“Altered states of consciousness” sounds like something from a cheesy 80’s sci-fi movie or a trip down the rabbit hole of Alice in Wonderland.
But each and every day you and I enter into altered states of consciousness.
Whenever you get transfixed by a screen (aka. your phone or the TV) and dream at night, you enter into an altered state of consciousness.
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However, at some point in life, most of us have a bizarre – or even frightening – experience that we can’t quite explain.
Sometimes, these strange experiences are actually blissful and ecstatic. And other times, these odd undergoings are a mixture of both joy and pain.
Have you ever gone through something that blew your mind and temporarily shattered your reality, but you’ve never really understood why it happened or what it meant?
What you’ve likely experienced was, in the words of mythologist Joseph Campbell, a “Call to Adventure” or call to walk your one and true life path and find the meaning of life.
Table of contents
- What is an Altered State of Consciousness?
- Types of Altered States of Consciousness
- Causes of Altered States of Consciousness
- 15 Signs You’ve Had an Altered State of Consciousness
- Why Do We Experience Altered States?
- Altered States of Consciousness as a Path of Soul Initiation
- Why Are Altered States Sometimes Terrifying?
- How Do I Make the Most of My Altered State Experience?
- Takeaway
What is an Altered State of Consciousness?
Altered states of consciousness (ASC), also known as a non-ordinary state of being, occurs when we temporarily access a state of mind that isn’t usually available to us. Altered states can be either deliberately stimulated or may occur randomly and without warning.
Types of Altered States of Consciousness
There are a number of different types of altered states of consciousness out there. Some examples include:
- Drug-induced hallucinogenic or psychedelic states
- Hypnotic states
- Meditative states
- Out-of-body experiences (OBE)
- Alien abductions
- Shamanic trances
- Yogic states (e.g., Siddhis)
- Lucid dreaming
- Psychosis (mental illness)
- Mystical experiences
Causes of Altered States of Consciousness
An encounter with unfathomable beauty, terminal illness, or any extreme of human experience might induce a sudden shift in consciousness, a sacred knowing. But perhaps more commonly, states of non-ordinary perception are first entered with practice— meditation, prayer, chant, trance dance—or perhaps with a sacramental entheogen such as peyote, psilocybin mushrooms, or ayahuasca.
— Joanna Macy
Altered states of consciousness can be produced by:
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- Trauma (mental, emotional, physical)
- Sensory deprivation (e.g., float tanks)
- Impaired sleep
- Fasting
- Breathwork (e.g., holotropic)
- Prayer
- Astral projection
- Entheogenic drugs (e.g., LSD, Mescaline, Ayahuasca, etc.)
- Near-death experiences
- Hypnosis and trance states
- Deep states of meditation
- Ego death
- Kundalini awakening
- Shamanic or spiritual healing
This list isn’t exhaustive, but these causes may give you an idea of what triggered your own altered state of consciousness.
15 Signs You’ve Had an Altered State of Consciousness
As defined by psychologist and shamanic teacher Christa Mackinnon, there are a number of different signs that you’ve experienced an altered state of consciousness.
How many of these signs can you relate to?
- Time distortion (time slows down or speeds up)
- Altered sense of body (you may feel disconnected from your body or hyper-tuned into different parts of it)
- Increased focus or narrowed perception (you are hyper-aware of some part of your reality or experience)
- Visionary experiences (symbols and imagery, often of an archetypal nature, come to mind)
- Reduced internal dialogue (i.e., the ‘monkey mind’ or inner narrator turns off)
- Amnesia or hypermnesia (that is, memory loss, or conversely, detailed recollection and remembering of past events)
- Suggestibility (an increase in being open to suggestions)
- Catalepsy (muscle stiffness and fixed posture)
- Age regression or progression (accessing past self or creation of future self)
- Analgesia or anaesthesia (reduced feeling in body, i.e., numbness)
- Intense relaxation or activation (i.e., feeling extremely calm or extremely afraid)
- Dissociation (feeling disconnected from one’s thoughts, feelings, and sense of self)
Other signs that I’m adding to this list include:
- Ability to access deeper insight (epiphanies, revelations)
- Access to flow states (i.e.,”being in the zone,” intense attunement to the present moment)
- Big picture perspective (i.e., ability to make new connections and see from a “bird’s eye view”)
Do you need to have experienced all of these signs to have undergone an altered state of consciousness experience? No. Some of these signs may apply to you, and some won’t. That’s normal and okay.
This list is also not exhaustive, so keep that in mind.
