Make no mistake, this book is not just about the year 2012. Pinchbeck, journalist and author of the drug-riddled psychonaut investigation
Breaking Open the Head, set out to create an 'extravagant thought experiment' centering around the Mayan prophecy that the 2012 era would bring about the end of the world as we know it, 'the conclusion of a vast evolutionary cycle, and the potential gateway to a higher level of manifestation.' More specifically, Pinchbeck's claim is that we are in the final stages of a fundamental global shift from a society based on materiality to one based on spirituality.