This book was a lot of fun despite a persistent degree of amateurism.
I do have to say though, I was a little surprised someone so seemingly open-minded would be able to so ignorantly suggest that
"Gabon remains the only peaceful country in a region of inescapable hostility, tribal conflicts, mindless genocide."
Come on bro.

Interesting and easy becomes difficult and cluttered with difficult to understand phrases and ideas. Then becomes interesting and easy and then ends with the author disconnected from normal ways of thinkong and talking about magic and levels of realities, which is difficult to grasp because of no personal experience and difficult words that make complex ideas even more hard to understand. probably to do with copious amounts of chemicals indulged by the author. I do recommend

ok, it is great.
It gets better and more intense as you go on. He winds up on a pretty wrenching analysis of how the earth is being destroyed and how it is a measure of our consciousness.
Not finished yet,
Its a good expose on burning man. Pinchbeck likes to talk about his own personal journey. He spends a good amount of time marveling about sycronisity in his own life, you know, stoner stuff.

A great and provocative look into the world of contemporary shamanism and shamanistic practices through out the world. Part personal experience, part historical documentation, this book will take you through the spiritual and often raw experiences and practices of shamans in todays society. As well as discuss the different hallucinogenic and mind expanding entheogenic compounds that these shamans use, that have been passed down from generation to generation.

The book could have been shorter. It’s clear that when he wrote this book he could not see the true value of psychedelics, I don’t know if he still does. He advocates for respecting psychedelics while casually ingesting, snorting, etc like it’s no big deal.The hypocrisy of the book is mind bending. He goes on to project some semblance of humility with anecdotes from friends and disdain for the capitalists mindset. However, he fails to realize that he is part of the very culture he resents. The traveling hippie lost in the world looking for a culture to appropriate in order to satisfy a spiritual void.

should have been a podcast.

The first 3/4 of this book was this guy trying to achieve spiritual faith that most women contain by the age of 11 but once we move past that it gets pretty crazy. I appreciate how well researched this is and I can definitely see it being an important read for men who are overly attached to the physical world and their own arrogance. Four stars because it was so so well written

This is so much more than his experience of taking psychedelic drugs. Shamanism, mysticism and the nature of reality all get explored here. I love his articulation and the style of his writing and found the book hard to put down. He prompted me to think about reality in a totally different way and I warmed to his analysis of his proposed alternate understandings of how the world might operate on a spiritual rather than materialistic foundation.

Joseph Conrad's quote at the beginning of the book sums it all up very well "one must explore deep and believe the incredible to find the new particles of truth floating in an ocean of insignificance"

The capitalist, consumer society that many of us inhabit does foster feelings of insignificance. Pinchbeck found himself losing interest in himself. "I felt like an actor who had lost the motivation for his part. or, I was like the character of 'Daniel Pinchbeck' trapped in a half-finished novel that an incompetent author was in the sluggish, surly process of abandoning." For Pinchbeck, drugs were the road towards a shift in perception and consciousness and his accounts are memorable. Whilst I would not wish to attempt the process myself - I can fully understand why an individual would want to.

Modern life has banished folk knowledge along with all modes of non-ordinary perception. Exiled to the realms of fairy tale and myth to order to create a culture devoted to mercantilism, industrialisation and scientific progress. We have lost the Shaman from our culture and the artist has replaced this role. Altered states of consciousness allow individuals to escape, temporarily, from the overwhelming and intoxicating dream world of capitalism.

Pinchbeck's alternate Shamanic realities are no rose tinted utopia. In instances, what he describes is scary, horrific even and a taste of dystopia. "diabolical hierarchies, secret cabals, vast libraries of wickedness... we little human beings have absolutely no idea what is going on in the cosmos."

So, are the trips that people experience on psychedelic drugs evidence of some kind of other order? Or are they just latent powers or quirks of the human mind? Delusions? Con-jobs? Synaptic fritzes? You are left to make up your own mind but Pinchbeck does suggest that "once you have had the experience, you are permanently rewired. You can consign existentialism to the scrap heap as you wrap your old ontological constructs around this new pole"

For Pinchbeck, the nature of reality is spiritual not physical. He lacks any hard evidence but he intuits it as an unfathomable truth - pieces of his private puzzle.

I, for one, am glad that he has shared his experiences, beliefs and intuitions.

This book, written in 2002, has so much to say about what is happening in the world today. No it did not make me want to go into a psychedelic binge (for lack of a better word).
It did make me think of my actions and how they relate to the world as a whole. We are so wrapped up in ourselves with out actually knowing ourselves and what our lives mean. Reflect? Hmm I wonder if there really is such a state.

'The capitalist mind perceives the world purely in terms of material resources to be used for its benefit, to increase productivity and profit without thought of long term consequence. If there is still a vague and oppressive sense of guilt, of wrongness and imbalance, this gnawing guilt spurs capitalism on to greater acts of consumption, more ... Read moreviolent attempts to subjugate nature, more totalizing efforts to create distractions. To the "rational materialist" mind, death is the end of everything; this thought feeds its rage against nature, which has placed it in this position of despair.'

white man

This changed the entire way I view psychedelics, as well as the physical and non-physical world. It made a deep impact on me, and I'm not one that can be convinced easily.

The amount of research and first hand accounts are insane in number. Look at the bibliography, I've got a ton of further reading just from that alone.

If you've ever had any interest in Shamanism, psychedelic drugs, or are just curious about the unknown forces in this world, I recommend it.