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COFFEEHOUSE CULTURE -- Issue 2

Come a day and 1967 will be recognised as the pivotal point in world history it is revealing itself to be. While the real meaning of what happened in 1967 is only now coming to light, everyone has been effected by the events that took place in that year. Their influence has reverberated through society producing a range of subtle but important changes in attitude that have, to a large extent, defined the closing years of the millennium.
.....But, although the events of ‘67 continue to exert a major influence over society, there have been no dramatic changes, no great steps forward, no revolutions. That is, no overt revolutions. For, what took place in 1967, was not much less than a revolution even though it did not involve weapons. Indeed, in some ways it was more of a revolution than is armed insurrection.
.....Despite the commonly accepted meaning, ‘revolution’ is more about evolution than anything else. A glance at the word itself confirms our point. And evolution? Well, evolution and consciousness go hand in hand. All of which brings us back to 1967 and the major change in consciousness that took place over those few summer months. When, in a flash of white light, we glimpsed in the boundless landscape of our own consciousness the hidden world that underwrites the whole of external reality, we were making a statement on a number of levels. In the mere act of experiencing an expanded inner vision we were restoring man’s subtle link with the Cosmos as whole, reaffirming his right to increased consciousness and realigning the world-view that had been imposed upon him by the scientific establishment. Statements, however, do not mean much without some kind of attendant validatory experience to make them come alive.
.....So it was with the silent revolution of 1967.
.....Those who participated in ‘67 had that validatory experience and so powerful was it that in many cases it lit up their lives. But they were only a few.
.....Consciousness, however, is not contained or confined. It exists in everyone (and, for that matter, in everything) and as such, to some extent, is shared by everyone. It is not so surprising, therefore, that the essence of those experiences not only entered collective consciousness but became a well-integrated part of it. The process that accompanied this integration was so subtle and subliminal that it is difficult now to see how or when it happened. But happen it did. Suddenly it was just there.
.....It was an ineffable ‘something’ but it changed our attitudes. In a big way.
.....In the aftermath of ‘67, the Western world would rediscover an interest in spiritual matters. It would apply new standards of freedom and acceptance in sexual matters. It would start to return to a less exploitative view of the world. It would turn away from allopathic medicine and look again at unorthodox health systems. It would have a new regard for individual and collective freedoms. Indeed, in broad terms, it would see the world in a different way to the way in which it had seen it before that fateful year.
.....This has been and still is our heritage from the 60s.
.....But there is something more. Something that is even more important, more significant, more influential. But, alas, it is something that is even harder to put words around. Since ‘67, it is as if life has taken on a new dimension — the dimension of mind expansion. When the hippies broke down the gates of the prison in which our minds had been confined they opened a portal through which so many have since passed. The hippies’ experience of inner freedom, their vision of inner landscapes, their appreciation of the subtle level of existence have been shared by so many people.
.....The effects of this are manip-fold. The most obvious one is the Western world’s preoccuation with drugs and drug use since the 60s. Less obvious is the general freeing up of attitudes. Once again, phenomena do not come much subtler than this. How can we describe it? There has been a broadening of vision, a relaxation of preconceptions, a freshness of approach. But it has been subtle. So subtle that it is only now, when it is producing its first fruit, that we can even be sure it happened.
.....It is a new vision that takes in our psychedelic past in a way that would have been impossible pre-1967. And, what is more, it is a vision and a subject that accords with the vision and interests of a broad section of the public.
.....One reflection of this new vision is the recent book by Paul Devereux, ‘The Long Trip: A Prehistory of Psychedelia’. A child of the 60s, Mr Devereux was amongst those adventurers in consciousness who had that crucial experience, reached the only conclusions possible and carried them through. He is yet another individual (in addition to the writer and untold others), whose lives were irrevocably changed by the events of ‘67. As the potted biography at the front of the book says: ‘For over twenty-five years Paul Devereux has pursued his twin passions: the study of ancient sites and the study of consciousness .’ We hope that means what we think it means.
.....Offering the profoundly moving experiences during his first trip as the basis for his studies (see 'Visions of Infinity,' next page) Paul Devereux combines ‘his twin passions’ to interesting and original effect. Cataloguing the symbols that define the hallucinogenic experience and tracing them into the very roots of human life on earth, he reveals a cultural existence that is clearly based on psychedelics. Although he does not ignore the well-researched and documented psychedelic cultures of the Middle and Far East and Central Americas, his interests and researches have been concentrated closer to home.