Why Do We Experience Altered States?
Now that you have an expanded understanding of altered states of consciousness, you might be wondering “WHY?”
Why go through such an experience? What’s the purpose? What’s the point?
There are various explanations out there ranging from depressing to mediocre to cosmically “wow!”
For instance, many traditionally-trained psychologists and psychiatrists would assign many types of altered states of consciousness to merely being a form of pathology – a mental illness.
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Others explain altered states as neurological misfirings of synapses or chemical imbalances in the brain.
And still, others believe that altered states of consciousness are always and only ever signs that you’ve “entered alternate universes,” “upgraded your DNA,” “cleansed your etheric energy field,” and other such new age explanations.
My stance is that there’s no black or white explanation. Yes, some altered states may be due to trauma and mental illness, and others may be neurological impairments. Perhaps it is possible to communicate with aliens or enter alternate universes.
But overall, it’s my conviction that altered states of consciousness are meaningful and often pivotal points in a person’s life. They possess deep value and are ripe with insight and the possibility for personal transformation. Often, such non-ordinary states set in motion a necessary existential crisis.
In this way, I believe that many altered states are “calls to adventure” to take a closer look at our lives, work through our inner wounds, and reconnect with our souls.
At the core of altered states of consciousness is a move to be more Soul-centered.
Altered States of Consciousness as a Path of Soul Initiation
Most altered states of consciousness throughout history can be found in a religious or spiritual context.
Whether it is the trance-inducing Sufi dancing, the chanting of Hindus, the deep prayer of Christians, the meditative practices of Buddhists, or the sacramental ingestion of entheogens like peyote in Native American ceremonies, altered states have always been valued as sacred.
There are three main reasons why altered states of consciousness have been seen throughout the centuries as sacred:
- They shift us out of the small and narrow ego-self into the big and expansive Core Self.
- They enable us access to deep self-understanding and consequent self-transformation.
- They empower us to spiritually evolve.
In the words of depth psychologist Bill Plotkin,
… a conversation with soul is not likely within the defended confines of ordinary consciousness. The conscious self must look at its own psyche from a different perspective, from a unique angle, from a position of altered awareness, like viewing earth from outer space, or returning home after a month in an exotic culture. Most soul-encounter practices induce liminal states of temporary ego dissolution that release us from the usual rules and norms of our personality and culture, opening the way to fresh observations and creative adventures.
Altered states gift us with the ability to temporarily exit the straightjacket of the constricted and conditioned self and access a higher (or deeper) vantage point.
We all have an animating spark of life, a core essence, an authentic Self – and for those of us who are lost and don’t know how to find that inner Center anymore, altered states are the pathway to illumination.
In fact, I’d go so far as to say, in many cases, that the Soul drives us toward or even triggers altered states of consciousness to beckon us “back home” via soul searching – back to our true path.
Why Are Altered States Sometimes Terrifying?
If altered states are so positive and are signs of spiritual awakening, why are they sometimes horrific – even terrifying?
My answer is that altered states are sometimes frightening because they can bring us face-to-face with our mortality, biggest wounds, and greatest fears.
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Sometimes altered states are the product of, or produce themselves, trauma. A PTSD veteran, for instance, may enter an altered state whenever they hear a gunshot on TV. A schizophrenic person may enter a period of psychosis, which is an altered state.
Some altered states, it seems, are the result of a traumatized self (or ego) trying to piece itself back together.
Another reason why altered states may be terrifying – this time in those who are otherwise mentally sound – is that the ego doesn’t feel prepared to access higher realms of consciousness (as can be seen amongst those who have blissful mystical Oneness experiences and the like).
If you’ve ever observed (or been one of those) people who have taken an entheogenic drug, you’ll notice that one’s mental state is everything.
Those who are in a state of fear, mistrust, and resistance to life often end up having “bad trips.” Whereas those who let go, trust, and allow the ego-self to subside, end up having joyous and euphoric experiences.
In essence, one’s mental state is everything when it comes to altered states of consciousness.
How Do I Make the Most of My Altered State Experience?
Going into an altered state is nothing weird. You do it all the time. The question is whether you use the altered state to produce change, and if so, how are you going to use it?
– Richard Bandler
We go into altered states of consciousness every day, but there are some altered states that can’t be ignored. They must be integrated – or transferred into your life in a meaningful way. Without integration, such profound experiences will miss out on unveiling their innate, precious, and rare powers.
