Thanks to the Daily Grail for turning me on to this article by (my new favorite author name) Zeus Tipado:
Your Brain on Psychedelics Might Look the Same as Your Brain on Religious Mysticism
Zeus (can’t resist using his first name) describes neurospirituality as “the brain mechanisms behind spirituality and religion” and since the article appeared in the psychedelically aligned Double Blind website, he examines the role of psychedelics in this area of study.
“Spirituality is defined as the belief or acceptance that certain actions and events within an otherwise rational reality are the result of forces that are impossible to explain with objective reasoning. Another definition of spirituality involves the idea that existence is linked to a purpose that’s usually defined in a reality outside our physical universe. Neurospirituality, on the other hand, is the study of the neurological mechanisms of spirituality within an individual. It’s not my idea, it belongs to Michael Ferguson at Harvard Divinity School.”
It was Ferguson who first sought to “objectively measure spirituality” by conducting brain scans of Mormon subjects while praying in 2018. This article relates other researchers using brain scans such as FMRI technology and neuroimaging to track blood flow in the brains of users on psychedelic drugs. Zeus sees this as the first step to measuring “psychedelically induced spirituality.”
I regularly find myself perusing data on psychedelics, while promoting Past Life Journeying as a non-drug related spiritual technology, because of writers like Zeus Tipado who are exploring this interface between spirituality and the psychedelic experience. I recognize that accessing Future lives and the Non-Physical Experience Between lives might have more in common with a psychedelic trip than most explorations of Past lives. My work aligns perfectly with the psychedelic community in one crucial area that is the starting point of my next book:
We need to get comfortable with the realization that reality is much weirder than we’ve yet had to consider.
Neurospirituality is a starting point for what Zeus refers to as “slowly chipping away at this enigma that’s trapped inside all of our heads.”