Kylie Harris, PhD, is a transpersonal research psychologist from Melbourne, Australia. She has recently completed her dissertation on the topic of spiritual emergence(y) and its relationship with psychosis and personality. Kylie’s work is inspired by her own personal experience. She believes that people around the world are “waking up” as we undergo a scientific and spiritual paradigm shift, catalyzing spiritual emergence(y) for individuals, as well as on a global scale. Kylie has published articles in numerous academic journals and has presented her work at local and international conferences. She is a wife, mother, and Transpersonal Counselor. She also considers herself a spiritual emergence(y) experiencer. In this article, she shares the results of her dissertation. You may contact Kylie via email at kylie.harris.research@gmail.com or you can find her on Facebook (Kylie Harris Serong) and Instagram @dr.kylieharris.

I would like to present some of the findings of my recent doctoral research, which investigated the relationships between spiritual emergence and emergency, psychosis, and personality. The term ‘spiritual emergency’ was first introduced by Stanislav and Christina Grof, referring to a process of spiritual emergence that becomes a personal emergency, or crisis. This “emergency” may occur due to the speed of onset of the process, the trauma that the experience can unearth, or if the experience is triggered suddenly. Triggers may include a stressful or traumatic experience, such as childbirth, relationship breakdown, or loss of a loved one or job. Some activities, such as yoga, meditation, and mindfulness practices, may also be potential triggers.

The transpersonal psychological literature has been very focused upon discussing and identifying the similarities and differences between spiritual emergence and emergency – collectively referred to as SE(Y) – and clinical psychosis, with which severe cases of SE(Y) may appear very similar. However, there has been less focus

Isa Gucciardi, PhD, holds degrees and certificates in transpersonal psychology, cultural and linguistic anthropology, comparative religion, hypnotherapy, and transformational healing. She has been a dedicated Buddhist practitioner for forty years and has spent over thirty years studying spiritual, therapeutic, and meditative techniques from around the world. Isa has worked with master teachers of Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism and Sufism, as well as expert shamanic practitioners from a variety of traditions. Isa is the creator of Depth Hypnosis, a groundbreaking therapeutic model that has won rave reviews from psychotherapeutic and spiritual counselors alike. Isa teaches and speaks nationally and internationally, and has published numerous articles, podcast episodes, videos, and the books Coming to Peace and Return to the Great Mother.

She maintains a private practice with institutions and individuals in Depth Hypnosis and Coming to Peace processes. Isa speaks five languages and has lived in eleven countries. She is the mother of two children and lives with her partner in San Francisco. She is the founding director and primary teacher of the Foundation of the Sacred Stream. For more information about training opportunities and to learn more about Isa’s upcoming workshop on Plant Medicine: Preparing & Integrating the Experience, go to www.sacredstream.org.

ACISTE recently had an opportunity to interview Isa about her views on the use of psychotropic plant medicine for psychological and spiritual transformation. Given the recent resurgence of clinical interest in the use of psychedelics for treating mental health concerns, we hope this two-part (Feb/Mar) interview will encourage therapists and others to further educate themselves about the unique integration needs of those who choose to engage plant medicine for healing and guidance. In today’s interview, she offers practical counsel to support professionals. To read Part 1, click here.

Q: What is your understanding of recent research on plant medicine in certain populations and for certain conditions?

As I mentioned in the first part of this interview, the work at Johns Hopkins has been very important. I think the work that MAPS (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) does is even more important because this organization advocates for the exploration of plant medicines and other psychotropic substances as a tool for self-development within the clinical setting. This goes beyond using psychotropics as a medicine for illness and brings them into the clinical setting to help support a process of personal transformation. Michael Pollan’s book, How to Change Your Mind, has created an important bridge for helping psychotropic plants be better understood by mainstream organizations and individuals.

The history of scientific research into psychotropic plants always seems to have at least two camps: those who want to be very deliberate and slow in gathering data and providing analysis, and those who want to work with these substances in more generalized settings in order to create social change. The former wants to maintain a platform for continued funding for research, and the …

Isa Gucciardi, PhD, holds degrees and certificates in transpersonal psychology, cultural and linguistic anthropology, comparative religion, hypnotherapy, and transformational healing. She has been a dedicated Buddhist practitioner for forty years and has spent over thirty years studying spiritual, therapeutic, and meditative techniques from around the world. Isa has worked with master teachers of Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism and Sufism, as well as expert shamanic practitioners from a variety of traditions. Isa is the creator of Depth Hypnosis, a groundbreaking therapeutic model that has won rave reviews from psychotherapeutic and spiritual counselors alike. Isa teaches and speaks nationally and internationally, and has published numerous articles, podcast episodes, videos, and the books Coming to Peace and Return to the Great Mother.

