What is the role of risk in psychedelics and spiritual practice? Are you a 3 or a 9 on the risk appetite scale?

This is an intriguing and sensible Substack post by Jules Evans. The article starts: "We’re at a moment in the psychedelic renaissance where there’s a lot of focus on safety and ethics. There’s a new Psychedelic Safety Institute, a Congressional initiative to create better psychedelic safeguards, and a growing body of articles and research papers on the risks and harms of psychedelics and how they might be mitigated. This is part of a broader conversation on spiritual risks and harms – the adverse effects of meditation, the dangers of Vipassana retreats, the tendency of spiritual organisations to become high-control cults led by abusive gurus. My own work is quite involved in this effort towards greater ethics and safety in psychedelic and spiritual culture.  But is there not something paradoxical or even Quixotic about the idea of making Dionysian experiences ‘safe’. Dionysus is not safe. He is the god of transgression, of ecstasy, of going beyond limits. He’s also the god of madness. And while something might be gained from initiatives to professionalize, normalize and moralize transgressive subcultures like New Age psychedelia, is something lost as well?"

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