The Soul’s Companion: Altered Consciousness, Embodied Practices, and the Power of Rhythm

Edited by Aaron Michael Ullrey.

This Research Reflection by Anya Foxen, Visiting Scholar, is part of an ongoing series spotlighting the academic study of religions. The reflection draws on a co-authored project by Anya Foxen and Sravana Borkataky-Varma, tentatively titled “Altered: Body, Mind, and Practices of Doing, Knowing, and Being”

Psychedelics are having a moment. Whether for therapy, recreation, or spiritual exploration, we are captivated by the possibility that certain molecules—tangible substances—can alter states of consciousness. To begin, let us allow, at minimum, that those seriously invested in psychedelics do not understand such alteration as simply a fluctuation of neurochemistry but, in a more holistic sense of reconfiguring, if only temporarily, our way of relating to the world.

Yet, many things can go wrong. The most basic is the well-documented possibility of an adverse psychological response—sudden ego dissolution is not for everyone. And then there are more subtle harms that arise out of various forms of historical and ongoing cultural erasure, exploitation, and extraction. We suggest that both sets of concerns can benefit from a more expansive understanding of the “psychedelic,” a term that etymologically has little to do with substances but rather derives from their ability to manifest the mind (or soul, if you prefer). 

In their traditional cultural contexts, such substances are hardly ever used on their own. Instead, they are woven together with any number of other “altering” modalities such as sound, movement, ritual, spoken word, and visual art. These practices are not merely decorative. They are not even ancillary. They are themselves powerful agents of alteration and manifestation. They, too, are psychedelic.

This richer version of the psychedelic requires us to reevaluate three central concepts. The first is embodiment, not only our own but also the very notion of what counts as a body. The second is agency, how we act and what we understand as capable of acting upon us, challenging our notion of personhood and sometimes moving beyond it altogether. And, finally, relationship and what it means to relate to an embodied agency other than one’s own.

As scholars of Indigenous traditions, including current CSWR researchers Andrea Sánchez-Castañeda and Osiris González Romero, have argued, psychoactive plants and mushrooms are not to be viewed as mere substances but rather agents in their own right. They are beings, literally rooted in the land, and by entering into relationship with them, we access the knowledge and power inherent in our shared cosmos. Such a relationship requires not only our physical bodies (that is, our neurochemistry) but also our minds, emotions, and senses. It requires our own agency but also a recognition of the agency of others, including others who are not human and whose bodies are radically different than our own. 

Fine. It may take some loosening of definitions, but most of us could probably be convinced that a mushroom has a “body” to which we could relate. But what of those other supposedly psychedelic modalities? Surely a sound, a dance, or a poem has no body. Here, then, it may be more helpful to begin by expanding our understanding of agency beyond the boundaries of personhood. How do we act through such embodied practices—and, just as importantly, how do such practices act upon us—to alter our relationship to ourselves and our environment?

There are several frameworks that capture not only the physiological but also the mental, emotional, and, ultimately, relational aspects of this question. But let’s consider one relatively simple mechanism: rhythm.

Scholars of rhythm, regardless of their field, often converge on the curious phenomenon of entrainment. If rhythm is a pattern—of sound, or movement, or perhaps something more complex—then entrainment is our ability to replicate that pattern, by humming along, by tapping our fingers, by marching, by waltzing. An orchestra is a feat of entrainment. But, crucially, so is a rapt audience. 

We feel rhythm as a constellation of bodily stimuli and cultural scaffolding intimately interwoven with emotion and imagination. Even simple rhythmic patterns, such as a repeating sound or a swaying motion, alter our fundamental state of being, if only because they alter our relationship to time. Our sense of “internal time” instinctively entrains to any rhythmic stimulus to which we lend sufficient attention. The pattern may not have a tangible body, but it is an entity with agency. 

When it comes to static visual art, this concept has been explored under the label of Einfühlung—literally “feeling into”—a German term introduced in the nineteenth century by Robert Vischer and usually translated into English as “empathy.” But how do we feel into a painting, an archway, or a vase? Proponents of the theory usually cite imagination, but this is ultimately too abstract. The mechanism, the bodily tool of imagination, is rhythm. To feel into an artwork is to entrain oneself into its rhythmic flow, its patterns of lines and curves, of light and darkness. Thus, the painting, the archway, the vase becomes not an object but a body. We tangle with this body mentally, emotionally, and sensually until we come to feel as it feels. And that is pretty psychedelic.