She maintains a private practice with institutions and individuals in Depth Hypnosis and Coming to Peace processes. Isa speaks five languages and has lived in eleven countries. She is the mother of two children and lives with her partner in San Francisco. She is the founding director and primary teacher of the Foundation of the Sacred Stream. For more information about training opportunities and to learn more about Isa’s upcoming workshop on Plant Medicine: Preparing & Integrating the Experience, go to www.sacredstream.org.

ACISTE recently had an opportunity to interview Isa about her views on the use of psychotropic plant medicine for psychological and spiritual transformation. Given the recent resurgence of clinical interest in the use of psychedelics for treating mental health concerns, we hope this two-part (Feb/Mar) interview will encourage therapists and others to further educate themselves about the unique integration needs of those who choose to engage plant medicine for healing and guidance.

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Q: What is your perspective on why plant medicine journeys have become so popular in recent years?

There is a serious existential crisis in many western societies at this time. This is a function of the deterioration of the social fabric there. The rise of social polarization across the planet and the cultivation of a culture of “no compassion” in the U.S. contribute to people becoming increasingly desperate for answers and meaning. The traditional sources for finding meaning are frayed as well – churches whose ministers are abusing children and overloaded mental health care providers who are unable to provide the level of assistance they have in the past, as two examples.

I think people are looking for answers in new places – and many people are finding them through the experience of plant medicines. As they speak about their experience, others are interested in trying them as well. There is also a more esoteric answer, which has to do with the intentionality of the plants themselves, but I think that answer requires a bit more context in order to make sense to most people.

Q: What are the greatest challenges to integrating the powerful insights and awareness these journeys can offer?

One of the greatest challenges is that as humans, we are ‘human-centric.’ We tend to value our own ways of knowing and seeing over the intelligence of other forms of life. Most people don’t even consider that other life forms have their own intelligence. This makes it hard for people to think of plants as intelligent beings whose biochemistry may offer insights to our own ways of processing information.

This lack of awareness extends beyond just turning to plants for assistance. It also extends into the processes of integrating the insights we receive from ingesting the plant medicines. In a way, it is actually a problem of translation. Most people do not understand the ‘language’ of image and …

Bonnie Greenwell, PhD, is a transpersonal psychotherapist and non-dual teacher in the lineage of Adyashanti. She has authored four books on spiritual awakening and kundalini, her latest being When Spirit Leaps: Navigating the Process of Spiritual Awakening released by New Harbinger Press last June. Since 1990 she has trained people internationally to work with spiritual emergence, and provided assessments and consultations to over 3000 people through Internet appointments, webinars, and retreats. She believes the awakening of consciousness to Truth is a natural realization available to all, and this potential is initiated by a spiritually or energetically transformative experience. Her books are available on Amazon.com and Kindle, and her websites are www.kundaliniguide.com and www.awakeningguide.com. Find her on Facebook at Shanti River Center or read her essays on Awakened Living Blog at shantiriver.wordpress.com. You can hear more about Bonnie and her teaching in her most recent interview on Buddha at the Gas Pump.

Many people pursue spiritual practices in order to feel more peaceful, more harmonious and content with the world. The function of yoga, Qi Gong, meditation, and other esoteric practices are to create a new energy pattern in the body, and to help consciousness be more in touch with the interior energy and spaces, and ultimately, peace.

Sometimes these practices break our identification with the body or the limited form of whom we are. When this happens it is said in yoga that the first knot is broken. This allows our awareness to become much more conscious of itself as an energy field. One could say that instead of knowing ourselves as the outer structure of the cells we begin to experience ourselves as the movement inside the cells, as vibration.

There are many possibilities once this happens. We may begin to use practices to gain some control over the directional flow of this interior energy (called prana or chi), such as in martial arts, healing, Reiki, or yogic and Taoist breathing practices. In this way we can build strength, or open chakras or various energy centers.

