Grof builds a carefully laid out tapestry of thought unlike any other writer. Boldly going into dimensions that the orthodoxy fears, Grof consistently shows us that the best findings are often the result of adventurous undertakings.

One must truly venture into uncharted territories in order to discover hidden, powerful forces in the world.

All of Grof's work makes for a rich intellectual and spiritual treasure that will be edifying humankind indefinitely.

Judging by a deluge of media reports and a growing body of respectable scientific literature, a great many people are having experiences that don't fit into our civilization's dominant cosmological map. You may be one of them: someone who has experienced, for example, powerful, even predictive, dreams; remarkable synchronicities; undeniable psychic events; or convincing mystical experiences.

But, according our culture's cosmology, none of these experiences is supposed to be possible.

In this book, transpersonal psychologist Chris Bache opens up a different way of approaching this conundrum - by exploring the spectrum of our consciousness and what it implies for a much wider and comprehensive cosmology. The personal and social consequences of such an expanded worldview are profound.

Cosmology orients us in the universe. It tells us where we came from, where we are, and where we are going. Implicitly or explicitly, it defines what is possible for us as human beings, and thus it channels, or limits, our highest ambitions.

Modern Western culture lives entirely within the confines of what Bache identifies as "daytime" consciousness - that is, it takes into account only what we can perceive through our outer, physical, senses, and of those perceptions it takes seriously only those we can measure. These data are then organized according to the rules of logic and reason (mostly mathematical). "Nighttime" consciousness - what we can learn about the world through, for example, dreams, intuition, psychic or mystical experiences, and other nonordinary states - plays no part in designing modern cosmology.

As a result, we are moving into a kind of cultural dislocation, in which the official cosmology fails to map many of the experiences that matter most to us.

Combining philosophical reflections with deep self-exploration to delve into the ancient mystery of death and rebirth, Bache emphasizes collective rather than individual transformation. Drawing on 20 years of experience working with nonordinary states, he argues that when the deep psyche is hyper-stimulated using powerful psychedelic techniques, the healing that results sometimes extends beyond the individual to the collective unconscious of humanity itself.

Bache presents one of the most persuasive accounts - based on many years of personal spiritual exploration and incisive scholarly work - of why our culture needs to take seriously the spectrum of nonordinary states of consciousness experienced by so many people.

If you want a powerful, at times dramatic, account of the sheer majesty and mystery of our multidimensional cosmos and how the psyche fits in, this book is a must-read. If you want a transformative approach to learning and eduction about who we are and our place in the cosmos this book will inspire you.

This is an interesting and even heroic work, well worth the money. In large part the author combs the relevant literature and supplements it with his own experience from deliberately induced psychedelic states in order to mine for the material he presents.

Among other things the book deals with collective mind and group karma. As a professional worker in the field of environment I can vouch for the fact that some of the shared mind phenomena reported by the author, particularly elements involving group pain are quite real. I have encountered this effect in the course of environmental work. My experience did not evolve from any clinical or therapeutic exercise but rather as the result of the intense conflict (non-physical) involved in trying to manage environmental activities. Until I opened this book, I had not the remotest idea that some of the experiences I went through were of a form recognized by Mr Bach.

It is true that group karma exists and apparently the tragedy of Cambodia is a case in point. However, it is important to note that the perceived effects of group suffering referred to in the book may not necessarily indicate the operation of "group mind" but rather may arise as the results of "aspects of mind shared by a group". There is a big difference. In the first instance it may be easy to depose the ego-self from its central throne and to substitute, as Mr Bach attempts to do, a group responsibility (group mind). In the case "aspects of mind shared by a group" this displacement is not so easily accomplished. I think a better term than "group mind" or even "collective mind" might be the term "shared aspects of mind".

Apart from "Earth experience" in general, that is humankind's experience with matter, evolutionary progression (our animal nature) and so forth, the particular character of situations that spark group karma is directly due to limited numbers of people. In the matter of human strife, there is always one person or, perhaps a few people, acting to precipitate trouble. In general this is also true of the causes of most large environmental problems. The author of Dark Night Early Dawn feels that the collective human actions currently despoiling the environment will lead to a broad physical catharsis (as a karmic act involving all of humankind). He proposes that the survivors of such a global tragedy, knowing the causes of the events, and with the collective ego of the despoilers eliminated, will thus be driven to experience a great awakening.

