Blog #9

One of the main questions I’ve been dealing with throughout the class, and one I suspect others have been thinking about too, is whether or not certain types of altered states are “legitimate.” By this I mean to say are certain things seen and experienced in altered states, such as those experienced by Castaneda, actual events (legitimate) or hallucinations (illegitimate). Sometimes I almost want to believe they are real, and at other times I find myself thinking they’re nothing but chemical reactions within the brain. At times it’s been mentally tiring to consider this seemingly endless question, but it’s also been interesting.

Considering this fact (that the class can be tiring but interesting) another question comes to mind. Where does creativity fit into all this? Is creativity which has been inspired by altered states as legitimate as that conceived in a normal state? Hughes presents two different answers to this question and I think they’re worth exploring.

The first answer is yes; altered states creativity is just as legitimate as normal state creativity. On page 156 Hughes writes, “the mind is visited by energies that demand to be understood.” This is very reminiscent of The Field, in which McTaggart explains that everything, even consciousness, is composed of waves of energy. Assuming this is true, creativity is not necessarily an individual’s creation, but is more accurately that individual’s representation of what he has learned from connection with a universal consciousness. Using this reasoning it would only follow that altered states are simply a tool to access this information. If an idea is just out there, waiting to be discovered, then there is certainly merit to altered states and the creativity they inspire.

However, the above answer is not the only one Hughes supplies. In quoting Baudelaire on page 167, Hughes offers a different opinion: “no man who with a spoonful of conserve is able to procure instantly all the treasures of heaven and earth will bother to acquire the thousandth part of it by means of work. The primary task is to live and work.” Here Baudelaire seems to imply that creativity is something an individual achieves by his own work, not an idea just waiting to be found. He states that creativity through altered states (specifically for him cannabis) is not legitimate because it does not require the artist to “live and work.”

I can see and understand the reasoning behind each argument. On the one hand the first argument seems to make the most sense. There are so many common motifs in creativity from around the world that it seems there must be some sort of common connection. Yet, the individualist within me agrees with Baudelaire that creativity is something which the individual must work for and discover on his own. I’ll not try to guess which alternative is correct, but will just leave it as this; another unanswered question.