Micro-Dosing Psychedelics Appears to Boost Creativity Says Study
The benefits of micro-dosing psychedelics, such as psilocybin, might have found validity in a recent FDA-approved study conducted by the London-based, Compass Pathways. After administering small doses of psilocybin, the psychoactive ingredient in “magic mushrooms,” subjects were given tests to analyze creative thought and normal cognitive function.
The study found that the micro-dose improved creativity and had no negative effect on day-to-day cognitive function, including rational thinking, problem-solving, and abstract-reasoning.
The subjects were given an average .37 grams of dried mushrooms three days a week, followed by cognitive tests 90 minutes after consumption. As reported by Scientific American, one psychologist involved in the study, Dr. Bernhard Hommel of the Netherlands’ Leiden University said, “performance was significantly higher,” on tests of convergent and divergent thinking –two measures of analytical and creative thinking.
The study was conducted after a trend of anecdotal evidence from Silicon Valley execs and creatives who have used psilocybin and LSD in diminutive doses on a regular basis to boost creative thought, supplant caffeine, and generally increase mental performance.
Studies by Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris at London’s Imperial College have made leaps and bounds studying the benefits psychedelics can provide sufferers of depression and drug addiction, while also breaking down antiquated taboos from the drugs’ history.
One of the recent discoveries of Carhart-Harris and the team involved psychedelics’ effect on the Default Mode Network (DMN), a series of brain regions connected with ego, thought, and emotion. The DMN is the daydreaming “default” mode our brains go into when they have nothing to focus on. The study found that when psychedelics were administered, the DMN quieted down, supporting the feeling of “ego-dissolution” often reported by psychedelic users.
They also noticed that the default mode network plays a role in the strict connections our brains make that reinforce behavior and thought; essentially what hampers creativity. But when psychedelics were introduced, the brain opened up it’s thinking to drastically more possibilities, leading to greater creativity but also temporary false conclusions about what it was seeing – the mechanism behind hallucinations.
But now it seems that with micro-doses, those myriad possibilities in the thought process may be accessed without the trip, sans hallucinations. Our brains form rigid connections as we get older, creating ‘shortcuts’ in order to easily comprehend and react with everything life throws our way. But at the same time, those connections inhibit creative thought, keeping us set in our ways. But what Carhart-Harris et al. hypothesized is that psychedelics break down those connections and open up new ones, allowing creative “out-of-the-box” thinking. And that’s what this study focused on; instead of one intense, paradigm-shattering trip, could a regiment of imperceptible daily doses do the same?
Psilocybin targets 5-HT receptors in the brain which are responsible for regulating serotonin. These receptors are known to influence reflective thought, introspection, and imagination. They are also the target of migraine and cluster headache medications, which some sufferers have found can be replaced with a more effective dose of psilocybin. In addition to serotonin, psilocybin also increases the concentration of the neurotransmitter dopamine, which is thought to mediate desire and motivation.
Of course, this was a single trial in which the placebo effect could have played a role, warranting more placebo-controlled iterations of the study. It was also posted as a preprint, meaning it has yet to be put through the rigors of peer-review. But if their findings and method were valid, it seems that psychedelics could give that creative boost many seek.
About the Author
Group Intention Experiments Shown to Have Measurable Healing Effect
In the field of research being done on intention and manifesting, Lynne Mctaggart is legendary. Her latest revolutionary experiments show the power of group intention to heal.
Mctaggart is a journalist and bestselling author, world-renowned for her groundbreaking work on consciousness and the power of intention. She is also the architect of “The Intention Experiment,” a global laboratory involving thousands of participants testing the power of group thoughts to heal the world.
Her research has repeatedly shown the profound effect thoughts have on reality.
“We’re all a batch of vibrating packets of energy so there’s nothing solid or stable about us (and) there’s nothing solid or stable about the world,” McTaggart said.
“In between different objects is a giant quantum energy field, we’re all in the field, and our subatomic particles make up the field. So, because we are energy, energy is changing at every moment at the subatomic level, nothing is an actual anything yet, it’s every possible state all at once. What they’ve found is what turns that potential of something into something real is an observer. So, our consciousness, our ability to observe, our ability to intend also makes us a creator.”
McTaggart’s intention experiments, running since 2007, are some of the first controlled explorations of the power of mass intention. In these experiments, she invites an audience to send a specific thought to affect a target, after which a team of scientists calculates the results to measure possible change.
“I’ve run 40 intention experiments — everything from trying to make plants grow faster, seeds grow faster, to purifying water, to lowering violence in war-torn areas or violent areas, to even healing someone with PTSD,” McTaggart said. “Of those 40, 35 have shown measurable, positive, mostly significant effects as measured by teams of scientists at different prestigious universities. So, we’ve got lots of evidence that thoughts are things that affect other things.”
Of particular significance to McTaggart are her peace experiments, which include the two she has now done on the 10th and 20th anniversaries of 9/11.
