.

The career, for many shamans, begins with a spontaneous psychospiritual crisis (“shamanic illness”). It is a powerful visionary state during which the future shaman experiences a journey into the underworld, or the realm of the dead, where he or she is attacked by evil spirits, subjected to various ordeals, killed, and dismembered. This is followed by an experience of rebirth and an ascent into the celestial realms. Shamanism is also connected with holotropic states in that accomplished and experienced shamans are able to enter into a trance state at will, and in a controlled manner. They use it for diagnosing and healing when the client, the healer, or both of them are in a holotropic state at the same time. The shamans play the role of “psychopomps” for holotropic states of other members of their tribes; they provide the necessary support and guidance for traversing the complex territories of the Beyond.