This is a quick romp through different methods of achieving altered states of mind for a workshop with my coven. This is meant to be suitable as a series of practical exercises. We rushed through this skipping the odd section and it took us about 2 hours to complete.
Why include a section about Altered States of Mind on this website?
It is common for spiritual rituals to be oriented around achieving an altered state of mind, theoretically, to increase the mind’s perception and manipulation of spiritual reality. In reality it connects the conscious mind to the subconscious mind. Those that believe in spiritual reality assume that the subconscious mind is the aspect of the practitioner which has direct experience of spiritual reality so we are connecting our conscious mind to the part that more directly experiences spiritual reality. Nearly all forms of spiritual ritual are oriented around achieving an altered state of mind.
What is an Altered State of Mind?
Altered states of mind, also called trances, are mental states that allow us a deeper experience of our own minds. It is a state of mind which is different from normal waking consciousness in some way or another. For example, sleep is a state of mind. These are methods for deliberately achieving different states of mind, by altering the normal functioning of the mind.
The mind is a vast and intricate landscape with many states beyond the ordinary waking consciousness. Altered states of mind encompass a spectrum of experiences ranging from deep meditation, out-of-body experiences, various senses of peace, psychedelic journeys or vision quests and states of consciousness where we can experience different perspectives of our own minds, and therefore, different perspectives of reality. These states offer profound opportunities for self-discovery, creativity, and spiritual growth. By engaging in specific practices and exercises, individuals can tap into these altered states, unlocking the potential of their minds and expanding their understanding of reality.
What’s this Workshop?
These exercises are useful for you to have a personal direct experience of altered states of mind to get a feel for them and decide for yourself which states are helpful and useful for what you’re trying to achieve. Not all altered states of mind are necessarily useful for all purposes for example methods that make you particularly aware of your body can be distracting and unsuitable for achieving out-of-body experiences. Alternatively, the same energy levels might not be achieved through meditation as can be achieved by ecstatic dance. Let’s work through some interesting exercises to achieve a direct and personal experience of altered states of mind.
I have divided the exercises up usually by what you are doing or what part of the body is used to induce the altered state. You do not need to complete all sections and some are not suitable for a workshop, but are worth mentioning.
Before you start these Exercises
Some of these exercises can make you a little breathless. That can force the heart to pump a little harder to get the oxygen around the body. Be careful you don’t push this too far because it can do damage, by not breathing correctly. Many of these exercises work better on an empty stomach or at least not stuffed. However, if you start to feel a little woozy, I recommend eating something small like a biscuit and milk to help your body calm itself. When I did this workshop, I provided snacks in case anyone was woozy and light-headed which did happen and encouraged people not to be too full and I provided enough snacks and salad to form a full meal at the end. Drinks are also important.
Excitatory and Inhibitory Gnosis
In Peter Carroll’s phenomenal work Liber Null and Psychonaut, which formed the basis of many people’s approach to chaos magic, he divided trance into two types. Firstly, trance he referred to as “gnosis”. Gnosis is a Greek word which means knowledge. In a modern context, it particularly means personal, experiential knowledge that cannot be communicated through words or explanation, such as divine states of ecstasy experienced by the Christian Gnostics. Secondly, he approached the matter as if there were two types of “gnosis”: Excitatory and Inhibitory. Excitatory was his classification for methods of altered state induction which excited the body. These could include things such as dance, shaking, shouting and sex. The other classification included forms of trance induction which inhibited the body, such as silence, lack of movement, cessation of thought and concentration. I think that this distinction is helpful when choosing what approach you’re going to take, however, there are more minutiae to consider and having a good range of different personal “feels” for different trances or altered states is more important than one single black-and-white division. Watch out however for people always picking their favourite method of trance induction and seeking rationale to make it fit rather than picking the most suitable for the ritual purpose.
Breathing exercises
One of the first places to start with altered states of mind is breathing. Everybody breathes so these should be easy exercises to do. Some of the names for these I have taken from Qi-gong and Yoga. I have not included the full exercise instructions and function of these exercises from the tradition they are from so these will fall short of properly learning the techniques from a proper teacher. If you want an accurate reflection on these techniques go to an expert in yoga or qi-gong, but for now, I am presenting them because they will achieve altered states very well and that knowledge is useful for the purpose of this article.
