Memento Mori: An Exploration of the Spiritual and Existential Aspects of Psychedelic Experiences Outside of End-of-Life Contexts

Abstract

The past decades have seen a resurgence in the medical and psychological study of psychedelic substances for their potentially therapeutic effects on mental health. A promising area of exploration in this regard is in reducing distress and death anxiety in end-of-life cancer populations through mystical-type experiences capable of generating shifts in metaphysical beliefs. Whereas mortality and its associated fears may be salient in palliative contexts, and religiousness may facilitate mystical-type experiences, individuals of all beliefs and all stages of life may struggle with the bigger questions of life. This study explores the changes to existential concerns reported by participants outside of palliative contexts, while accounting for their unique spiritual and religious identity. Six individuals identifying as spiritual and religious and spiritual but not religious were selected to participate in a two-part qualitative interview process about their most significant psychedelic experience in the last year and its impact on their lives. Interviews were analyzed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to describe the participants' direct experiences as accurately as possible. Our findings led to the creation of the Contextual Recursive Model of Existential Transcendence, in which psychedelics generated biographically-contextualized existential confrontations that influenced the participants’ death attitudes and relationships to the various existential domains of existence. Findings support the positive impacts of psychedelics on death acceptance but also present their potential to reinforce an escape acceptance view of death in vulnerable individuals. Reviewing the experience and the embodied integration of psychedelic experiences are crucial in shaping the long-term effects of psychedelics on existential concerns.