However, one is minded to ask, as I continually do, if perhaps the idea that there will be survivors to such a catastrophe is not merely wishful thinking. The result of inappropriate environmental response (by humanity considered in the collective) will, on the contrary, very likely be extinction. For it is a fact that most species having inhabited the Earth are actually extinct right now and many major branches of life have withered without issue. Humanity might "pull through", promoted by an enlightened cadre of survivors but equally likely it might not, and on present balance it will not.

In order to justify the overall analysis, the author goes to great lengths to argue that the personal ego-self can be, as it were, eliminated. He says, "as the self dies a deeper form of individuality is liberated", which in itself is fine. He goes on to say "as the isolation of the private mind is consumed the self or ego dies - this is nothing more than the awakening ego of our - ashes - a truer form of individuality etc".

However, to my mind the whole form of one's ego must yet remains as an accessible construct regardless of the way one may choose to become detached from it. With effort, the ego can obviously be suppressed, shelved or transcended but it cannot be destroyed, how could it be otherwise? It can of course be superceeded but it is true that the sense of spiritual-self remains where the ego is suppressed. Subsequently this superceeds and modifies the ego in its development (if one is still in an apparently specific incarnation). One should be careful about the true implications of "eliminating" the ego-self. One remains responsible for what one is and what one has done regardless of forays into higher planes of consciousness. This responsibility is assumed by the "higher-self" even if manipulating one or an infinite number of avatars (threads of self-consciousness).

I agree with Ramakrishna (as quoted in Dark Night Early Dawn) that "The genuinely human body & mind of the avatara is an opaque covering. Beneath this veil there is no individual soul, no eternal facet of the divine, instead there resides the complete divine reality, with infinite facets". Of course the infinite facets shine into the "avatars" and these are responsible for producing the ego as they forget their true origin. As to the purpose of this, I suppose the only answer can be that in this manner the divine reality thus recreates itself into a "higher" more advanced state.

The opening chapter explores the convergence of modern physics with ancient mysticism, and the resulting radical implications for human psychology, thus setting the stage for the rest of the book.

Chapter two, "Dimensions of the Human Psyche: Cartography of Inner Space," describes the stages a person passes through when undergoing a series of low-dose psychedelic therapy sessions; these stages correspond to increasingly deeper layers of the psyche.

During the first few therapy sessions, one relives childhood traumas. Subsequent sessions gradually deepen into a reliving of one's birth, and a confrontation with death. After many such death-rebirth sessions, one experiences the final ego death: a profound psychospiritual annihilation, followed by visions of blinding white supernatural light, with feelings of ecstasy and rebirth. All subsequent psychedelic sessions are transpersonal: embryonic memories, encountering deceased relatives, ESP episodes, etc.

These three levels of the psyche, as revealed by LSD psychotherapy--biographical, death-rebirth, and transpersonal--provide a working model of the psyche.

Chapter three, "The World of Psychotherapy: Towards an Integration of Approaches," describes and critiques about a dozen major schools of psychotherapy from Freud, Adler, and Jung through Maslow and the modern experiential therapies of gestalt, primal scream, and bodywork. Grof feels that each is talking about a different level of the psyche: Freud deals with events occurring since birth, Reich and Rank describe the birth trauma, while Jung and Maslow focus on the transpersonal/spiritual dimension. The author integrates all into a coherent whole: while acknowledging childhood influences, he sees the trauma of birth as primary; he also recognizes the profound healing potential of ecstatic mystical/peak experiences.

Chapter four, "The Architecture of Emotional Disorders," is for me the core of the book. It examines how the birth trauma is the root cause of much psychopathology, from sexual dysfunctions and variations (impotence, sadomasochism, etc.), to extreme violence and aggression (such as serial murders), to neuroses (anxiety, depression, psychosomatic symptoms, and the like), to psychosis. Grof holds out hope of healing for all mental/emotional illness; even with psychosis, he has found that deliberately intensifying symptoms, using experiential or psychedelic therapy, leads to a radical breakthrough and positive resolution.

Chapter five explains why the medical model is ineffective and inappropriate in psychiatry; rather than suppression of symptoms, the author has found that purposefully intensifying symptoms results in spontaneous, autonomous healing.