Abdominal breathing (Fuhu xi – foohoo-hshee)
Firstly, this is perhaps the most normal form of breathing there is. Really what we are looking at here is how focusing on the breath affects the mind. Firstly, make a note about how your head and body currently feel. Once you’re ready to start set a short timer to go off in 3 minutes (an Alexa device or phone is fine) and focus on the breath for 3-minutes. Try to breathe into the belly and let it expand as you breathe in and shrink as you breathe out. Breathe at a relaxed pace, don’t try to go too slow or too fast. Try not to worry about how long you have been doing it for, and don’t clock-watch. If you’re clock is going to beep in 3 minutes that’s not a long time so try to spend this time as focused as you can be on the exercise and leave the timer to worry about that stuff for you. When the timer runs out, write down what you notice about how your body, energy and mind have changed. Normally when taught in Qi-gong these exercises are taught with qi-leading directions, but that’s not as relevant here.
Reverse Abdominal breathing (Ni Fuhu xi – knee-foohoo-hshe)
This is a similar exercise, but this time we will pull the abdomen in when we breathe in and relax it and let it expand as we breathe out. This time the belly is acting the opposite way to what we would expect. This can have quite a strong effect. It is sometimes called “qi-packing”. Make a note about your starting state, set the timer for 3 minutes again and make a note when it runs out. Tai xi or embryo/foetus breathing is very similar often involving pulling the back in as well, and pulling the perenium up.
Kundalini’s Canon-Breath or Kapalabhati (breath of fire)
These are similar exercises, for canon breath open the mouth into a round O shape for kapalabhati (or breath of fire) exhale and inhale through the nostrils. This time we are going to make regular short in and out breaths using muscle contractions in the abdomen just a little bit slower than 2 per second. If you start to feel out of breath, stop this exercise. It is often believed this will purify toxins with “fire” in the cavities. Again make a note, this time set a 2-minute timer and when that runs out note how the breathing changed your mind and body. This can be a lot harder to complete. Don’t be afraid to finish this exercise early. Even though I picked a shorter time we all struggled to perform this breath for the full 2 minutes. What did you notice?
Nadi Shodhana (Energy-channel detoxing) or Anulom Vilom (one way and reverse way)
This is a common form of breathing or “pranayama” taught with yoga. This method is used to clean the Nadis or energy channels of the body. Once you understand the instructions I recommend setting a timer for 5 minutes.
- Sit in a cross-legged position like Sukhasana or Padmasana or in a chair with your feet flat on the ground, whichever is more comfortable for you.
- Position your hand: Use your right hand for this practice. Bring your right hand up towards your face and place your index and middle fingers on your forehead between your eyebrows (you can also use your thumb to close your right nostril and your ring finger to close your left nostril).
- Close your right nostril: Gently press your right nostril closed with your thumb, so that you can breathe in and out only through your left nostril.
- Inhale through your left nostril: Close your eyes and take a slow, deep breath in through your left nostril. Focus on the sensation of the breath entering your body and filling your lungs.
- Close your left nostril: Release your right nostril and gently press your left nostril closed with your ring finger, so that your left nostril (which just inhaled) is now closed and your right nostril is open.
- Exhale through your right nostril: Slowly exhale through your right nostril, focusing on the sensation of the breath leaving your body.
- Inhale through your right nostril: Keeping your left nostril closed, inhale slowly and deeply through your right nostril.
- Switch sides: Release your left nostril and press your right nostril closed again with your thumb. Exhale through your left nostril.
- Repeat: Continue this pattern of alternating nostrils, inhaling through one nostril and exhaling through the other, for several rounds until the timer goes off after about 5 minutes.
Once this exercise is complete, record the sensations you feel in your body, mind and energy.
