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Analysis and Assessment of the Gateway Process
The following is an accessible transcript from the Central Intelligence Agency’s Reading Room called “Analysis and Assessment of Gateway Process”.
The original report was published on June 9, 1983. It was written by Wayne M. McDonnell to his commanding officer in the US Army Intelligence and Security Command.
McDonnell was tasked with offering an assessment of the Gateway Experience to his commanding officer. This proved to be a difficult project for him. He dives into transcendental meditation, hypnosis, quantum physics, both eastern and western religions, and more.
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You tasked me to provide an assessment of the Gateway Experience in terms of its mechanics and ultimate practicality. As I set out to fulfill that tasking it soon became clear that in order to assess the validity and practicality of the process I needed to do enough supporting research and analysis to fully understand how and why the process works. Frankly,-sir, that proved to be an extremely involved and difficult business. Initially, based on conversations with a physician who took the Gateway training with me, I had recourse to the biomedical models developed by Itzhak Bentov to obtain information concerning the physical aspects of the process.
Then I found it necessary to delve into various sources for information concerning quantum mechanics in order to be able to describe the nature and functioning of human consciousness. I had to be able to construct a scientifically valid and reasonably lucid model of how consciousness functions under the influence of the brain hemisphere synchronization technique employed by Gateway. Once this was done, the next step involved recourse to theoretical physics in order to explain the character of the time-space dimension and the means by which expanded human consciousness transcends it in achieving Gateway’s objectives. Finally, I again found it necessary to use physics to bring the whole phenomenon of out-of-body states into the language of physical science to remove the stigma of its occult connotations, and put it in a frame of reference suited to objective assessment.
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I began the narrative by briefly profiling the fundamental, biomedical factors affecting such related techniques as hypnosis, biofeedback, and transcendental meditation so that their objectives and mode of functioning could be compared in the reader’s mind with the Gateway experience as the model of its underlying mechanics was developed. Additionally, that introductory material is useful in supporting the conclusions of the paper. I indicate that at times these related techniques may provide useful entry points to accelerate movement into the Gateway Experience.
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Niels Bohr, the renowned physicist once responded to his son’s complaints about the obtuse nature of certain concepts in physics by saying:
“You are not thinking, you are merely being logical.”
The physics of altered human consciousness deals with some conceptualizations that are not easily grasped or visualized exclusively in the context of ordinary “left brain” linear thinking. So, to borrow Dr. Bohr’s mode of expression, parts of this paper will require not only logic but a touch of right brain intuitive insight to achieve a complete comfortable grasp of the concepts involved. Nevertheless, once that is done, I am confident that their construction and application will stand up to the test of rational critique.
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Paradoxically, having gone to such great lengths to avoid trying to render judgments based on an occult or dogmatic frame of reference in the and I found it necessary to return, at least briefly, to the question of the impact of the Gateway Experience on common belief systems. I did so because although it was essential to avoid attempting to render an assessment in the context of such systems, I felt that it was necessary after having completed the analysis to point out that the resulting conclusions do not do any violence to the fundamental mainstream of either eastern or western belief systems. Unless that point is clearly established, the danger exists that some people will reject the whole concept of the Gateway Experience in the mistaken belief that it contradicts and is therefore alien to all that they hold to be right and true.
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This study is certainly not designed to be the last word on the subject but I
hope that the validity of its basic structure and of the fundamental concepts upon which it is based will make it a useful guide for other USAINSCOM personnel who are required to take the Gateway training or work with Gateway materials.
https://medium.com/accessible-foia/analysis-assesment-gateway-process-army-cia-foia-1983-human-consciousness-d7fa332ef404