MIND-BLOWING LSD Secrets Revealed – Rebel Spirit Radio

Nick Mather: Welcome to Rebel Spirit Radio, exploring the frontiers of spirituality, consciousness, the esoteric, and humanity's sacred relationship with the living Earth. I'm your host, Nick Mather, and in this episode, I speak with Dr. Chris Bache, author of LSD and the Mind of the Universe, which details his experience of 73 high-dose LSD sessions taken over the span of two decades. In our conversation, Chris discusses reincarnation, its role in human evolution, the creative intelligence of the universe, our current ecological moment, and more. So please join me in a fascinating conversation with Dr. Chris Bache on Rebel Spirit Radio. Dr. Christopher Bache is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Youngstown State University in Ohio, where he taught for 33 years. He's also an adjunct faculty member at the California Institute of Integral Studies, Emeritus Fellow at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, and serves on the Advisory Council of Grof Legacy Training. The heart of Chris's work has been the study of the philosophical implications of non-ordinary states of consciousness, particularly psychedelic states. Chris has written four books: Lifecycles, Dark Night, Early Dawn, The Living Classroom, and his latest work, LSD and the Mind of the Universe. Greetings, Chris, and welcome to Rebel Spirit Radio. I am so very grateful for your time today, and I can't even begin to tell you how much I'm looking forward to this conversation.

Chris Bache: I'm glad to be here.

Nick Mather: Wonderful. So first, I wanted to say that I thoroughly enjoyed your book, LSD in the Mind of the Universe. I found it to be deeply personal, beautifully written, and very engaging. I believe it's necessary. I've read all of your books, and in a way, even though this is your latest, it seems to me to be the first, as the experiences you describe, I think, undergird all of your other work.

Chris Bache: That's correct, yeah. It seems to me it's the source material.

Nick Mather: I wanted to ask, you know, I'm sure that my listeners who are unfamiliar with you and your work, want to know, you know, what led you on this journey? You know, what led you to this journey and why?

Chris Bache: LSD, yeah, quite unexpectedly. I mean, I was raised in the Deep South, in Mississippi. You know, I got a degree in theology from Notre Dame. I mean, I'm the last person you would expect to have written a book on LSD research, and especially a psychedelic autobiography. The background is I had just finished my graduate work at Brown University. I came out as a philosopher of religion, atheistically inclined agnostic, and I had just begun teaching at Youngstown State in Northeast Ohio. I was looking around for where to take my research. I had just begun publishing articles out of my dissertation and came across the work of two people who changed my life. One of them is Ian Stevenson at the University of Virginia and his work on reincarnation, which convinced me, in one reading, that reincarnation was a fact of life—totally new to me at the time. Even more influential was the work of Stanislav Grof. He had just published Realms of the Human Unconscious. This was in 1978, and I was a young academic, 30 years old. I read Stan's work in one reading. He convinced me of the importance of psychedelics for philosophical inquiry, not just psychological inquiry. I became convinced that the most important contributions in my field would come from people writing out of an experiential basis, not simply an intellectual basis. So I had a choice to make, because psychedelics were illegal at this time. I made the choice to begin a private, hidden psychedelic inquiry just with myself, which led to eventually 73 high-dose LSD sessions following Stan Grof protocols as he outlines in his book LSD Psychotherapy. By day, I was a conventional philosopher and philosopher of religion teaching my students, year in, year out, and in my private life, I began a systematic exploration of the deep structure of my consciousness, and by studying my consciousness, studying how the universe manifested itself in these deep states of consciousness. So that's how I got into it.

Nick Mather: I really appreciate that. You know, also coming from a background in religious studies and philosophy myself, it drives me a little bit crazy that it's all theoretical, that there's so little of the practice part of it. I think that sometimes students have a feel for this. You know, they can tell whether someone's had profound religious experiences.

Chris Bache: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I want to mention right up front that I do not recommend that people do what I did. Setting aside the issue of the legality of psychedelics, I don't recommend that people follow the protocol I adopted because I know more now than I did in the beginning. I would recommend a different protocol if I were doing it over again today.