Lamaze Breathing
We actually skipped this one, but maybe you want to give it a go. It obviously has a huge impact on the mind because it is used for for pain relief. This is the famous breathing always used on a TV show when someone is giving birth. You might hear them saying “hee-hee-hoooooo”. Breathe in and make two sharp exhales while whispering “hee” followed by a short inhale and a long exhale while whispering “hoooooo”. I say “whispering” but it’s more like saying these words, but without the vocal chords vibrating. Try this for 3 minutes and record your results.
Hyperventilation
Our final exercise is hyperventilation. This time only do it for 90 seconds and if you don’t feel right stop and relax for a sec. This is rapid in and out breaths for a short period of time. This is often used by Chaos Magician’s to throw the mind into a state similar to the “death posture” where the brain is thrown into an altered state because it believes it is dying.
Movement
Swaying
Similarly, we are going to use swaying to obtain an altered state of mind. I believe Jan Fries refers to this as Seething in his book Seidways. It mostly reminds me of Frankie from Grace and Frankie, who often likes to sway for a second before doing something ritualistic. Sit down, close your eyes and sway very, very gently forward and back. Sometimes if you get it perfectly, it almost feels like you’re sitting still on a boat which is rocking gently. As you get a feel for it you can begin to speed it up very gently. Record how this technique works and the effects you notice. Take 4-5 minutes at least the first time as it takes a sec to get the hang of this.
Shamanic Shaking
Often done in combination with swaying you can stand on slightly bent legs and bounce slightly. Let yourself sway from left to right transferring your weight from one leg to another. Let your head very very gently flop left to right as you swing but keep your head controlled to prevent neck issues and begin to shake your arms. As time goes on switch to fast hops on your feet and back to swaying from side to side. Occasionally, switch to throwing your arms in front of you like you’re catapulting them forward for them to open some curtains and then throwing them to the left or right. Mostly let your arms fling on their own weight. Occasionally, hold your arms up and shake them vigorously as if you’ve just washed your hands and you want to get as many droplets of water on the mirror as possible. When you have got the hang of these different moves, let yourself automatically jump from one to another to another. It’s essentially a dance. Take your time as often it takes a few minutes to really notice the difference. Adrenaline and rushing blood add to this state. I recommend trying out the different moves a few times first. Then set a timer for 3 minutes and another for 3 minutes 20 seconds. When the 3 minutes is up stop, hold your arms up in front of you and shake them vigorously for 20 seconds. Record how the whole exercise felt.
Dancing
Probably not something I am going to include in a workshop, but going to your favourite bar and dancing without ceasing for some time is a very fun and easy way to achieve an altered state of consciousness. You’re just not always in the best place to use the state of mind without distraction while you are there. My best friend always tells me how dance triggers many of the body’s reward hormones and produces a good mental state all around.
Whirling Dervishes
Also, something I am not going to include because I am yet to find a way to do this without feeling sick. But it would seem the point of the “whirling dervish” dance known as sema is achieving an altered state which allows them to connect with deity.
Using the Voice
Laughing Yoga
Okay, so this isn’t like a yoga class with bending and meditation. It’s just giving yourself a space to feel comfortable to laugh even without needing something funny to laugh at. The first step is literally to start laughing. You fake it till you make it, in or to make it. Your body doesn’t care if the laughter is real or fake. It just responds to what you are doing and that is laughing. Often you laugh at your attempts to laugh before you get going. Again set a timer for 2 minutes and try to laugh continually for 2 minutes, this will take some doing. If you laugh so much you run out of breath, stop to catch your breath.
Glossolalia
Technically glossolalia is just a fancy word for speaking in tongues. Now we do not need some holy spirit to make us speak actual languages which really exist, no that’s not needed for achieving altered states. No, instead we are just going to speak absolute gibberish. You can start off with a phrase if it helps: “rom pom pom pom, tom mom mom mom, yally wally, doo doo, gally pally noo noo” and then continue from there either repeating or saying whatever sounds come to mind. Again do this continually for 3 minutes and make notes.
