Presenters

Stanislav Grof, M.D.

Stanislav Grof, M.D., is a psychiatrist with almost fifty years of experience in research of non-ordinary states of consciousness. In the past, he was Principal Investigator in a psychedelic research program at the Psychiatric Research Institute in Prague, Czechoslovakia, Chief of Psychiatric Research at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and Scholar-in-Residence at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Currently, he is Professor of Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) and Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara, CA, conducts professional training programs in holotropic breathwork and transpersonal psychology, and gives lectures and seminars worldwide. He is one of the founders and chief theoreticians of transpersonal psychology and the founding president of the International Transpersonal Association (ITA).

Rick Doblin, Ph.D.

Rick is the founder (in 1986) and president of MAPS. Doblin's dissertation (Public Policy, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government) was on "The Regulation of the Medical Use of Psychedelics and Marijuana." His master's thesis (Harvard) focused on the attitudes and experiences of oncologists concerning the medical use of marijuana. His undergraduate thesis (New College of Florida) was a twenty-five year follow-up to the classic Good Friday Experiment which evaluated the potential of psychedelic drugs to catalyze religious experiences. Doblin has also studied with Dr. Stan Grof and was in the first group to become certified as holotropic breathwork practitioners. His professional goal is to help develop legal contexts for the beneficial uses of psychedelics and marijuana, primarily as prescription medicines but also for personal growth for otherwise "healthy" people, and to also become a legally licensed psychedelic therapist. He currently resides in Boston with his wife and three young children.

Meredith Little

Meredith and her husband, Steven Foster, co-founded Rites of Passage Inc. in 1977 and The School of Lost Borders in 1981 . pioneering the methods and dynamics of modern pan-cultural passage rites in the wilderness, and .field therapy.. The essence of their work is captured in articles, chapters, an award-winning documentary film, and books that include: The Book of the Vision Quest, The Roaring of the Sacred River, The Four Shields: The Initiatory Seasons of Human Nature, and Lost Borders: Coming of Age in the Wilderness. Since Steven.s death in 2003, she has brought her three decades of international experience in guiding and teaching to the arena of Death and dying. Partnering now with Scott Eberle, she yearns to crack open the taboos surrounding Death, restoring dying to its natural place in the cycles of living.

Ralph Metzner

Ralph Metzner, Ph.D. who has a B.A. in philosophy and psychology from Oxford University and a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Harvard University, has been involved in the study of transformations of consciousness ever since, as a graduate student, he worked with Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert (later Ram Dass) on the Harvard Psilocybin Projects. He co-wrote The Psychedelic Experience, and was editor of The Psychedelic Review. During the 1970s, Ralph spent 10 years in the intensive study and practice of Agni Yoga, a meditative system of working with light-fire life-energies. He wrote Maps of Consciousness, one of the earliest attempts at a comparative cartography of consciousness; and Know Your Type, a comparative survey of personality typologies, ancient and modern. He was the Academic Dean for ten years, during the 1980s, at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where he is still Professor, teaching courses there on "Altered States of Consciousness" and "Developing Ecological Consciousness." He maintains a part-time psychotherapy practice, and conducts numerous workshops on consciousness transformation, both nationally and internationally. His books include The Well of Remembrance, The Unfolding Self, Green Psychology, and two edited collections on the science and the phenomenology of Ayahuasca and Teonanácatl.