Groundbreaking Psilocybin Documentary Unravels New Perspectives On Life & Death

"Could psilocybin hold the key to understanding our life and death, and relationship to both? The growing numbers of people that have experienced these compounds profess this - and much more."  PRNewswire

PRNewswire has announced the release of the new documentary A New Understanding: The Science of Psilocybin. The full documentary is no longer available from YouTube. However, the video can be rented or purchased from this website.

On a personal note, I do not make any money from this website and have spent many thousands of dollars on travel, books, and articles as well as time to read and digest information to post.  This is not my profession and I do not get any tax breaks. When you watch your daughter struggle with cancer for 3 years before passing, you come to realize it is not about the money. There is an important message here and it is a shame to have someone put a monetary value on it. When you attempt to turn spiritually into a business it dissipates.

Most cancer patient already face a huge financial burden so lets give them a break.

The documentary profiles two cancer patients, both now deceased, who had experienced profound benefit from participating in the psilocybin trials being conducted at Johns Hopkins, UCLA and NYU.  A 'normal' volunteer from the 2006 Johns Hopkins psilocybin study is also profiled as well as some of the psilocybin researchers from Hopkins, NYU, UCLA, Purdue, and the Imperial College of London.

"Putting words to it cheapens the experience". These words were spoken by Matt Meza as he was trying to explains his psilocybin experience as part of a cancer patient trial.  Those words sum up the documentary for me.  It is obvious the volunteers have gone through a life changing experience, one of a spiritual nature, not an intellectual one, so it can not be described in words.  Spiritual experience tend to evade verbal descriptions.  An excellent book that echos these sentiments is Swami Satchadananda's Beyond Words, a classic by a Spiritual Teacher espousing ageless wisdom.

Considering the very positive effect psilocybin appeared to have on the 'normal' volunteer's marriage, there is a distinct possibility that psilocybin may be very effective as an adjunct to couples therapy.  Of course this is just an N of 1, but still....

An earlier post provides a link to a panel discussion that occurred following the initial screening (14 April 2015) of the documentary 'A new understanding: the science of psilocybin'.  The panel primarily consisted of the same psilocybin researchers in the documentary.

Coming to the conclusion that psilocybin would be as effective for PTSD as it is for patients with a life threatening diagnosis is logical since both deal with a profound existential crisis.  Since the etiologies are similar, effective treatments may share the same similarity.

Overall, I recommend this documentary for anyone who may be experiencing a life threatening illness or for anyone who may someday be facing an imminent death or even a non-imminent death.  Too bad it's not freely available as those experiencing life threatening existential crisis do not need yet another obstacle to overcome.