Chanting
This works in a very similar way, but what comes out of your mouth is more repetitive and so it doesn’t need to be conjured by the mind. A commonly used chants in pagan circles is
“Isis, Astate, Hekate, Demeter, Kali, Innana”
(personally this is one I am not a fan of because of the awkwardness of fitting the two long vowels of Kali and the double “nn” in Innana which messes up any rhythmic symmetry.)
Another magic chant:
“Earth and Sea
keep harm from me.
Wind and Fire
bring my desire.”
It doesn’t need to rhyme. I often use “Earth Fire Air Water” but then I’m always tempted to continue “long ago the 4 nations lived together in harmony and then the fire nation attacked…”
In Kundalini Yoga often mantra such as “Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru, Wahe Jio.” are used and “Ek Ong kar” or just “har” repeated over and over.
Buddhists often teach the common mantra “Om Mane Padme Hum”.
I really recommend using some of the English chants before switching over to the yoga mantras as I believe that the yoga mantras have a power that doesn’t come from the individual mind of the person chanting and it could interfere with the feelings you get when using the chant.
For people working with a group chants is an important thing to focus on because they are frequently used in ritual work together.
Singing
Finally, this can work too. Often using songs which don’t require attention to sing a long helps. Some pagans might be drawn to songs like “We all come from the Goddess, And to her we shall return like a drop of rain.” Other people might be drawn to do hymns to pagan deities. If you’re singing a hymn to a pagan deity then you are to a degree invoking that deity and that might effect the feeling you get from the practice. So while you’re learning, I recommend you stick to simple songs which do not invoke deities or significant memories for your first notes and maybe a deity related one afterwards. You can record the noticeable change and then switch to a song which is more deity focused if you want to note that feeling too. There are also many mantras made in cute songs. (Deva Primal has published 100s of them).
Screaming
Okay so this is only really suitable if you are not going to disturb your neighbour. You might have heard that a good way to get stress out is to scream into a pillow. Same effect. It is most noticeable if you do it over and over for a couple of minutes rather than one time, but I’m not going to suggest that for this workshop unless you’re far from neighbours.
Rhythms
Drumming
Drumming is another method of achieving an altered state. It is my experience that this often awkward in workshop settings. Frequently in a workshop setting, there are people with no sense of rhythm, people with poor control over their limbs and so that’s some people not quite maintaining a steady beat and then anyone who has been to a few drum circles knows that there are often some people who believe the entire group should be following their rhythm and they don’t bother to listen to what anyone else is doing. Stick two of these in a circle and no-one knows whose rhythm to try to sync with the result is just noise. Some people like to drum to a phrase that gives a rhyme like “Bum. Bumper. Bum. Bumper” etc. On the rare occasion, that you can get a few people with a good sense of rhythm, it can be an incredible experience and the mind can lose itself to states of ecstasy. One way to work it, is to get one professional drummer to maintain a steady rhythm on a loud drum and other people to either listen or follow along with fingertips on a hard surface, so most people stick to one main rhythm and allow the brain to sync with that. Very different trance states can be achieved by rhythms of different speeds. Some are closer to dreaming, some are close to being energetic, some correspond with fear and danger.
Internal focus
Spinning energy
If your group has worked with energy before. You can join the group together and begin to circulate energy around the group. Try to make it go faster and faster until it whirls at great speed. In traditional Wiccan ritual often the aim is to form a cone shape in the circle, which can be infused with an intention and fire up throught the spike of the cone when sending something to the gods or aethyrs (perhaps for them to rain it down again when the astrological time is right) or sometimes the opposite if trying to manifest something now, the power is fired directly into the ground. (In my mind this is just too similar to grounding energy out to be used for manifesting as well.) Since this is an internal exercise and the mind can wander give yourself a little bit longer and record the results.