Here are some simple ways you can make the most of your altered state of consciousness experience:
- Journal about it. Ask yourself the following questions: “What was the experience like and what may have triggered it?” “What part of the experience stood out the most to me?” “What might the deeper meaning of this experience be?”
- Draw it. Drawing engages the right hemisphere of your brain and engages a more subconscious, creative, and emotion-centered form of wisdom. Draw the experience (and don’t think too much about it!). You may choose to create a scene-by-scene image, or one single image that summarizes the whole experience. Reflect on it afterward. What words, images, or realizations come to mind?
- Find a practical application. Having a non-ordinary state of consciousness is all fine and dandy. But the true value in that experience is how it translates into your daily life and lived experience. In other words, what practical changes can you make? How can you use your experience to help others, achieve your dreams, or walk a path that feels true to you? Be pragmatic and ground your experience in reality.
Other helpful resources you can explore include the following free guides:
- How to Find Yourself When You’re Lost in Life (9 Steps)
- 11 Ways to Be True to Yourself (When You’re Scared)
Takeaway
Altered states of consciousness can feel cosmic, horrific, eerie, otherworldly, hyper-real, or peaceful depending on your state of mind and ego receptivity.
But regardless of what triggered them, such intense experiences are powerful forms of Soul initiation – they can be seen as invitations from your deeper Self to awaken and evolve.
When approached consciously, altered states can be used to reorient you to your true calling in life. They can break you out of the fog of lethargy, self-centredness, narrow-mindedness, and sleep-walking that the ego-self is prone to falling into.
As sage and psychoanalyst Carl Jung commented about altered states, “the sacred makes claims on you.” In other words, altered states of consciousness are often experienced without us choosing them.
And sure, while being thrown into the stratosphere of non-ordinary consciousness may be totally scary and confusing, it also plays the role of humbling us – it helps us to see that Life is so much larger than us. Existence is so Mysterious. And consequently, a sense of sacredness can re-enter our domesticated lives.
We can reconnect with our Souls.
Tell me, what kind of altered states of consciousness experience have you had? I’d love to hear about your unique experience below in the comments!
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I had been attempting to be lucid in my dreams when one night I became lucid while dreaming about being in an old musty castle hallway without windows. Once I was lucid I tried to determine what made a dream feel like a dream and what made it different from waking reality. I touched the walls, They were solid and wet. I saw footprints in the muddy floor beneath my feet. I thought, well, I am giving it my attention, thus making it seem ‘real’. So I start3d walking down the hall. Arms swinging I was getting into a good pace, with nothing changing as I walked. Nothing on my peripheral vision. Everything appeared solid. Suddenly, up ahead a character from my dream appeared and my consciousness got pulled back into the dream. When I woke in the morning I had no memory of the dream….until I started walking to work. I hit the same stride I did in the dream with arms swinging, when I remembered the dream. Suddenly everything around me changed. I no longer saw solid objects, instead I saw points of light blinking into and out of existence. They formed holographic images of the things I knew to be in front of me. I had stopped walking and looked all around me. All of it appear holographic with pin points of light pulsing. I swept my eyes slowly from left to right and along the ground to my feet, where suddenly instead of a sidewalk I saw the dark expanse of the Universe beneath me. Only my body was solid. Then as mysteriously as it appeared it was gone.
I have never done drugs. I only know what I experienced in my waking state was what I expected to happen in my lucid dream state.
You can actually look up a lot of interesting information and studies on altered states of consciousness if you look. You can search up on this information online with these recommended terms/phrases if you want. 1. Science of altered states of consciousness 2. Psychology of altered states of consciousness 3. Brain of altered states of consciousness in neuroscience 4. Types of altered states of consciousness 5. Altered states of consciousness examples. 6. Altered states of consciousness books 7. States of consciousness in psychology 8. Brains of monks in meditation in neuroscience 9. Brains of people having a religious experience in neuroscience 10. Brain of people having a spiritual experience in neuroscience.
I loved a man who didn’t love me back, ended up broken hearted and made a big mistake 2 weeks after. I ended up talking to someone I shouldn’t have and was attacked by them when I asked for a friend. My spirit went out of my body but eventually comforted me when I needed her. It took a long time for my spirit to fuse back into my body with all the self development work I did on myself.