Nick Mather: Yeah, it doesn't read like it was fun. You describe a lot of pain and suffering, which is something I want to get to but, you know, I think that a lot of folks who aren't familiar with psychedelics probably have a false view of them in many ways. There's also a lot of fear centered around psychedelics. Since we're talking about how you had to keep this secret, you describe in the book how that was also painful for you. The illegality, of course, is important, and I think probably there was a question of credibility within the academic community. I know that the landscape seems to be changing somewhat. Oregon has legalized Psilocybin mushrooms, and there is legislation currently moving through California to decriminalize all psychedelics. I'm curious, given this new landscape, have you ever wondered what it would have been like to teach in this environment where these things are more accepted?

Chris Bache: Wouldn't that have been interesting? I did have an opportunity to do some teaching at the California Institute of Integral Studies in the Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness program, but this came rather late in my series. Basically, I did my work between 1979 and 1999, when I was between 30 and 50 years old, and now I'm in my early 70s. I did have an opportunity to teach graduate students this material after Dark Night, Early Dawn came out, but it would be fascinating to be doing this work in the classroom today. There's an upside to having waited as long as I did. I waited 20 years after I'd finished this work to write LSD and the Mind of the Universe. These experiences were extremely difficult to understand. When you work with high doses of LSD, it pushes you into dimensions of reality that go considerably beyond what even appears in much of the mystical literature. The methodology for engaging these deep states is very different than the methodology found in contemplative, meditative, mystical traditions. If I had been teaching while doing this work, I might not have been able to produce as mature a final product. By holding on to it for a long time, pondering and working out a lot of the details, the end result is a more polished, clear presentation of the stages of the journey. My experience involved going through a series of death and rebirth experiences, moving through layer after layer in the universe. Let me say something about the methodology itself, because this is an unfamiliar protocol. If people are familiar with psychedelics, they tend to think of them in a recreational way or therapeutic context. Methodologically, my work was similar to current protocols. I worked completely isolated from the outside world, no contact, with my former wife as my sitter for all my sessions. Working under the care and supervision of a clinical psychologist, isolated, lying on the floor with eyeshades and earphones, listening to carefully selected music designed to pace the stages of a session, I'd write up my session within 24 hours of its completion. It's a very different environment than taking LSD in a social context.

Nick Mather: I'm curious, because you were doing this at a high dose level, would the same methodology apply for lower dosages?

Chris Bache: The same methodology would apply, but the nature of the journey is different with lower doses or gentler psychedelics like Psilocybin or Ayahuasca. Psychedelics amplify and catalyze consciousness, bringing forward things far beyond usual experience. With lower doses, you might work through various psychodynamic levels, moving slowly into deeper levels. With high doses, there's a more powerful, cathartic sense, moving quickly through psychodynamic levels, engaging what Stan calls the perinatal level, and pushing into various levels of transpersonal, spiritual consciousness.

Nick Mather: One more question about methodology—I understand it's helpful to begin a session by stating an intention. You had an intention like, "May this help me serve the common good," but you later wrote that with high doses, the intention didn't seem to matter and you were taken by cosmic intelligence. Is the intention still important in low dose sessions, or does the experience drive itself regardless?

Chris Bache: I think it's a combination of both. The essence of this practice is surrender; once conditions are safe, you surrender to the experience. Lower doses disrupt psychological structure less, so your reasons for the work can influence it more. With high doses, my personal experience was that any intention was quickly shattered, and a larger consciousness guided my journey. Many experiences weren't fully understood until much later, viewing from hindsight. I engaged an intelligence, which I think of as the mind of the universe, a cosmic intelligence.

Nick Mather: I wanted to talk a bit more about this cosmic intelligence. Is this what others might identify as God? Is it beyond God? What else can you say about this? I'm assuming this is the mind of the universe.

Chris Bache: What shall we call it? God involves religious interpretations I'm not comfortable with. I sometimes refer to it as the divine, which is just a step sideways. It might be called the Dao. I think of it as the generative intelligence of the universe, responsible for the Big Bang and unfolding of all time and space. It’s conscious, incredibly large, incredibly old. The size and age of the universe reflect its intelligence. What shall we call this? Classical cultures might call it God, but interpretations of God are constricted by cultural contexts. This consciousness has qualities that echo infinite divinity discussed in mystical traditions, not so much in neighborhood church theology, specifically in contemplative traditions.