Meditation and Dhyana
This is really a whole section in and of itself. I can’t do meditation justice in a short 3 minutes exercise. But to give people something to try out. Sit and let your mind go blank for a while. If you’re not used to meditating you can picture a white wall and any time a thought comes in you can observe it without judgement and let it pass out of your mind again. Sometimes I find it helps some people to have them imagine a prolonged sound of the word “duh” or “ummmm”. The association between these words and the cessation of thought helps and the sound can take up all the space in your mind to prevent any subvocalisation. Sometimes, I notice when someone has tried to show me shaktipat that you can see the blank whiteness of your mind get brighter. This is something that the practitioner can visualise if it helps. The silence behind the words becomes like a loud or prevalent silence. There’s so much to write here, but you’re trying to achieve a period of no thought to see what effect that has on your mind. Through practising Dharana (which is the meditation of cessation of thought), I was able to overcome many of the difficulties I experienced reading as a dyslexic person. Yes, reading still takes a lot more effort for me than it does for the average person, but I actually managed to do most of the reading for a full Bachelor of Laws.
Conjuring the Trance
Visualize the Trance Feeling
This is perhaps the best key I have added to this work. I have never come across someone who teaches this and I might have just made it up myself, but it is very useful if you can get it to work. Go back over some of your notes from earlier exercises in this workshop and think about what one of your favourite trance states felt like today. Close your eyes and focus on how that feeling felt. There is little difference in the mind between experiencing something directly and having a memory of it. So a clear memory of a trance state seems (in my own mind at least) to be able to directly conjure that mental state. Try to just keep recalling that memory and visualizing it as much as possible and see what you can conjure in your head in a short time. 3 minutes should do like many of the other exercises.
Focus on Dopamine sensation
This is a meditation I’m secretly trying to teach my nephew without my fundamentalist Christian mother noticing. It is how I managed to get over many of the difficulties associated with a possible ADHD disorder I might have. Normally when people with ADHD struggle to concentrate there is usually one thing or another that they can concentrate on. This is often video games, Youtube videos, Social media. An old friend of mine used to work as an assistant in a school and there was an autistic child who was unruly all the time and couldn’t focus on anything, but during break time he was allowed to navigate to a website about electricity pylons and for some reason that calmed him right down and could focus for once. As an important piece of homework, figure out what you can normally focus on and imagine as clearly as possible that you are doing that. What does it sound like? What does it look like? Can you feel a controller or phone in your hand? Now you have that image clear in your mind what does your mind feel like when it is concentrating on that? Try actually doing it, but pay attention as much as is possible to what your brain feels like. That feeling is often how the mind feels when dopamine is in full-flow. When you’re no longer doing it, focus on that feeling for a few minutes. If it helps visualise that you’re doing whatever you find easy to focus on, then pay attention to your mind and intensify the feeling. Then try an exercise which is normally very distracting and try to deliberately activate the dopamine flow through visualisation of the sensation dopamine causes when you do the thing which is easy to focus on.
Not Quite Sleeping
Hypnotic Induction
Hypnosis is a state of mind which is between sleeping and being awake. To be hypnotised you need to be willing to be hypnotised and you need to be able to visualise. You can often be hypnotised by listening to a script either live or recorded which leads you into this state of mind by visualising things in a very relaxed setting. I’m not going to expand on this here since there are thousands of hypnotic inductions available as audio files and I have made a few myself. This can be some homework. Like the dopamine exercise. Go find one that is helpful to you, maybe good sleep or astral projection.
Hypnogogic states
Similarly to the exercise above this is a state which is part way between awake and sleeping. Often, it is triggered by a hypnotic induction, but a hypnotic induction is fully guided the entire way until the hypnotee is awake again. Sometimes the hypnotee will want to be put under, but not necessarily guided back and then they can continue to explore their unconscious mind while partially conscious. Sometimes a person might lie down as if they were going to sleep, but keep their arms pointing upward off the mattress. Then they begin to activate the dream state while they are awake and achieve a lucid dream. This allows them to explore the realms of the unconscious. If they begin to completely fall asleep their arms will drop and hopefully wake them up when they hit the mattress so they can begin again. An alternative method is where a person learns to question their reality on a regular basis. “Am I dreaming?” they ask. And then at some point, when this question becomes a normal part of life, they will do the question while they are sleep and realise they are dreaming. This allows them to partially wake up inside the dream. Many magical practitioners try to do these things daily for an extended period of time to achieve control over their dreams and better awareness of them.
