I originally read the first half of this book right after it came out and was fascinated. It was very cerebral and went over my head so I took a break and just never picked it back up again. finally, I was ready to revisit the book from, so here I am. After having the first half distilled through a second read, I really learned a lot more than from my first time through. The book has a great premise, solid investigative real world research, and a massive data dump of many fascinating ideas and mysteries related to consciousness, the soul, reincarnation, plant medicines, and different ancient civilizations beliefs on these matters. Going through the second half of the book was not as easy going for me. It dived deep into the author's personal hallucinogenic experiences and the Mayan belief system, both of which I did not find much interest in, nor did I care for. The whole bit on crop circles was new news to me. I always thought all that was a hoax and I only learned here that there actually is a real open-ended unknown phenomenon associated with that going back to pre-modern times. I thoroughly enjoyed the bit on the swami that argues that consciousness is fundamental, rather than matter. This exposition predates Donald Hoffman's recent public relations campaign arguing this same point, which has deeply resonated with me over the last year or so. for me, that was the greatest takeaway of this book and I'm very grateful that I got to read it and discovered in it that these ideas are long-standing and have an investigated by both the spiritual and intellectual classes of both Eastern and western society.

Well, I did find out the basis of this whole Mayan-End-of-the-World thing. Apparently, there's a short-cycle calendar and a long-cycle calendar, and while both calendars have had numerous cycles, in December of 2012, both calendars end on the same day.

The rest of the book was very strange. The author talks about eating mushrooms in order to communicate with aliens? I've always thought that hallucinogens result in hallucinations, but OK... I'm sure that even Fox Mulder would be put off my some of this guy's claims.

En el mapa cognitivo estándar que traza la Nueva Era, la «izquierda» representa lo inconsciente y lo desconocido, y la «derecha» lo consciente y el estado de vigilia. En consecuencia, la tragedia de la izquierda política en los dos últimos siglos se supone que es que se ha limitado a cuestiones de justicia social e igualdad económica, olvidándose de la necesidad de un cambio «más profundo», desde la conciencia racional-mental al reconocimiento de una dimensión oculta, solamente accesible a la intuición: «La izquierda luchó por los “derechos” del hombre, mientras ignora las “izquierdas” del hombre y de la mujer» (Pág.213). En la versión radical del espiritualismo de la Nueva Era, la crisis material que se avecina (la catástrofe ecológica) se reduce a una simple «expresión material de un proceso psicoespiritual que obliga a nuestra transición a un nuevo y más intensificado estado de conciencia» (Pág.392)

Viviendo en el Final de los Tiempos Pág.358

An excellent book, part essay and part memoir, following the author's intellectual and spiritual journey on par with some of the great fringe explorers. His style is a delight to read because he starts each chapter with an exploration of a different thinker ranging from Terrence McKenna to Rudolph Steiner to various crop circle and Mayan experts and then weaves in his personal journey, coalescing the two and shining a clear light on his personal pathway and the greater goings on in our modern society. It was definitely a page turner and elicited much personal self-reflection based on similar experiences or thoughts from my own life.. He did manage to break on through to the other side in a way that may turn off some readers, but as I am a similar explorer, one with experience in different realms but often caught in intellectual analysis, this work truly resonated with me. I would recommend it for anyone out there currently on their own spiritual journey or interested in a variety of subjects from aliens to esoteric knowledge to psychoactive substances. Worth the read and a quick one, so pick it up if you can!

I found this book a bit disappointing. Having read Breaking Open the Head, which I found very well researched and structured, I expected similar from this book. But the two aren't much the same. Though it has a lot of interesting points, overall I found 2012 to be pretty meandering, with a fair amount of unsubstantiated fluff. At points, Pinchbeck seems to even acknowledge that he knows he's off in the weeds. I still got a kick out of reading it, but overall didn't find it to be a particularly great book.

Notes:
One of the worst books I've read

Author describes drug trips and his descent into madness while messing around in the occult

It is full of darkness, perversion, anxiety, and demonic experiences

Sadly he is truly disturbed and in need of a true Savior

loved, loved most of this book. although, the last bit is frustrating, and by the end, although i really enjoyed 90% of it, the guy struck out with:
1. whining about his "partner"
2. whining about a "priestess."
3. pointless information about burning man (he has an epiphany that some of the people there are not actually spiritual seekers, but are superficial people on drugs.)
minus that strike-out snafu, he ends it with the current plight of the hopi indians which is gut wrenching. it's too bad he didn't leave out the creepy whining about women. we have woody allen for that.

