ON THE FRONT LINES—Interview with Michele McDonald Allan Badiner

ALLAN BADINER: You have many young people attending your meditation retreats. Do you find yourself having to address the issue of psychedelic use?

MICHELE MCDONALD: Yes. The drug issue is right on the front lines. As a meditation teacher, it takes a lot of reflection to present something that’s helpful and relevant in the face of how many choices students have around drugs. From my experience, no matter what kind of deep opening one might have on a drug, it isn’t going to develop one’s ability to have those experiences naturally. Other people might say that drugs are a doorway, but I don’t see it develop anything. It doesn’t develop equanimity, it doesn’t develop investigation, it doesn’t develop any of the factors of enlightenment.

BADINER: What do you see drugs doing?

MCDONALD: Drugs take a considerable toll on the body and the mind. They bring all this energy into the system so that it catapults you into a different state of consciousness at the same time that it taxes your body, mind, and heart. You get a sort of beatific view, but actually you’re further down the mountain.

BADINER: Do you think that applies across the board to all psychedelic experiences? Some people use MDMA, or Ecstasy, in conjunction with their meditation, such as metta meditation, and claim the openings that they get from this material translate into real change in their daily lives. Are they deluded?

MCDONALD: The initial experience with the drug might help one to experience intention to develop loving-kindness, but the ability to access that on a regular basis takes practice. A drug can’t help you create or develop your ability to practice loving-kindness.

BADINER: So the drug can’t get you there, but can it show you that there’s somewhere to go?

MCDONALD: No. I don’t think that a drug experience from five years ago, or three hours ago, is going to make metta accessible for me. It’s the willingness to put in the time through ordinary consciousness and develop your ability to practice deeply that allows you to access the mind of loving-kindness when you’re in traffic, or at the grocery store, or talking to your kids. To depend on a drug to develop that quality is antithetical to what we would call the development of mind. So while drugs may spark an interest in those states of mind, one always has to assess the toll it takes on the body and the mind.

BADINER: What has been your experience on retreat with people who use?

MCDONALD: I’ve had people who have come to retreats who’ve done a lot of drugs, and it seems like they don’t have the energy to go deep. They’ve blown it off with drugs. You pay a price for any drug experience. There’s no price that your body or mind has to pay to be in retreat and deepen those states naturally.

BADINER: So you feel that it’s not only that drugs don’t help one along the path, they are actually a hindrance?

MCDONALD: On a really deep level of letting go, drugs get in the way. This is especially true for those who are heavily armored.

BADINER: What I hear you saying is the opposite from what some conservative Buddhists might say; that if you’re heavily armored and you desperately need an opening, well then, and only then, maybe it would be OK to use a psychedelic. But what you are saying is to avoid drugs particularly then, because they will increase your already strong resistance to doing the hard work.

MCDONALD: Right. I’m talking about a deep level of attachment in the mind, where if one is needing to repeat an experience, it is reinforcing that attachment. When a person feels that they need drugs to deepen in their spiritual journey they’re just reinforcing the attachment to those particular states of consciousness.

BADINER: How is that different from attachment to the state that one reaches in meditation?

MCDONALD: In a retreat you’re going through sleepiness, you’re going through restlessness, you’re not aiming for a certain state. At least in vipassana practice, which is what I teach, it’s not state-oriented. The idea is that freedom isn’t based on any experience, so you’re developing an awareness that isn’t imprisoned by being attached to certain experiences. When you take a drug you’re definitely attached to an experience, or you wouldn’t be taking the drug.

BADINER: Have you had personal experience with psychedelics?

MCDONALD: I can very happily say that I’ve had some very deep experiences, even spiritual experiences on drugs.

BADINER: But you don’t recommend them?

MCDONALD: I don’t. While I did have some very powerful experiences on drugs, I’ve had much deeper and more powerful experiences in meditation. I wasn’t looking for any particular experience when I took the drugs, I took them because my friends thought it would be great if I finally dropped acid or if I finally tried the marijuana brownie. But when you put in the work of going into retreat, you’re going to open up and it doesn’t take such a toll, and it’s much more dependable in the long run. I recommend doing the work.

BADINER: So you didn’t get attached?

MCDONALD: No. I feel that drugs promote attachment to experience. In terms of my idea of what liberation is, they make that deeper letting go of experience itself harder. I really saw this in my own work.

BADINER: I wonder if you could say more about the distinction between the psychedelic high and the meditation high?

MCDONALD: Meditation strengthens your ability to cope with the ups and downs of life so that you’re coping with being depressed, you’re coping with being tired, and you’re developing an equanimity and an awareness that helps you cope with the downs as well as the ups. In taking the meditative path, you will come out stronger and win in all ways. You learn that you can feel “high” and how to access that when you create the right conditions. Then you can cope with the downs without needing drugs. But what you actually get from drug experience is the desire to take the drugs again. The basic urge is to be free; but true freedom is awareness that isn’t tied to experience. The underlying urge is healthy. I really try to support that urge. But drugs don’t make it easier in the long karmic trip we are on.

BADINER: Why do you think so many people feel like psychedelics help?

MCDONALD: There are two aspects to our spiritual journey: one is transformation, the other is transcendence. It can feel like drugs are helping. But each breath that we’re really aware of, day by day, in ordinary life, each step we take with awareness will in some ways feel very ordinary initially, but we are cultivating true freedom. You can develop great awareness without drugs. We have twenty-four hours in the day, and there are a lot of moments while we’re washing the dishes, while we’re driving the car, that we can practice being aware. When we’re on retreat we intensify the practice, while we’re watching the breath, while we’re watching our steps. And we learn through this sometimes incredibly tedious repetition how to have an awareness that’s free of any one experience. Any attempt to escape that, or avoid putting in that time just sets you back. In the long run the very attempt to escape itself makes it harder to escape.