Other methods of achieving altered states
Some of the following are not necessarily suitable for working shopping, but I include them here for good reason.
Drugs
Nearly all drugs alter the mind in some fashion or another. Not all states are helpful. The only issue with the use of drugs is that you can’t stop it if it is not comfortable or helpful. If this is something you are thinking about exploring, a friend of mine frequently speaks highly of groups that do similar plants to Ayahuasca and Peyote. Doing an event like this means that there are plenty of people around who know how to have a positive experience of whatever drug they are using. They will deliberately incubate positive messages and help you through your trip. I will not encourage anyone to do drugs for legal reasons and I recommend you consider the legal implications of whatever you are doing and question whether the law is there for a reason. Also question whether you workplace might ask you to perform a drug test.
Sex
Sex is frequently used by Chaos Magicians to reach an altered state of mind. I am not going to write a how-to about how to have sex, but I will say that sometimes sexual denial can be just as altering as participating in sex. Sometimes I wonder if the “purity” so often associated with Judeo-Christian ritual might achieve an altered state through denial. Many chaos magicians try to expose the mind to sigils just at the point of climax to allow them to enter the deep mind.
Fasting
Sometimes an altered state is achieved by a certain diet for example low protein to reduce aggressive tendencies. Many old tantras and grimoire work involve fasting for some time before the practice. Be careful with managing your sugar levels if you might have diabetes or similar conditions which might be aggravated by not eating. As someone who has done a lot of altered states, they’re not worth dying for.
Sensory Depravation
This can also achieve an altered state. This is partly because the brain is bored and needs to send signals to keep itself going.
Not moving
Finally, keeping still. This sounds crazy, but it works in a very unexpected way. Often your body sends what’s called a “tick signal”. If you haven’t moved for a while your body will give you an itch to scratch or a feeling like you need to roll over. If you’re awake you will respond to this signal and roll over or scratch yourself. If you don’t respond, your body will send a heavier tick signal. If it gets no reaction from a number of signals, it will assume you have gone to sleep and start making you very comfortable, increasing your body heat to a warm state and relaxing. It can sometimes even cut off your mind’s control over your limbs so you don’t act out your dreams and sleepwalk. This trance state is often associated with Asana for Thelemic Ceremonial Magicians, but the word Asana as it is used in Yoga just means posture. If you ever try this and achieve sleep paralysis which is possible with this technique, the recommended method to get out is to change the speed of your breathing. You will always have control over your breathing and you can speed it up and slow it down and speed up and slow it down. Soon your body will realise your brain is awake and drop the sleep paralysis.
What do I do with this state of mind?
What don’t you do with this state of mind? Often an altered state of mind is achieved in a magical ritual and then a series of images is conjured to lead the mind to have a vision or thought. This can be through poetry.
Often in an altered state, the initiate has more direct control and experience of energy so it can be more easily manipulated. This can result in more intense energy work rituals.
Sometimes a ritual action is taken in an altered state to believe the deep mind should impact the universe, for example, stabbing a doll of a Conservative Prime Minister while in a trance state might lead to the brain trying to psychically attack said PM. Doing the same in normal conscious doesn’t have quite the same magical effect.
Often Chaos Magicians want to throw sigils into the deep mind and the awakened normal state of consciousness seems to prevent this for some reason, so they achieve altered states of consciousness and then they present the mind with the sigil. This allows the sigil to bypass the mind. Sometimes, the sigil is designed to try and conjure a part of the mind or universe forward and the altered state of mind to bring together the unconscious which is capable of perceiving the spiritual force brought forth and the consious which you are aware of, but which does not normally perceive such things.
Once in an altered state try performing invocations, statements of intent, presentation with sigils, ritual actions, and much much more. Go forth and do your worst.
Recommended books:
Liber Null & Psychonaut – Peter Carroll
Hands on Chaos Magic – Adrieh Vitimus
Dreamwalking – Michelle Belanger
Asana, Pranayama, Mudra and Bandha – Swami Satyananda Saraswati