In chapter six, the various mechanisms of healing are discussed, from abreaction and catharsis, to death-rebirth experiences and reliving fetal traumas, to direct mystical/peak experiences of the divine.

Chapter seven describes hyperventilation therapy as well as other nondrug experiential therapies. It also outlines the basic principles of psychotherapy; Grof Feels that "the psychotherapeutic process is not the treatment of a disease, but an adventure of self-exploration and self-discovery....the client is the main protagonist with full responsibility. The therapist functions as a facilitator" (p. 375).

The book concludes with an epilogue, a fascinating examination of how "in wars and revolutions nations act out a group fantasy of birth" (p. 423), as documented by psychohistorian Lloyd de Mause.

Scattered throughout the book are three dozen or so illustrations, mostly from the author's and others' LSD psychotherapy sessions, which suitably enhance the text and help bring it to life.

This book is not light reading, but to the intellectually curious, motivated layperson or psychotherapist, I believe it will yield its fruits and prove itself well worthwhile.

It has served as a guidebook on my own psychotherapeutic journey (involving legal, safe psychedelic therapy complemented by hyperventilation therapy), helping me understand what I am going through, and letting me know what to expect next; it has also helped me understand other people, including their religious fanaticism, sexual preferences, and even, with several persons, their psychotic symptoms.

In conclusion, if I could have only one book in my library (beyond a dictionary and a Bible), BEYOND THE BRAIN: BIRTH, DEATH, AND TRANSCENDENCE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY would be that book.

Other books by Stanislav Grof which I've enjoyed: THE ADVENTURE OF SELF-DISCOVERY, about the author's form of group hyperventilation therapy (which as therapeutic effects similar to psychedelic therapy); LSD PSYCHOTHERAPY, guidelines for psychedelic therapists; and STORMY SEARCH FOR THE SELF, written by Stanislav with his wife Christina, about difficult spontanious psychospiritual awakenings--such as triggered by mystical, near-death, or UFO experiences, and including Christinas's own kundalini/alcoholism crisis--which are often mis-diagnosed as psychosis, and yet have the potential for radical growth and healing.

I first encountered Stanislav Grof in the late 'seventies at a seminar held in Pacific Grove, California. He was a featured speaker, and to say that I was impressed would be an understatement.

In this book, he speaks of paradigms--the model of reality that scientists work within, accepting certain basic assumptions. He points out that the Newtonian/Cartesian paradigm (a system of thought based on the work of Isaac Newton and Rene Descartes) is still accepted and the orthodox foundation of precepts in use in psychiatry, psychology, anthropology and medicine. He points out that physics has moved on to a new paradigm: relativity and quantum theory and beyond, while the previously named sciences have languished, and opines that it is time for them to re-examine their fundamental belief structure as well.

Grof said, at the seminar, that he was originally--in Czechoslovakia where he originated--a dyed-in-the-wool Freudian, until he began to perceive difficulties with that approach. He grew from there. He was one of the original medical investigators to use
d-lysergic acid diethylamide in serious psychiatric research, from which he derived some astonishing results.

Grof was formerly Chief of Psychiatric Research at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is no lightweight airhead, but rather is a highly qualified, credentialed and credible researcher. This and his other books are well worth your time, if you have the necessary vocabulary and the scientific background to benefit from them.

Grof makes a bold argument that understanding of the perinatal and transpersonal levels changes much of how we view both mental illness and mental health. His research in transpersonal experience evokes serious questions into such areas as reincarnation and the spritual side of the human being.

Joseph H. Pierre [...]

This is a dialogue between three spirits. Inter-resting that it is dialogue, in the true sense, but between three. And so it spreads.

I am only a simple mother waiting to be a grandmother but I can COOK! You bring great food for thought and new recipies for the family of man.

Peter Russell has a new book out available at his site...go there...I did and plan to read it. I consider all these men as Great Chefs and I am following instructions to the Cook.

For actor/director and therapist Paul Rebillot, author of "The Call to Adventure," Campbell's work provides a context that he uses to create a ritual structure designed to bring the archetypal hero story into direct contact with here-and-now experience. Propelled by a period of intense personal crisis in the late '60s when he lost touch with ordinary reality, Rebillot discovered firsthand the demons one must face in the quest for wholeness and integration. He is convinced that it is the lack of meaningful rituals of transition and initiation that creates much of the spiritual emptiness of our acquisitive consumer society. In a world currently dominated by biochemical experts who give Prozac to record numbers of patients as part of an enormous medical bureaucracy, he has turned his fascination with the roots of theater, his training in Gestalt psychology, and 25 years as a group leader at Big Sur's Esalen Institute and in Europe into an experiential process that he calls "The Hero's Journey."

