Muy bueno!

“Preparation for ultimate death is to be aware that your highest and most intense form of life is accompanied by, and conditional upon, a series of small deaths all the time. We have to be dying to these obsessive memories.”
― Aldous Huxley

I read some of Huxley's books, and he was quite influential. After reading this book, and having the opportunity to read cognitive science of religion and evolutionary medicine, there's nothing more to say, he was in fact, way ahead of his time. He really was. We now have, thanks to the advances in neurobiology, and cognitive neuroscience, under the scope of evolutionary medicine, that the brain behaves in such a way that could be described as the "visionary experiences" detailed by Huxley. We now have books such as "Ritual", "Ritual in Human Evolution and Religion", and "Supernatural Selection: How Religion Evolved", that explain many things mentioned by Huxley, more than 50 years ago concerning the use of drugs and why the human species have always done that.
He would have been happy to know that science managed to explain some of his insights concerning effects such as placebo, nocebo, drug use, schizophrenia and religion leadership, and many other themes that go way back, to the origins of human life and the creation of symbolic meaning and ritual.
The book contains mostly letters between doctors, and the transcription of lectures that Huxley shared because he was invited. The last chapters are all about his death. He was an advocate to the meaning of afterlife, talking a lot about Eastern tradition, and he died of cancer the same day that John F. Kennedy got a bullet is his head. On the other hand, Huxley was given a shot of LSD and he crossed the bridge between life and death without any pain, making it his last visionary experience.
He may have sinned of being ahead of his time, people sometimes considering him as a nutjob, a wackjob, a new age ridicule, and a drug user (he only took LSD 4 times in a controlled environment), but he understood something that anyone did not, and that could be understood way after: the thin line between the mechanistic world and the symbolic meaning that only the human species can achieve.

Great book, this collection of writings tracks the development of Aldous Huxley's thought relating to psychedelics and spirituality. Mostly letters and seminal essays written by Huxley, the book lays bare the tragedy that is the prohibition of psychedelic sacraments and the restricting of psychedelic therapy. Ends with a moving piece by Laura Huxley about Aldous's final moments on LSD.

Huxley’s writings on psychedelics are an absolute joy to read.

As the title suggests, this book is a collection of Huxley's writings on his psychedelic experiences and what he perceived about the drugs being used for the benefit of humans (which led to his last novel, "Island"). Included are his letters to Humphrey Osmond, the British ex-pat psychologist experimenting with psychedelic therapy in Canada, Albert Hoffman, who first synthesized LSD in 1943 and, of course, Timothy Leary, no introduction needed.

Huxley, an English intellectual to the end, communicated his perceptions of the psychedelic state of mind very eloquently in his texts (especially "The Doors Of Perception", from which a snippet is provided in 'Moksha') and lectures given to various groups of congregated scientists at various conferences. His letters seem most interesting though. An almost behind-the-scenes look at the very early psychedelic movement, before the wave crested in 'the Sixties'.

The final chapter, written by Huxley's second wife Laura, sees Aldous off into the bardos--with two small injections of LSD at his request. One of the first great 20th century psychonauts given his own gentle version of a Viking funeral.

Have not finished reading this. There must be some value in that book and that anthology of stories that i have yet to discover!

Reading this collection of deep thoughts about nature of reality, society, spirituality and of course, use of psychedelics, raises an important and harrowing question: Where have great people like Aldous Huxley, with their beautiful mind, vision and understanding, disappeared from our modern world?

Letters, deeper reflections on psychedelics, letters from others as well.

there is a light that never goes out

(Notes, not a review)

Reading Aldous Huxley is a bit like reading Borges or Bell Hooks in that you learn so much about the thinkers that inspired them. Huxley quotes and references writers, scientists, and religious texts with ease. What a beautiful mind.

A few pieces in here that I really enjoyed:
- The Far Continents of the Mind -- I believe this is the first essay in the book in which Huxley introduces the term "gratuitous grace" and how psychedelics allow us to explore "the antipodes of the mind"
- Drugs that Shape Men's Minds -- an exploration of the human search for transcendence whether it's alcohol, drugs, or crowd mind. Talks about how many ancient gods were drugs personified. Example: Dionysus who was the god of wine, but also was wine.
- Culture and the Individual -- how psychedelics help us see through cultural norms, and the limitations of language
- O Nobly Born! Written by Laura Huxley about Aldous's death (the same day JFK died). What a wonderful death, and one that Huxley envisioned in The Island.
- A Tribute to Aldous Huxley by Timothy Leary

2 books that were mentioned in here in particular that I want to read:
1. You are not the target, by Laura Huxley. She introduces two concepts in this book that Huxley references in Moksha: one man is a thousand men and ice cubes in the mind
2. Zen Flesh: Zen bones, by Paul Reps

And of course, The Island, which I haven't read yet and am very much looking forward to.

Also, a great quote that Huxley mentions several times in his essays and letters:
"Malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's ways to man."

Volveré una y otra vez a esta obra fundacional del pensamiento psicodélico

"El opio es la religión del pueblo."
Alucinantes testimonios de primera mano sobre los experimentos artísticos y filosóficos de Huxley con el LSD y sus reflexiones sobre la legalización de la droga en sociedades utópicas / distópicas.