Psychedelic Medicine at the End of Life

Dying Without Fear

By: Dr. Richard Louis Miller, Rick Doblin - foreword

Narrated by: Sean Daeley

• Outlines 10 steps for dying gracefully with the help of psychedelics, including how to navigate the complex legal landscape and find the right guide and therapy

• Looks at clinical studies of psychedelics from UCLA, Johns Hopkins, and NYU School of Medicine that show dramatic lessening of end-of-life anxiety in terminally ill patients

• Shares wisdom from experts on psychedelic research and palliative care, including Roland Griffiths, Katherine MacLean, Ira Byock, and Anthony Bossis

Examining the evolving landscape that is found around end-of-life psychedelic care, Dr. Richard Louis Miller, a clinical psychologist for more than half a century, looks at how LSD, MDMA, psilocybin, and ayahuasca can be vital tools in allowing individuals in all stages of life to confront fears of dying and, in so doing, lead richer lives.

Miller shares wisdom from experts on the frontiers of psychedelic research and palliative care—including Roland Griffiths, Katherine MacLean, Ira Byock, and Anthony Bossis—and examines cutting-edge studies from Johns Hopkins, UCLA, and NYU School of Medicine that show dramatically decreased anxiety in terminally ill patients through the use of psychedelics. He explores how different substances can help the dying overcome their end-of-life distress. He also provides testimony from researchers and patients participating in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy that helps convey the experience of ego death at the heart of the psychedelic experience.

Miller outlines 10 steps for dying gracefully, without fear, with the help of psychedelics. He examines how to navigate the complex legal landscape and find the right guide, dose, and therapy. He also includes reflections from key figures in the psychedelic community as well as some of his own psychedelically informed mystical and near-death experiences.

Revealing psychedelics as a portal of transformation, Miller shows how they are singularly valuable in helping individuals face the end of life with courage and serenity.

©2024 Richard Louis Miller. All Rights Reserved. (P)2024 Inner Traditions Audio 2024. All Rights Reserved.

Critic reviews

“Miller writes personally, emotionally, wisely—unafraid to talk about dark and difficult parts of his own life and enthusiastic about every day remaining. Thoroughly grounded in his own close-to-death experiences and insights gained from his and others’ psychedelic journeys, his refreshing understanding of what dying brings to living is healthy and sane. He has given us a needed alternative to our current death-phobic and deathdenying usual narrative. He makes a strong case for benefitting from different psychedelic plants and fungi, most of which can reconnect people to the underlying unity in which some parts are being born and some dying but none are ever lost. This is a deeply uplifting, clear, and compassionate guide to dying and how psychedelics, used correctly, diminish our fears about approaching the door that opens at the end of our life.”—James Fadiman, Ph.D., microdose researcher and author of The Psychedelic Explorer’s Guide

“A masterful overview of an area of vital importance to our modern world rapidly attracting interest and support. Through his own moving life stories and those of his friends, colleagues, and patients, Miller shares insights on how we may more effectively approach and prepare for the end of life. He wisely states that psychedelics under optimal conditions have a unique application for those mired in psychospiritual suffering and asserts that these are existential medicines of inestimable value. This book is a valuable resource and contribution to the growing field of psychedelic medicine along with our ever-present struggle to find meaning and value to our lives while we still inhabit this mortal coil.”—Charles S. Grob, M.D., professor of psychiatry at UCLA School of Medicine

“From my earliest exposure to psychedelics, I have always carried the pivotal understanding that they showed to me: that death has a bad reputation but is perfectly safe. In Psychedelic Medicine at the End of Life, Miller has supported and elaborated upon that perspective, integrating his clinical expertise, his personal experiences, his appreciation for the developing body of research, and his encounters with a unified vision of reality in a book that will be instructive and inspiring to readers from a wide variety of backgrounds and disciplines.”—Mariavittoria Mangini, Ph.D., FNP, nurse, author, and investigator of psychedelic-assisted therapies