The book itself is a combination of Rebillot's story of his development of the process and clear instructions on how to use it. It has been designed as a guidebook either for an individual ritual of self-discoveryor use with a group. Readers of Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf may remember the Magic Theater visited by its protaganist; Rebillot's connected exercises can take a willing reader into an imaginal place as deep and vivid as that.And it's as much fun as you had as a child at play---though this game is one that's been told and played since the childhood of the human race!

Included are beautiful meditations for centering, grounding, and group-bonding as well as a wealth of insights from an artist and healer who has made transformation into a life's work.

Since we live in a world where most of those around us were born vaginally, it's really helpful to hear a different view. Just becoming aware of this Different Doorway has helped me reframe some of my experiences around boundaries, difficult relationships, my craving for touch, the pain I experience when separating from others, my determination.

If you are non-labor Cesarian born, I think you'll learn alot about yourself through this book. I've also found in talking about the book that a number of my friends are also Cesarian born and they fully understand the issues I've been dealing with.

The typical hyperventilation session begins with physical and emotional tensions surfacing. Continued fast, deep breathing brings intensification of physical and emotional pain until the suffering reaches a climax, followed by sudden release, with subsequent deep relaxation and even bliss. During the termination phase, any residual tensions can be released by massage of the painful area. In addition, when a breather seems helpless and vulnerable, and is clearly regressed to early childhood--perhaps even curled into a fetal position--then supportive mother-like physical contact such as rocking and cuddling can have "truly remarkable" (p. 226) therapeutic results, especially in persons with an emotionally deprived childhood.

In early breathing sessions, most people dramatically relive their birth. Later sessions bring transpersonal experiences such as reliving fetal traumas, and feeling healing streams of Kundalini-like energy flowing through one's body; in everyday life, synchronicities often become more common. There is a definite trend over many breathing sessions from difficult, negative episodes to more positive, healing experiences.

Besides describing the technique of group hyperventilation therapy in detail, the book outlines the healing mechanisms involved. The therapeutic value of reliving childhood traumas, of the death-rebirth process, and of transpersonal experiences, are all explained.

The excerpts from breathwork sessions bring the text to life. For example, one woman's experience: "I stayed with my fear and my tantrum....I resumed the deep breathing....I pushed and strained and yelled. Images of struggling to get out of the womb, out of the crib, out of my confining life situation came to me. After maybe twenty minutes, I was quiet again....I...thanked them for helping me find God again....I had never felt so connected, after feeling so alone in my life" (p. 215).

The two dozen or so illustrations from breathing sessions also round out the picture of what this form of therapy is actually like. For example, one painting is of a person lying staked to the ground while overhead a beautiful swanlike bird takes flight, with the sun shining on the horizon in the background; the caption reads, " a powerful death-rebirth eperience".

For those who wish to try hyperventilation on their own, I recommend patience and persistence; I succeeded only after a couple of dozen tries over a period of several weeks (I simply had not been breathing fast and deep enough). One way I can tell when it's working is I get a buzzing/vibrating sensation in my head after I've been hyperventilating for a couple of minutes. Pursing one's lips into a tiny opening, as if whistling, may be more effective at moving a large volume of air in and out of the lungs more quickly (rather than holding one's mouth wide open). Also, alternating a period of hyperventilation with a period of holding one's breath works well for me (Grof mentions this technique).

I have used hyperventilating alone by myself to reduce stress, as well as to resolve several severe panic attacks over a period of several months about two years ago.

It is worth noting that while hyperventilating alone by oneself does have some therapeutic effects, hyperventilating with a group is "much more powerful" due to the "catalytic energy field" (p. 199) that develops. I tried hyperventilating in a group only once (transportation and cost limited my access to the nearest group), and it was with a non-certified facilitator. While it definitely was more powerful than alone, my experience was a mixed one, and I recommend a Grof-certified "holotropic breathwork" facilitator for best results.

