A review by jfmiles
How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan

informative inspiring reflective

4.5

I entered my experience with "How to Change Your Mind" with, well, an open mind. As someone with an already healthy interest in psychedelics, I was immediately taken with the premise and found my interest piqued by little other than the title. I was surprised to have the book recommended to me, but nonetheless grateful. Having not read any of Michael Pollan's other work, I didn't have a concept about what I should expect, but was pleased to find within a healthy mixture of journalistic and dispassionate recounting of psychedelic history, memoir, and scientific fact relayed in an approachable, enjoyable manner. The uniqueness of this combination held my attention even through portions which I'd been advised I could probably have afforded to skip. Pollan's way with words is such that his description of his own experiences under the influence of the various psychedelics felt simultaneously beautifully crafted and sufficiently intimate that it was possible to empathize with the sensations and emotions. 

 

While I can imagine criticism of How To Change Your Mind as a mishmash of these genres, and all of which with a not-unbiased conceit (that is, in favor of the - safe! - utilization of psychedelic drugs for both the ill and the "healthy normal" or well individual at their discretion), I found that even my already-sympathetic viewpoint found an appreciable amount of additional information presented in a highly persuasive manner. I am glad to have read it (or, at least, listened to it - incidentally, Pollan's performance reading the text is rather compelling). Had I been a psychedelic skeptic when starting the book, I'm not sure Pollan's book would have, well, changed my mind; however, I have emerged from the experience with a guide for exactly how I might someday do so.