100 Books Like Separate Reality

I read this wonderful book when I was a teenager, and it had a lot of influence on me. I still read it again and again and gain a lot from it.

This is one of the earliest descriptions available of a meeting with a Mexican shaman, and the teachings of that shaman. It vividly describes the way the shaman acts, thinks and operates, and this is so remote and alien from modern Western thinking that it made me realize that alternative ways of perceiving realities do exist. 

Regardless of what some say, I am confident it really happened and that the descriptions are coherent and true. What a book! This is really a book for departure. 

For me, this book is the bible. Reading it in the early ’70s, I had never before felt the excitement of exploring a worldview as different from that which I inherited from my culture as it could be. As I read, I experienced a powerful calling to question every aspect of my worldview and every belief I had considered to be just the way things are. I believe it was that calling that allowed me to open my mind and my heart to a more loving and satisfying understanding of myself and of human beings in general. Of all the spiritual teachings I have encountered, none has been more profound in making me a better human being than those in this book.

There are plenty of academic tomes about psychedelics—their chemistry, their medical applications, their cultural impact, and so on. I was hunting for something more personal: stories of people’s experiences while zonked out of their gourds. What I found was this aptly named collection of tripping stories, with chapters submitted by writers from all walks of life.

It's a sipping book—at over 500 pages, it’s one you take a chapter at a time, not devour cover to cover. What makes the book special is its remarkable curation: the stories are diverse, covering the full gamut of psychedelic experiences from spiritual nirvana to hellish ordeals. Some stories struck me as stronger than others, but thanks to the editor’s deft hand, the prose always sparkles.

Like a good acid trip, the overall effect is stimulating and emotionally satisfying. But unlike a real trip, this vicarious ride is one you can pause and resume… show more.

Anthropological fieldwork is not restricted to isolated indigenous people in remote areas. Anthropologists study scientists in university research labs. Langlitz did a remarkable feat: He immersed himself in the research activities of two laboratories studying psychedelic effects on humans and animals. Through this participation in everyday work, he delineated contextual sociological and psychological factors of what made it possible for researchers to be allowed to give healthy human subjects and patients with psychiatric problems mind-altering drugs in the lab and what motivates researchers to go into these frontier areas of research. LSD, psilocybin, and ayahuasca are studied again scientifically. What made that possible? Langlitz gives answers.

This book chronicles the heroic journey of Christopher Bache’s 73 high-dose LSD sessions over twenty years and how these sessions impacted his life.

His story was a testament to me of the incredible hard work and persistence required to clear the body of energetic blockages when using psychedelics to reach the highest states of consciousness, including tapping into the cosmic creative principle of the living universe, exploring hell and heavenly realms, and nonduality. I loved how compelling and inspiring Bache’s story is.

When a gay journalist from Manhattan visits the charming town of Hope Springs, Pennsylvania, formerly known as Hell’s Ferry and one of the most haunted destinations in America, he stumbles into a quarreling coven of witches and his own shocking past. What distinguishes this profound and engaging novel is the journalist’s path to enlightenment with the aid of radical fairies, spirit guides, witches, and historical figures. This novel is a haunting fusion of New Age/Old World ideas.

The most practical book I’ve ever encountered for applying the Old Testament in the New Testament age and for dealing with culturally foreign parts of the New Testament as well. Outlines a process for extracting timeless principles from culture-specific passages and then finding equally concrete contemporary applications, even if we might not literally ‘greet one another with a holy kiss’! Jack was an editor with three major Christian publishers, a personal encouragement when I was writing my commentary on 1 Corinthians and his approach was the most influential resource I had when I was writing on application for my co-authored Introduction to Biblical Interpretation.

This book haunted me for days after I finished reading it. I felt like someone I loved had died. Few works of art have stuck with me the way O’Connnor’s book did. Its main characters—Hazel Motes and Enoch Emery—are the epitome of outsiders. I grew up in a religious family in Kentucky, so I can understand Motes’ struggle with faith. The way that Motes and Emery are so severely separated from the rest of humanity is affecting them.

The book caused me to passionately take their side, rooting for them and their cause, sharing in their anger towards the rest of mankind. This book had such a powerful emotional impact and influence on me, leaving me with a palpable feeling of hopelessness and catharsis over several weeks—unlike I’ve experienced with any other work of art. 

If I were talking about this book over coffee with a friend, I would say this: you cannot understand the ancient Maya without reading it. The Popol Vuh is the written version of an oral, indigenous creation myth more than two thousand years old. There are many English and Spanish translations of the Popol Vuh; but this one is my favorite because it is approachable and precise at the same time. For example, you can choose to ignore the footnotes and their implications. However, if you decide you want to go down the rabbit hole (as I always do), you will not be disappointed. I learn something new every time I pick up this book—it is that good.

This was Eric’s first book, a novel celebration of Black sisterhood. Sister, Sister was the first book I read that centered on a group of women and their relationships. Very different from what I was used to reading but it left an impression.  The sisters are all dealing with crumbling relationships at various stages. As a reader you will devour and turn the pages quickly as you uncover the ways in which these women handle their love woes. Dickey came on the scene with a true page-turner. I appreciate his decision to give first-person narratives for each of the main characters so we can truly experience their emotional highs and lows.