Two other books I recommend: Stanislav Grof's masterpeice BEYOND THE BRAIN; BIRTH, DEATH, AND TRANSCENDENCE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY, presenting the author's radical new view of the human psyche, its disorders, and its potential for growth, based on his seventeen years as a pioneering LSD psychotherapist; and Sandra Ingerman's SOUL RETRIEVAL: MENDING THE FRAGMENTED SELF, a modern shamanic view of finding one's lost "inner child" soul parts, which has helped me understand my own returning-inner-child dreams, and begin to welcome my lost sub-personalities (which split off due to childhood traumas) home again.

Only the most ignorant of commentators could describe any aspect of his work as "bad". His work is not ideological, or even philosophical, in nature. It is existential. He instructs in the use of a technique, and does not even suggest much theory, to participants. My impression is that Zosimos has had very little exposure to the material associated with LSD Psychotherapy, and has virtually no experience with holotropic breathwork. If this is true, then he can only derive the authority of his opinion from reading, and listening to lecturers. He is the classic case of a paradigm bound individual making no effort whatsoever to wrestle with information and facts that cannot be accounted for by his model of reality. Its sad, really. Grof offers some of the most exciting insights to be found anywhere--but you have to be willing to keep an open mind if you have no experience with either LSD in a therapeutic context, or holotropic breathwork, or a close encounter with death.

During the birth of her first child, at one point Christina felt something "snap" inside of her, and powerful electrical-like energies began rushing through her body, while brilliant white fireworks exploded in her head. These and similar symptoms of kundalini-energy arousal plagued her life from that day onward, and eventually she turned to alcohol for relief, resulting after several years in alcohol addiction. When she "hit bottom" with her alcoholism, the sense of total physical, emotional, and spiritual bankruptcy was the internal dying experience or "ego death" (the turning point in many psychospiritual crises) that she needed; from that day on, her kundalini symptoms disappeared and never returned.

As the Grofs began telling others about Christina's stormy spiritual awakening, they discovered that other people had been through similarly difficult periods of psychological instability and growth. However, others' troublesome symptoms had been triggered by a variety of events other than kundalini arousal, ranging from a near-death experience or a mystical experience, to unsought development of psychic powers or spirit guides or channeling or shamanic-initiation illness, to encounters with UFO-related otherwordly visitors, to psychiatrist John Perry's psychosis-like "return to the center" (which the book left me with only a vague understanding of; I wish the authors had explained this condition more clearly and completely). The Grofs also concluded that some addictions (like Christina's alcoholism) can be a sign of a "spiritual emergency" in progress. ("Spiritual emergency" is the authors' term for any period of emotional turbulence and/or mental confusion which is caused by a traumatic experience in a person's life; such conditions always have the potential for healing and growth leading to a higher sanity, deeper stability, and greater wholeness than ever before.)

The Grofs offer practical guidelines for anyone going through a stormy psychospiritual awakening, such as listening to music while expressing your feelings in dancing or other movement, while at the same time singing or chanting or otherwise vocalizing. They also suggest how family and friends can help, such as by remaining nonjudgemental, keeping your sense of humor, offering supportive physical contact like hugs, and trusting the process to eventually resolve itself provided it is simply supported and encouraged.

One way to encourage and support the growth process is simply by breathing more quickly and deeply than usual. During Christina's crisis, the Grofs had discovered that hyperventilation causes symptoms to temporarily intensify, eventually (after an hour or so of fast, deep breathing) to reach a climax, and then to subside for several days or weeks. Repeated hyperventilaton sessions--especially when done in a group with other hyperventilators, which greatly potentiates the process--results in permanent cessation of troublesome symptoms.

Two chapters of this book stand out for me. One is devoted to outlining Stanislav's new map of the psyche, which is based on his experience as an LSD therapist. Nearest the psyche's surface are repressed memories from childhood; deeper within lies the experiential (psychosomatic and emotional) memory of one's birth, as well as one's unconscious fear of death; deepest of all one encounters the spiritual or "transpersonal" dimension of the self, which can mediate contact with the divine during healing transcendent mystical or "peak" experiences. This new view of the subconscious helped me to understand how distressing psychological symptoms are formed, and how they can be cured

Another chapter explores the history of psychological crises, such as aboriginal rites of passage, the ancient Greek "mystery" religions, and the hero's journey in mythology; there is also a section on the teachings of Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism about spiritual growth and enlightenment.