Nick Mather: It reminds me of merkabah mysticism, where you can't fully describe God, but you can talk about parts, like Ezekiel's throne, the hem of the robe. But it's just a small portion of a grander vision.

Chris Bache: Yes, I think so. I've spent more ink than most trying to describe these things, and yet I still feel like I'm just talking about the hem of the garment.

Nick Mather: Absolutely. I want to dig deeper into this cosmology, one key element being reincarnation. Like you said, Ian Stevenson's work deeply informed you. I agree; his evidence is unequivocal, although he was cautious as a scientist. Your take on reincarnation seems different from traditional understandings. Could you speak more to that and how reincarnation fits into this cosmology?

Chris Bache: Ian Stevenson and many researchers in past life therapy have produced data that, if unbiased, overwhelmingly supports reincarnation. Our consciousness is older than our body. We are beginners and don't know the physics of reincarnation: what the soul is, how consciousness encodes into a new brain or stays coherent after death. Our early understandings are inadequate, like coming back as an animal, rejected by sophisticated thinkers. Reincarnation is about not repeating the same level. Present life is shaped by multiple past lives, not just the most recent. Life is like a deck of cards; certain past lives are active in shaping current experiences while others are in the background. Upon death, we expand into a larger state of consciousness, the soul, which holds all incarnation experience. Incarnation contracts us into specific bodies and circumstances, expanding at death. Reincarnation is this rhythm of expansion at death and contraction at birth. We learn and challenge ourselves, evolving over time. My primary difference from traditional thinking is that waking up doesn't mean leaving the system for heavenly realms. Instead, we wake up to embody our soul consciousness in this world. The awakened soul, the Diamond Soul, remembers past lives and lives the life gestating from these incremental courses taken over centuries.

Nick Mather: That's beautiful. You describe not escaping into heaven or Nirvana but deepening a sacred presence on Earth. We don't remember our past lives fully, but children sometimes recall aspects, and I've suspected personal connections to past life experiences. Can we work towards bettering our cycle consciously in this life, affecting our rebirth?

Chris Bache: I think so. Traditional spiritual teachings, even without past life recall, emphasize understanding reincarnation and karma’s cycle of cause and effect. Once that understanding is there, it naturally improves choice quality—choices of non-injury, generosity, long-term thinking. Native American tradition emphasizes sacrifices thinking over seven generations; once one understands structures of reality, it's about making informed choices. Dharma, the teachings of what's real, guide us to live in harmony.

Nick Mather: This Native American analogy about thinking of seven generations ahead reminds me that those future generations could be us through reincarnation. How would our behavior change if we truly internalized this?

Chris Bache: In ecological terms, reincarnation means we return to the world we leave behind. If we truly believe we’ll inhabit this Earth in 100 years, we’d take better care of it. Knowing we’d return to society in unpredictable roles might drive a fair, just society benefiting all. Understanding long-term impacts on the ecological systems and distribution of resources might change cultural organization.

Nick Mather: I've thought about environmental actions in terms of karma—future generation impacts. Escaping those consequences seems unlikely. If more accepted reincarnation, how might this shift collective consciousness? Are we evolving towards the larger vision you experienced?

Chris Bache: I think so. I think that while there is a growing appreciation, awareness, and thirst for spiritual truth and encounter, it's not necessarily expressing itself as an increase in religiosity or religious participation. Personally, I think what's happening is that the religions that exist today have largely done the bulk of the work they were charged with doing. Once you understand the breadth of human evolution and how many hundreds of thousands of years we're involved in growing, and growing, and growing, when you look at religions—and they don't last more than a few thousand years—you see that a religion isn't eternally true. It can't be realistic to expect that.

I think a religion helps us evolve, helping a reincarnating humanity go from A to B, then when we reach B, there's so much more to go. It requires new insights, new inspiration, and a new vision to take us from B to C. When we get to C, it'll require another new vision for C to D. I think we're in that phase where the vision that has taken us to here is not sufficient for where we need to go next. I would mention that, all the religions of the world, and I know you're a professor of religion, so you'll appreciate this, make at least two fundamental mistakes. They get women wrong, and relatedly, they get nature wrong.