For me it has been from the “ket hole” when I was an experimentimg I have experienced it many times but never knew what it was and just thought it was just what the drug does? Years later I had lost my self to depression during Covid lockdowns and I pushed away my family and lost everyone around me. I tried to deal with this feeling of been empty by filling my life with alcohol, cocaine and women. I remembered one night the good feeling of the ket hole but this time it was dark and scary not empowering and sense of been on top of the world like a giant like when I was younger then one night my depression turned to suicidal thoughts. I’d had enough I thought the only way was death. So I got myself mortally drunk and sniffed a strong mix of cocaine and ketamine I had dragged the bbq into the living room and awaited the sleep I’d never wake up from. I was laid there for hours room filled with charcoal smoke, until I went into the hole.I could feel my heart pounding so hard and I was spinning around a huge temple like building with rows and rows of columns for miles but this Time the darkness was bright and remember repeating to my self please let me die, why can’t i leave my physical body as along I could only physically feel my heart beating so hard! Then boom it went bright white. I could only see light but something was there standing in my way and it didn’t say anything but I knew it was saying “no not yet” then I felt a push that sent me flying through an empty white void until my eyes opened and I was back in my body. Next I remember thinking ok I don’t wanna die and I rang the emergency services to help me but I couldn’t physically say a word and they just tutted and put phone down on me. I crawled out of the room and slowly got my Speech back but for some reason I developed an Irish accent which eventually went back to yorkshire but I laid on my bed trying to understand what just happened and begged for some change in fortune or help for a better life but then this changed to youve survived for a reason and it took me 4 weeks to understand what it was. My sleep was very poor as i was still doing cocaine but every night I would look at the time and 3 days on trot when I looked it was 3:33am. I didn’t know at this point what that meant but I knew I meant something. Then one night I was on tic tok and a video of a man explaining our body’s are a vessel etc and that stuck with me for days. So here I am on this site getting the answers and realizing the truth and now I’m overcome with the joyful feelings of having my eyes opened. I know I have a long way to go and lot more to understand but now I know where the answers lie. Thank you for the guidance.
It all started with a strong vibrating in my bottom one night in bed, which we thought was MS. Then I was sitting in my porch and closed my eyes and in my vision I saw a clump of dirt being thrown into my face. Then I started getting this low buzzing in my right ear. When I work on gratitude, meditations, raising my vibration it gets louder. When I am depressed and doubting spirituality it becomes a quiet buzz, only able to hear it in complete silence. Slowly, I realized I was going through a spiritual awakening.
Another night I woke up in my bed 30 minutes after falling asleep. I remember my curtains of my window being blown up like I had flown under them, slammed into my bed. I got up to use the bathroom and came back to bed to fall asleep. Then I felt this incredible spinning in my chest that shook me. I was so frightened and full of energy that I couldn’t go back to sleep for hours. After that night I started having visions and conversations with loved ones that had passed.
Then one morning in September of last year I woke up and my eyesight had changed. Almost like I’m not a part of my body anymore, hard to explain. After that I began feeling everything in my body intensely. When I speak of the truth, goosebumps to me are heightened to a complete vibration throughout my body. When I speak to my angels or any higher being, I get the vibration’s intensified throughout my body.
I have been to every dr, had every test done, and they all come back normal. This has been the most terrifying and beautiful experience for me. I have embraced it and I’ve denied it. My visions have gone away, not completely but not as strong as they were. I’m trying to again find myself grateful for this rare opportunity to open my senses. I was told by a few mediums that I have every one of the Clair’s and that I am connected to energy, which explains when I was very Ill I was affected by all electricity (something I can go into deeper if anyone wants to know).
That sounds so so similar to what I had experienced and also still experiencing. A certain melody or song has always lifted me up and gave me goosebumps but since the blurred vision, ear buzzing and connections with the spiritual, my emotions have been heightened to no other. I’m wondering if you have any advice on what has worked for you in either tapping into those abilities or better managing them. If my chakras aren’t fully aligned, I can feel so deeply like a pocket of trapped energy and it needs to be massaged out. Those pockets have run mostly on the upper back of my spine. Also, I have had some wild visions and can tell when I’ll have them when I wake up with a bump on the top of my neck. heh let me know if that sounds familiar. Thanks :)
Hello, I have tried magical mushrooms 2 times in 2020. 1st time I got sick and I was feeling panicky and crying while my heart was racing, my mental was all over the place! I Seen the walls breathing swirling with the colors green & yellow all I can do is pray and deal with it until it wore off after 5hrs of suffering.