We may begin to experience erratic energy releases as cells begin to release old patterns and attract new ones. We may open up new pathways for energy and activate kundalini, coiled at the base of the spine. This awakening amplifies our energy and orchestrates the gradual reorganization of our energy field. We may go through periods of mental disorganization or disorientation, emotional volatility,

Chris Cole hosts the Waking Up Bipolar podcast, focused on the intersection of bipolar disorder and spiritual awakening. He is the author of The Body of Chris: A Memoir of Obsession, Addiction, and Madness, inspired by his own journey of spiritual unfolding and mental health challenges. You can find Chris’s message of spiritual and psychological transformation on Lion’s Roar, Psychology Today, To Write Love on Her Arms, and the International Bipolar Foundation. He offers life coaching for any number of mental health conditions, specializing in bipolar disorder and spiritual emergence. Chris’s experience with addiction, disordered eating, body dysmorphia, psychosis, and spiritual emergency allows him to relate to a wide range of clients. He utilizes a holistic approach to mental health which views wellness in physical, mental, emotional, social, and spiritual domains. Learn more about Chris and his work at colecoaching.com.

I‘ve racked my brain around issues of etiology regarding madness, psychosis, and psychiatric criteria in general for about 15 years now. Being effected by the stigma, confusion, and marginalization of altered and extreme states can do that to a person. In recent years, particularly since I’ve started making more connections online following the publication of my book, topics of social justice have greatly influenced my conceptualization of this material.

Mad thinkers, movers, and shakers, as well as neurodivergent and marginalized folks of numerous locations, have shown me that what we think of as pathology exists in relationship—with ourselves, each other, and our environments. Ideas that psychopathology exists in the vacuum of one’s isolated experience only serves to silence discourse and marginalize divergent experiences. If nothing else, it reveals a rudimentary comprehension of human development. Because I can’t quite come up with the perfect name for such a conglomeration of radical thought, I am calling my holistic model the Mad Triangle until further notice. I particular felt the need to publish a blog post about this, to document much of what I have been presenting lately in group settings, workshops, and dialogue.

The Mad Triangle Overview
The Mad Triangle is extremely expansive, and so it cannot possibly be given justice in a blog post. My hope here is simply to provide a few basics, leading someone into self-identified healing and social locations that may be further explored as desired. By self-selecting psychological and neurological discomfort, folks are empowered to self-determine which aspects of their experiences are problematic, which are special and/or gifts, which are simply divergent experiences, and which experiences are the result of violence, marginalization, and/or systemic oppression.

Dr. Yvonne Kason MD, Med, CCFP, FCFP, is a retired Family Physician and MD-Psychotherapist, author, and public speaker, previously on faculty at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Medicine. She is the person who first coined the phrase “Spiritually Transformative Experiences” (STEs) and defined five major categories of STE experience. She was the first Canadian medical doctor to specialize in the research and counseling of patients with Spiritually Transformative Experiences. A renowned international expert on STEs, she has had four Near-Death Experiences herself. She was a founding member of the Kundalini Research Network, the Canadian Coordinator of the Spiritual Emergence Network, the founder of the Spiritual Emergence Research and Referral Clinic, and co-founder of the Spirituality in Health-Care Network. She has four published books, and her most recent is Farther Shores: Exploring how Near-Death, Kundalini, and Mystical experiences can Transforms Ordinary Lives.

Dr. Kason retired from the practice of medicine in 2006, for health reasons. Following a dramatic brain healing in 2016, a “miracle of brain neuroplasticity,” Dr. Kason has now resumed writing, public speaking, and giving media interviews – sharing both her personal STE experiences, and insights from her over 38 years clinical experience researching and counseling persons with diverse types of STEs.

By some twist of fate, I have been blessed with four Near-Death Experiences (NDEs) over the course of my lifetime. At the hand of the Divine sculptor, I have become one of a very rare breed – a multiple Near-Death Experiencer!

All four of my NDEs had powerful after-effects on me and altered the course of my life, both as a medical doctor and as a spiritual seeker. Together with a Kundalini awakening, mystical experiences, and psychic awakening, those NDEs prompted me in 1990 to become the first Canadian medical doctor to specialize in the counseling and research of persons having NDEs and other mystical and paranormal experiences.