When you have an "up and out" theology, where the goal is to become spiritually awakened or saved and then leave time and space, you create a gap where the physical world isn't valued as deeply as the spiritual world. We therefore lack an answer to the question: What is the purpose of time-space, the purpose of the physical world? It becomes something to escape from, to get to someplace better. Current religions are wrong about women and the Earth. What we need is a larger vision of reality that includes the best of past insights but expands into a new vision that is truly gender and species balanced, because traditionally, religions have been anthropocentric, valuing humans more than other species. We need a vision that values physicality and the experience of being physical as more than just training for going to heaven.

I think we're at a transition time. The collapse of the old is becoming clearer, but it's not yet clear what the new will look like. It's like we're at the cusp of night and seeing the early layers of dawn, but what comes forward isn't fully visible. It's a very uncomfortable time due to so much uncertainty and things falling apart. We haven't yet formed around a new vision. There's a lot of anxiety, back and forth, push and pull, conflict. We can see this polarization politically, and the Earth is forcing us into a new formation of our values.

Nick Mather: Yeah, absolutely. There's so much I want to say. I was thinking about our current moment, especially with this pandemic. Initially, I thought the pandemic was almost like a final warning shot, a last opportunity to make meaningful changes. I remember when the lockdowns first happened, I was walking one evening. I'm in Pasadena, which is in LA County, and the air was clean. I could breathe. For a while, LA had some of the cleanest air in the nation. There were stories about dolphins returning to the canals in Venice, and wildlife coming into cities. For me, one great thing, even though I was riddled with anxiety, was it was quiet. I could hear nature. In New York, you could hear birdsong again. I thought, this is amazing. Despite the horror, there's potential.

A couple of weeks ago, we had a thunderstorm here. There was a tremendous crack of thunder. Since I grew up in Ohio, I immediately went to my front porch. It wasn't really raining or horribly overcast. I could actually see pollution again, hovering over a nearby freeway, and hear sounds from the freeway, cars, horns, and a siren. I thought, "It's too late. We lost our chance."

We have to go through these experiences, and in your book, it seems like you're suggesting something similar. We have to go through this pain we spend so much time avoiding, but it's a necessary part of initiation into a new form of humanity. Am I getting that right?

Chris Bache: I think we are being initiated. We're kind of jumping ahead, as this is a chapter I deal with towards the end of the book. Basically, I think humanity is being initiated into a new level of consciousness and maturity. We're inheriting the consequences of our egoic history. The ego is a beautiful thing—individual consciousness is extraordinarily beautiful—but it's fundamentally fragmented. It cuts us off from each other. We don't necessarily experience the common ground we share with each other, other life forms, and the physical world itself. We can no longer afford this fragmentation because a world built by ego is divided and fragmented. It divides into haves and have-nots, and we're inheriting centuries of the consequences of a world built by ego. We need to grow up, become less adolescent, and more adult—taking adult-sized responsibility, vision, and commitment.

Yes, there's going to be pain because past choices have accumulated in our social systems, legal systems, economic systems, and our bodies. There's a tremendous detoxification taking place and about to take place—a purification process. We're entering what I think of as a birth process. Birth is hard work, as every woman will tell you. Gestation is a long process, but birth, when the waters break, is a short, cathartic, powerful process. I think the new human, or future human, has been gestating inside us for thousands of incarnations. The Diamond Soul has been developing over centuries, and now it's time for this higher being to be born. Labor is hard work, and we are entering global labor.

Nick Mather: It seems we also have, as you've said, embodied trauma from our past lives and ancestors. We're going through a necessary healing process, and the pain is part of that healing. I'm curious about ancestors—not just past lives but culturally, like the founding fathers. There's a lot of pain and trauma from them we still have to account for.