2012 is part memoir, the psychedelic and spiritual "awakening" of the author, and part research study, based on the Mayan belief in a profound, world-wide conciousness shift, believed to happen in the year 2012. I found this book, and Pinchbeck's philosophy, incredibly interesting, though very disjointed. A lot of it makes perfect sense (the cyclic dawning and collapse of great civilizations), a lot of it requires great imagination and a major step away from my usual skepticism (the crop circle phenomenon, alien visitations), and a lot of it is just a little too far removed from my relatively sober reality (week-long heavy psychedelic trips in the Amazon), but I'm fascinated by it nonetheless. To be read with an open mind. And maybe while on mushrooms.

So first off, this book is NOT about the end of the world...maybe the end of the world as we currently understand it, but not just fire and brimstone death and dismemberment, so that was encouraging.

In fact, Pinchbeck traces his personal journey to understand various apocalyptic prophecies in the context of the Mayan return of the Snake God "Q" (I'll just misspell it a bunch so we'll use "Q" instead).

Well researched, the book explores many congruent belief systems which all have similar harbingers of a change or great turn in the near future (2012), a movement into another phase or evolution of human existence. The speculated suggestions for this "turn" are derived principally from the various ancient peoples, psychedelic transcendence, and some alien crop circles thrown in for good measure.

The rational part of me says it's reasonably presented with a few speed bumps which personally put me off, principally Pinchbeck managing to be a cipher for the intentions of "Q". But, the heart/feeling part of me, somehow knows the premise is more right and reasonable than the simple nihilist, "we all gone die soon" apocalypse rhetoric we get from fundamentalists, pragmatists and doomsayers.

Maybe it's just because I like the idea that all this technological distraction is the last gasp of rationality's quest to quantify everything, and that an evolution could integrate transcendent tribal synchrony with the natural movements of the planets/earth/weather AND the useful technological means without the need for one to dominate the other.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, the "turn" would include a fair amount of collapse, it's not speculated to be all Hair the Musical, age of aquarius, the Earth and it's inhabitants will likely suffer this transition like a generational birth pain...Man made wrath will be wrought, we must first suffer the travails of our technological excess to grasp the valuable lesson on the other side.

So, I guess I should consider myself "lucky" to be alive for this momentous opportunity to engage a new reality...hope to see you all on the other side.

wow. this book really was as fascinatingly interesting as it was impossibly dry. several chapters held my attention thoroughly and made me really examine and think about the world around us, philosophically, rationally, metaphorically, and mythically, while others were perfect when i needed to get to sleep quick. overall, i'd definitely reccommend it to people who are looking to learn more about interesting ideas about the future of the human race and culture, while looking at clues from ancient civiliztions. my own interests lie in the mayan calendar and their whole idea of the 2012 rebirth of time, which dp certainly goes into, and his whole sections about the crop circles really make me want to go to brightonbury to see them myself. however, the drug induced philisophical meandering gets a little lengthy and boring.

This book links UFOs, the mayan 'long count' calendar, and quantum theory with various major events in human and evolutionary history. The author delves into the prophecied upcoming 'phase shift,' its theological and spritual underpinnings and what we, as human can expect- a fundamental shift in the way we experience reality and understand consciousness. Are aliens a post-modern fairy-tale mythology manifested by universal human conscious? Are hallicinagenic plants a way we can understand our destiny right now? Was Jesus Christ a Taoist?

At first I was intrigued, then about half way through I became confused but still entertained and then eventually too bored to finish it. I did try though, I got pretty close to the end.



It's not a bad book, it's just different,and different is usually good when it comes to books. And, it is good in many ways, but in other ways it's hard to follow because he doesn't know how to stay on topic for very long. Then he takes his tripping experiences too seriously and lost me. I've tripped, so I'm not ripping on the guy, but it's not anything to be taken seriously once you return to sobriety and reality.



Fun ride, but a bit of a let down toward the end.