Katie Mottram is an author, blogger, speaker, activist, and project coordinator. As well as in her own book, Mend The Gap, her personal story is featured in the 2016 publication by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Spirituality and Narrative in Psychiatric Practice: Stories of Mind and Soul. She is the founder of the grassroots social movement Emerging Proud and its companion film. Katie’s latest project is The Emerging Kind, an outcome of the Emerging Proud launch that took place in 12 countries on May 12, 2017. The question the event asked participants was: “What do we need in order to create a society in which it’s safe to talk about extreme human experiences?” Key responses from all 12 countries included: the need for validation, safe spaces to openly talk and feel heard without fear of judgment, and support from peers who understand what it feels like. Here Katie shares with us her own journey toward integration.

1. Dissolution of Duality Consciousness

It’s difficult to pinpoint when an STE begins. Until quite recently I would have marked that pivotal moment in my life as being the moment of epiphany when I experienced an intense and spontaneous awakening to unity consciousness in the spring of 2012 during a meditation. In that moment, I experienced the euphoric, ineffable connection to “all that is,” an energetic, universal love. However, six years on, and after many cringe-worthy reflective moments along the bumpy road to integration, I’d now say it began a couple of years earlier, when my sense of self began to crack and finally shatter.

Until that point of existential crisis, I had identified only with my human self, one that was fraught with insecurity and repressed self-hatred. Despite not being a particularly enjoyable ego identity to claim, I had clung on for dear life –

Bill Scheffel is a meditation and creative writing teacher and videographer, who has directed meditation retreats since 1980. Bill was a student of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and taught classes in meditation, creative writing, and poetry at Naropa University for thirteen years. In addition to several films, he authored the book, Loving-Kindness Meditation: Meditations to Help You Love Yourself, Love Others, and Create More Love and Peace in the World. In 2017, Bill founded Transcending Madness and is co-leading a series of workshops and retreats related to working with extreme and non-ordinary states. He also teaches online classes in creative writing and the I Ching. For more on Bill and his work, see his websites: Transcending Madness, Vertical Time Yoga, and I Ching and the Human Body.

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“We are the bees of the invisible. We wildly collect the honey of the visible, to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke

We have no memory of being in the womb or emerging from the birth canal. Dreams are quickly forgotten if remembered at all. We experience emotions but may not always know why. The most fundamental dimensions of our experience cannot be found in any solid way, quantified, or even seen. How can we understand spiritual emergencies and other spiritually transformative events if, as R.D. Laing wrote, “We can see other people’s behavior but not their experience?”

Of course Laing sought above all to understand the experience of those he saw psychiatrically; initially he was nearly alone in his belief that psychosis held meaning. After experiencing my own spiritual emergency, I recognized I needed a new language for what I’d experienced as well as allies who believed my experience had value. Six years later, I advocate that, for those in extreme states, the greatest first aid is honest inquiry into their experience, and humility and patience in the face of the ineffable dimensions they experience. Those who have such experiences must be encouraged to speak, and we must all cultivate the inquisitiveness and courage to listen.

In the 1970’s, I dove into the spiritual life. As a student of Chögyam Trungpa, I became a pioneer—

Ingo Lambrecht is a New Zealand-based clinical psychologist and consultant with over 20 years of experience. His book, Sangoma Trance States: Exploring Indigenous Consciousness Disciplines in South Africa, skillfully interweaves personal experience with scholarly research to map the specific non-ordinary states of traditional South African healers. He has clinical experience in a variety of settings in South Africa and New Zealand. Using a collaborative, integrative approach, he works with a diverse group of people of all ages, who present with a wide range of issues and difficulties. He is currently a consultant and project leader for the integration of various Māori mental health services in New Zealand. With a long history of working with people who have cultural and/or spiritual concerns, his special interest lies with the complex clinical work related to the cultural-clinical interface for indigenous people. For more of Ingo’s perspectives on non-ordinary states and psychological distress, please see his highly informative presentation on Shamanic Spiritual Emergencies.

Working as a clinical psychologist in a state-funded mental health center for Māori, the indigenous people of New Zealand, myself and my colleagues are charged with providing culturally-integrated clinical care to the top three percent of the seriously mentally ill. We serve many patients presenting with severely distressing psychotic states or schizophrenia, and also severe mood disorders such as depressive disorders and bipolar disorders.

Our model of care is Te Whare Tapa Wha, the House of Wellbeing. This holistic model is based on the sacred communal site of the Marae. Four pillars or aspects of well-being make up the Marae: whanau or family health, hinengaro or mental health, tinana or physical health, and wairua or spiritual health. These four foundational supports hold the protective space of health and well-being for Māori and in fact, it could be argued, for most people. Māori have