Chris Bache: Just as we are those future seven generations, we are our ancestors. Our ancestors aren't separate from us. In a reincarnating universe, generations are constantly reborn. The ancestors are part of us. It's easy to oversimplify, but the strains of our ancestors, the learning and qualities, are woven into our present incarnation. We carry not only pain from former lives but also strengths and incredible qualities. Many learn about reincarnation through past life therapy literature, which tends to focus on pain. But I think that's a small percentage of what carries over. Most children pass every year in school, learning well. Most people learn positively from each incarnation, carrying more positive than negative into future lives. There's an accumulation of intelligence built into our bodies: musical, mathematical, social intelligence—the voices of our ancestors alive in us as we become ancestors of our future selves.

Nick Mather: Wonderful. That gets to another point I wanted to discuss—the connection between human evolution and individual reincarnation. You mentioned evolution grows species while reincarnation grows individuals. Could you elaborate on that?

Chris Bache: Reincarnation is the higher octave of evolution. Evolution, scientists say, involves entire species. Somewhere, nature figured out how to evolve individuals within highly developed species. As group evolution progresses, individual evolution is added, evolving consciousness. Individuality emerges within species; choices influence learning. Once that cycle establishes, it influences species' physiology and individuals' psychophysiology. Reincarnation evolves consciousness individually, becoming a higher octave of evolution, involving individuals and consciousness.

Nick Mather: When you spoke, it occurred to me this model avoids the notion of intelligent design as external, suggesting we're actively driving human evolution. Would that be correct?

Chris Bache: I think design is a reaction to the inadequacies of conventional evolutionary theory, trying to bridge gaps with external interference. But evolution and reincarnation are emergent principles. Intelligence manifests within matter, expressing in greater complexity through recognized and subtler mechanisms, arising from within. Evolution arises from within organisms; reincarnation arises within individuals—a self-expressive, self-transformative process.

Nick Mather: Okay, that makes sense. I want to return to some of your experiences, this idea of pain and suffering. You describe an ocean of suffering as both personal and collective. Most religions have something to say about suffering, often centered around ending it. You write that we need to be open to our suffering.

Chris Bache: Let's back up and put this into context. In a therapeutic modality with psychedelics, your system becomes hyper-conscious. When this happens, the system spontaneously cleanses itself, bringing forward parts of your past difficult to deal with—the pain, fears, and such. By confronting these heroically, you resolve things unresolved before, allowing a tremendous relaxation in the system. As you move into deeper realities, facing more profound cycles of purification and deeper layers of dying, you surrender. This liberates consciousness to explore new dimensions.

Initially, this journey involves ego death—the shattering of your time-space identity—liberating you into deeper mind textures. Continuing this invokes more cycles of purification, ultimately leading to deeper explorations beyond individual awareness. You engage unfinished trauma species-wide, dealing with collective suffering. In the ocean of suffering chapter, after ego death, I engaged vast human suffering fields for two years. At first, I saw it as personal transformation, but I concluded it wasn't. It was aimed at transforming the entire human family.

If you're willing to bear humanity's suffering within an expanded awareness, not as Chris Bache but as the species, a transformation registers in both the individual and the human species' awareness. Processing pain heals humanity, much like individual trauma healing. After two years, my experiences didn't return to this level; I operated beyond the collective unconscious, exploring archetypal and causal realities. In these deeper dimensions, you explore life as perceived from the Divine's perspective, where a oneness remains unbroken. You dissolve into this oneness, experiencing reality as an undivided whole.

Eventually, after deeper cycles, I moved beyond causal reality. In the book's first chapter, I discuss the overwhelming amount of suffering detailed. It's not because I'm a sadomasochist. I'd like to avoid suffering as anyone would. However, in this work, suffering initiates transformation. The deepest insights follow purification. You learn to surrender to suffering, contributing to the universe and receiving blessings awaiting on the other side.

Nick Mather: That answers many questions. You mention creation as a choice, and we voluntarily participate with blessings following all this. Is the "Diamonds from Heaven" subtitle the blessing, the gift?

Chris Bache: There are many blessings in this work—insight, transformation, opening—but I use "diamonds from heaven" more specifically. After 15 years and moving through ego deaths and deeper realities, I was catapulted into a dimension of pure, crystalline light. I had experienced light before, but this was diamond consciousness—an ultra-clear quality not metaphorical. Over the last five years, in 26 sessions, within the Diamond Luminosity, I received what I consider the greatest diamonds from heaven—most profound takeaways. In religious literature, the closest concept is Buddhism's Dharmakaya, the clear light of absolute reality. This dimension is what I experienced in the diamond Luminosity.