Another noteworthy feature of this book is the clear guidelines the authors provide for distinguishing a psychological growth crisis from psychosis. Since spiritual awakenings are often mis-diagnosed as psychosis, this section should prove quite useful.

STORMY SEARCH FOR THE SELF has reassured me on my own psychotherapeutic journey that I can indeed trust the intrinsic wisdom of the psyche, and the natural unfolding of my path of growth, to lead eventually to wholeness, as I simply support it with hyperventilation and other therapeutic techniques.

Other books I like are Stanislav Grof's BEYOND THE BRAIN, and also his THE ADVENTURE OF SELF-DISCOVERY. I also enjoyed SOUL RETRIEVAL by Sandra Ingerman, Whitley Strieber's COMMUNION, John Mack's PASSPORT TO THE COSMOS, and Betty Eadies's inspiring near-death account EMBRACED BY THE LIGHT, as well as THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF GOPI KRISHNA.

When the couple began sharing with others about Christina's stormy psychospiritual awakening (which began with the birth of her first child as powerful electrical-like energy coursed through her body and brilliant white fireworks exploded in her head), they discovered that many other people had been through similarly difficult, dramatic experiences. Yet instead of kundalini awakening, others had been confronted with a variety of diverse events, from near-death or mystical experiences, to UFO/extraterrestrial encounters, to shamanic opening, to development of psychic powers or channeling or spirit guides; the Grofs also concluded that some cases of alcoholism or other addiction are due to a potentially positive spiritual awakening that is trying to happen; and they describe several additional types of "spiritual emergencies," as they term these sorts of crises.

Although often mis-diagnosed as psychosis, a psychospiritual awakening crisis can be worked through, using techniques such as hyperventilation, resulting in growth and a positive resolution, just as Christina's alcoholism-kundalini crisis resolved when she hit bottom with her alcoholism, helped along by her husband's knowledge from LSD psychotherapy.

For indeed, Stanislav had noticed that his wife's symptoms were similar to what people go through in LSD therapy (in large part reliving birth, and confronting death). He dovotes a chapter to describing the levels of the psyche that he discovered as an LSD therapist (the surface layer of childhood traumatic memories, and deeper in the unconscious the experiential memory of birth, while deepest of all lies the transpersonal or spiritual aspect of the self). With his understanding, and the couple's discovery that hyperventilation can resolve troubling symptoms in a way quite similar to how LSD therapy resolves problems (by reliving birth and facing one's mortality over several dozen intense, dramatic therapy sessions), Christina had reached a new stability, and freedom from her kundalini symptoms which ended her hunger for alcohol to blunt the symptoms.

The authors offer guidelines for distinguishing a psychospiritual awakening from psychosis, which should be helpful for anyone falsely diagnosed as psychotic, or anyone wondering if they are going crazy (which is a not uncommon feeling in a spiritual emergency).

They also offer suggestions for working through one's symptoms and so cooperating with one's growth process, such as singing and dancing and yelling to music; also included are tips for friends and family who want to help, such as trusting the process to eventually resolve itself with encouragement and support.

I have been going through my own psychospiritual journey of awakening for about fifteen years, and I found STORMY SEARCH FOR THE SELF to be quite reassuring and helpful in trusting my own growth process...I recognized some of my own symptoms in the pages of this self-help masterpiece.

I have found STORMY SEARCH... more useful since I have also read other books such as Stanislav Grof's comprehensive distillation of all he learned from his almost two decades as an LSD psychotherapist, BEYOND THE BRAIN: BIRTH, DEATH, AND TRANSCENDENCE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY; THE ADVENTURE OF SELF-DISCOVERY, about the Grof's hyperventilation therapy technique (which I've found useful in resolving several severe panic attacks about a year ago in my own life); Sandra Ingerman's SOUL RETRIEVAL: MENDING THE FRAGMENTED SELF, a modern shamanic view of welcoming home one's lost inner child self which may have split off in childhood due to trauma; THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF GOPI KRISHNA, about his kundalini awakening; Whitley Strieber's and John Mack's books about otherworldly visitors (such as COMMUNION and PASSPORT TO THE COSMOS); LSD PSYCHOTHERAPY, Grof's guidbook for psychedelic therapists; and Betty Eadie's near-death bestseller EMBRACED BY THE LIGHT.