.....The influence of Serbian shamanism on American cultures is well-known. What is less known is that the same influences are evident in pre-Celtic arts and artefacts. Drawing his examples from earth works in Brittany and early Neolithic pottery from Great Britain, Paul Devereux plots the progress across Europe of Mycenean and Minoan (early Greek, to us ordinary folk) influences. Taking such Neolithic tomb artefacts as braziers as indications of opium and cannabis use that goes back to halfway through the fifth millennium BC, he ties in dramatic cultural and artistic changes that took place at that time and relates these to the sudden appearance of chambered mound tombs and the decorations they bear.
.....With a strong hypothesis based on extensive archaeological research — both his own and that of others — and drawing on the fullest range of sociological and scientific research studies, Paul Devereux presents a view that expands existing knowledge regarding the persuasiveness of psychedelic influences on culture. We are all, it seems, whether we like it or not, children of the psychedelic experience. And, for some of us, it is a huge relief that there is at last some recognition of what we already knew.
.....If Paul Devereux’s hypothesis is a bold one, let us try to top it.
.....We can, of course, never do so. We have neither his academic credentials nor can we offer a vast body of historical evidence, such as he provides, to support our case. The best we can offer is surmise, supposition and conjecture. And presumption. We have plenty of that.
.....Our outrageous proposal is that the hallucinogenic experience is not only at the roots of civilisation, it is responsible for that civilisation. What we are actually suggesting is that the hallucinogenic experience is the link between the primate-based image of pre-man and the civilised version. Such a view is, of course, in total opposition to any held by historians, theologians or anyone else who might have an opinion. It is not, however, beyond all possibility.
.....In support of our hypothesis, let us consider and compare in simplistic terms the nature of the human mind. One of the things that distinguishes human beings from all other thinking creatures is a sense of individual uniqueness and identity. This sense of being an entity that is largely separate from nature. Linked with a highly-developed brain structure, a high level of intelligence and communication ability, this ‘separate entity’ view provides the basis for what has been traditionally seen as the determining factor that distinguishes man from the other creatures of the earth — self-determination. They also, almost, provide the basis for the totally abstract thought that has produced such civilised concepts as God and art. Almost. But not quite.
.....Now let us consider, again in very simplistic terms, the nature of the hallucinogenic experience. There are a number of aspects of tripping that are relevant here. The dramatic and powerful nature of the visions, both in form and colour; the inclusiveness of the world viewed in such a state; the enhanced sense of individuality; the expanded vision of oneself and one’s functioning; the reconnection with emotional expression in life; the inspiration. Everyone who has had such an experience will recognise the resonances in these factors.
.....Let us now put all this together.
.....Unfortunately, this is where our argument really loses its foundation. For we can only offer you airy fairy conjecture. Is it not possible that the key quality our primate-ancestors lacked was that crucial sense of individual identity? And, if so, how did they develop it? Surely the development from functioning without individual awareness to functioning with it is a quantum leap of unimaginable proportions. Think about it. Looking at world history (which is not to say, looking at the history of the world) there would seem to be no precedent for such a leap. That, and the absence of any kind of physical evidence, weighs heavily — to our mind — against non-assisted evolution.
.....And there are those ‘civilising’ abstract concepts. How do creatures not yet this side of the human/animal divide come up with such concepts as Art and God? They are surely the stuff of tripping. And, indeed, why come up with such concepts at all? They can surely only have come into being to facilitate expression of profound states of consciousness that can only have been experienced with hallucinogens.
.....Taking our argument on to its final recourse in total subjectivity, we have experienced the multifarious magic of thinking within the psychedelic mode. It is in such a mode that one can experience the dual consciousness that is responsible for the realisation of individual identity and for the ability to see the broader picture.
.....That experience changes lives. It is an irrevocable bite into the Apple of Knowledge that changes things irrevocably. Having had a vision of the expansive vistas of our own consciousness we can never again return to a self-image that panders to limitation and small-
mindedness. We can never rest comfortably on our laurels. We can never forget that we haveseen the secret of life. We can never ignore the importance of being ‘chosen’ for such an experience. We can never turn our backs on evolution. We can never stop celebrating life and living. We can only forevermore acknowledge our own mental power and its potential to take us into higher realms of existence.