Nick Mather: Much of your cosmology seems Buddhist, but with differences. Unlike entering Nirvana, you emphasize continuous evolution. Do your experiences confirm Buddhism, or are there any other differences?

Chris Bache: I've been deeply influenced by all world religions, having taught them for decades. While I've learned from Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Native American traditions, Christianity and Buddhism have had the longest-lasting influence on me. My experiences affirm the core truths of Christianity and other world religions, including Buddhism, but also eclipse past religions in many ways. The universe I was initiated into, the opportunities for exploring reality's deep structures, required understanding beyond traditional religious exposures.

Despite affirming core religious insights, these experiences led to a deeper metaphysics beyond individual religions' claims. Every religion claims the uniqueness of its scriptures and teachings, but these experiences suggest that none are truly unique. All are part of a larger dynamic, affirming core insights of interconnectedness and collective well-being. Self-sacrifice is worthwhile for others' good, and the long view is important—orienting toward deep future and consciousness expansiveness. Embracing the deepest inspiration from within, as the Taoists say, aligns us with the Tao. I’m comfortable with world religions yet feel I inhabit a place larger than them.

Nick Mather: I can see that. I've been asking this question about feeling this call to ground everything in spirituality. Where do you turn when many traditions don't seem to fulfill that deep desire right now? I see a kind of eco-spirituality, and I've been thinking about reclaiming paganism. But something you wrote about new archetypes, do you think this new spiritual vision is unfolding now? How do we ground ourselves in this new spiritual experience?

Chris Bache: The movements you mentioned, Neo-paganism and eco-spirituality, are trying to bring nature back into spiritual discourse, something lost in patriarchal religions. They connect us to Earth's wisdom and to the stars. We see this in the resurgence of astrology—not a mechanistic understanding but recognizing the universe has a pulse. If you know how to read that pulse, you can feel your life unfolding in rhythm with the universe. I think there's a lot of dissatisfaction with traditional spirituality. Psychedelics are interesting; they arrived precisely when needed. They're giving highly educated, scientifically informed people experiences that counter the belief that the universe is devoid of consciousness. They show that the universe is intelligent, that our existence results from intelligent action, not random chance. Psychedelics can offer experiences of layers of intelligence, rupturing the idea that life is pointless. They show the universe as a living intelligence we might want to merge with, reanimating interest in deepening our consciousness. This leads to breaking out of old paradigms and exploring new ideas.

Nick Mather: Wonderful. I'm mindful of the time, and I think that's a beautiful place to end.

Nick Mather: You have a website, chrisbache.com. Is that the best place to learn more about you and your work?

Chris Bache: Yes, although it's not quite finished yet. You can also find me on academia.edu, where my most important publications are available under Chris M Bache. My website will soon be complete with all my work available there.

Nick Mather: Great. And your books are widely available. Is there anything upcoming you'd like listeners to know about?

Chris Bache: After being silent about psychedelics for decades, I'm now hosting conversations around "LSD and the Mind of the Universe." These six-week conversations, announced on my website, are for people who've read the book and want to discuss its themes, not just my experiences. I want these to be useful for both psychedelic-initiated individuals and those who haven't used psychedelics but reach similar states through other means. Psychedelics amplify consciousness, and it's consciousness that does the real work. So, I'm open to collaboration and showing up where needed, otherwise, I'm content to relax and grow old.

Nick Mather: Thank you so much for your time. I've thoroughly enjoyed this conversation, and your work has been very profound for me.

Chris Bache: Thank you, Nick. I've really enjoyed talking with you today.

Nick Mather: Thanks, and that's a wrap on episode two of Rebel Spirit Radio. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it a positive review and consider subscribing. For those on YouTube, give this video a thumbs up, subscribe, and hit the notification bell for updates. I'll be releasing episodes every other week for now, aiming for weekly releases in the future. Please consider supporting via Patreon at patreon.com/rebelspirit. Your support makes this podcast possible. Until next time, may you be in peace and flourish in all possible ways.