My 2nd time was “BEAUTIFUL” i did the right steps this time lol! I burned my palo santo, set my intention, played some frequency music and grabbed my Celestine crystal. I cried in the beginning seen the walls breathing and swirling green & yellow I was laying on my back closed my eyes and the magic began! I seen a red X then a magenta pink spiderweb, started spinning around clockwise then the flower of life started spinning then I heard a voice say look to the right it was a lotus flower blooming WOW JUST BEAUTIFUL! Then the voice said look to the left there was a woman dancing I tried to see her head but there was no head to see. Then she faded and 2 cat ears appeared then I seen 2 pleasant eye ball blinking, I got freaked out a little because they were looking at me lol! So I open my 2 physical eyes and those blinking eye balls was still there now they are on my wall! That same voice said look up now i see 2 more eye balls looking at me on my ceiling I was getting kinda nervous now lol! The eye balls faded away and now I see a head with an eye wide open on the forehead staring at me with a round pointy shaped hat. It stayed on my ceiling for a little longer so I was looking at it trying to figure out what it was I thought it was a elf or gnome but was wrong. So I had lots of research to do so pretty much everything I seen is sacred we are all connected and that dancing lady was Goddess Parvati and the head I saw belongs to her she has an eye on her forehead and wears that shaped hat plus she dances. She’s connected to the heart chakra that’s why everything I saw was pink. She’s my 1st goddess I worked with she has cracked my heart wide open! After working with her I received Durga Maa energies she is Parvati’s alter ego. WOW WHAT AN EXPERIENCE!
Thank you for all of your information I’m learning new things.
I have experienced using DMT roughly 4 times. 3 out of the 4 we’re all the same. I merely got high but didn’t break through. I saw colors and symbols everywhere including on my friends face. It was so cool though because every sense in intensely experiencing the high also. However 1 of those times wasn’t so good for me. I guess after consuming it my friend says I was hunched over and appeared to be crying. He went to comfort me and says I started screaming at the top of my lungs. Went back to same stance and again he went to comfort me and I screamed like before. I however have no recollection of anything. I wish I did and hope one day to find out. I want to know what I saw that scared me so bad. He thought I was lying at first when I said I didn’t remember anything but then realized I was being honest. Hopefully within the next month I’ll be able to try that again, this time hopefully to confront whatever messed me up that time.
I have done 7 psilocybin journeys thus far. My cousin did it ONCE, she had an ego death and she says that 3 beautiful elderly ladies came down and healed her ulcer. I haven’t experienced any of that :-(.
The first one i did at a sanctuary with the lady who runs the practice present. I cried for at least 3 hours of the trip in the bathroom and i saw a lot of things that i could make sense of. Since doing it at home on my own i haven’t really been able to piece anything together, and cried with all of them except one. I went through a seriously dark period of intense panic attacks, tingling throughout the body, anger, sadness, which frustrated me so much as i was expecting my life to have changed for the better by now. I haven’t given up yet and will hopefully get the ego death, connect with Spirit guides & higher self and experience a spiritual awakening that i’ve been hoping for as well as find my true path.
Through the dark patch for about a month or two in the beginning i asked the lady who does the journeys for some kind of guidance and was told “because you aren’t doing the work or listening to Spirit”. What work??? I don’t understand Spirit language and what they are trying to tell me!! So i ended up frantically searching on the internet and came across your site. The spiritual emergency article helped me IMMENSELY from doing any self harm and has renewed the hope i had before beginning my journeys. I have also bought the self love journal and printed a lot of articles. Once that is done i will move on to the next etc. Thank you for all you do!
Hi Lauren,
I remember my psilocybin days fondly :-) But I want to offer some advice: please be gentle with yourself. Plant medicine teachers can do some serious disruption to the psyche, and it’s imporant to slow down and make sure you integrate what you find. I’d recommend only 1-3 experiences per year with an experienced guide or sitter if you plan to keep doing them. “Doing the work” is about learning to integrate the experience by reflecting on it, meditating on it, journaling about it, and making active changes in your life.
If you keep trying to search for the next high, the next thrill, the next spiritual accomplishment (in the form of an ego death, which by the way isn’t always a pleasant experience), you will miss the whole point of this. So try to be aware of the frantic doing-mentality and slow down. It will help a lot ♡
Many years ago I lay on my back in bed before going to sleep when I felt a horrendous downward pressure on my chest. It wasn’t painful, but it was very heavy pressure. I saw flashes of lightening-like sparks in front of me and I thought that I was having a heart attack. It was a bit frightening at first, but despite the pressure across my chest, I could still breathe okay so I realised I wasn’t in danger. After a few minutes, the pressure dissipated and I’ve never had the experience again.
I’ve no idea why it happened and was wide awake, so it wasn’t a dream. Strange things happen don’t they?