LSD: My Life-Saving Drug
gq.com
gq.com
When done right and with the right people it can be a truly profound experience which I firmly firmly believe all humans should participate in. I've heard just as many people though turned off to them permanently though through bad experiences which I (who am likely biased) chalk up to bad settings. I'd also say properly grown mushrooms may be a better option for most people. Finally, maybe mixing drugs isn't the best thing to do either.
You ideally want to develop a trusted source, probably through someone you know
http://www.widespreadpanic.com/tour
Also, pretty much any large multi-day music festival with a campground, especially reggae. Suppliers are way less discreet at these kind of venues. You'd typically either get lucky and get whatever they say it is, or not and get something that has no effect; chances of something dangerous are low.
Discovered only a few years ago, it's way too new and untested. The effects are not the same as LSD, and reports of negative side effects are common.
Unfortunately they are commonly sold as LSD. Very sad and worrying.
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/psychiatry/research/volunteer...
It has the added effect of being legal, and being done in a setting meant to give one a pleasant experience. Their psilocybin ("magic mushrooms") research is worth checking out. They found it had no lasting harmful effects in any of the volunteers, and overall seemed to have long-lasting positive effects in many people:
http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/single_do...
Do note that it's not trivial to get into this in a cautious way. It will take some work to get Bitcoins, and it's possible you may lose some money to fraudulent sellers. However, the people I know source all their psychedelics this way, so it does work (at least for some people).
On the subject of finding people: if you're comfortable, you can invite your friends. This might not be wise if they're not comfortable with psychedelics, so tread lightly. Anecdotally, I got into all this literally just by asking people I knew, it turned out they where all willing and things have been fun ever since!
Succumbing to positive peer pressure is a good thing. If you're friends aren't into it, then go have fun doing what they're into. Compared to walking in the woods with your child, psychedelics are not very high on the scale of profundity.
The two best starting places are reddit.com/r/darknetmarkets and reddit.com/r/dnmavengers
Prioritize research and place limited trust in reviews, especially on-market reviews.
http://azarius.net/smartshop/magic-mushrooms/grow-kits/mushr...
( Note : You can buy it from different sources online, this is just a link, no affiliation )
Its easy and its rewarding :)
No one wants a bad trip.
It was generally nice. We went out to outrageously gorgeous outdoor parks, and I kept people from wandering off cliffs.
One time, somebody was having a terrible trip (which I hear is the equivalent of an actual vacation in hell), and he stopped it with his Clonazepam prescription, which is essentially a longer lasting drug in the same class as Xanax.
The day before yesterday, a friend and I took 2CB nasally for the third time, for both of us. Quick note: 2CB is roughly similar to LSD.
As it turned out, the previous two times we had been losing quite a bit of 2CB during the snorting process because we where basically pressing our faces against the surface then inhaling. This led to some 2CB stuck on our face, some stuck just inside the nose, etc. Because such small amounts of 2CB are so effective, this loss meant we where experiencing an order of magnitude fewer effects.
So, it's our third time, but this time we decide to use a straw. Using a straw meant we got the full amount instead of losing the majority. The net effect was we found ourselves in the middle of an experience that was orders of magnitude more than what we where emotionally prepared for. If we'd been aiming for the experience we where having, we'd have been fine; but since it was so unexpected it felt very uncomfortable.
After about an hour, my friend was lucid enough to get a Xanax for himself and offer me one as well. The Xanax stopped that trip in it's tracks. 15 minutes after taking, lucidity solidified and I was back to being able to hold conversations. Within 30 minutes, we where down to only very subtle visuals, and within 45 minutes, the trip was effectively over.
To reiterate, Xanax worked for me, and I'll be keeping it around as a safety feature in the future.
2CB dilutes in water with a little effort and it's much easier to measure out consistent doses in tablespoons or mL of a liquid rather than very minute amounts of a powder.
Fun drug, but it upsets my stomach.
1. Overstimulation, an inability to cope with all the new perceptions. This is especially pertinent during come-up. If you experience overstimulation in sober life, you'll probably recognize it. If you haven't, it feels like agitation and confusion.
2. Anxiety that is brought into the trip that is either consciously perceived or not beforehand. If something's bothering you at the back of your mind, it's going to come up front and center.
3. Intrusive thoughts. There's no reason why they can't happen on a trip, right? Like sober life, the best thing that makes them go away is acknowledging them and letting them play out. Trying to force them down can make them worse. Intrusive thoughts can lead to disturbing experiences even if they don't result in a bad trip.
4. Panic from feeling your own body in unfamiliar ways. Your proprioception shifts rapidly with LSD. You might not be able to tell where your limbs are, or whether they even still exist. The solidity of your body suddenly feels a little too insubstantial. You can't tell if you're too hot or too cold. Blankets don't seem to work. Come-up can be rough like this. You need to have immense trust in the world that you're ok, that you're not falling apart, that your body can take care of itself and your brain will soon compensate for the new chemical situation and restore homeostasis and understand your modified internal senses.
5. Temporary psychosis. it happens and i am not qualified to suggest a remedy or reasoning to it.
Edit: Sleep! Sleep deprivation is definitely on this list. Can't sleep on acid.
Interestingly, due to the low doses many groups take they take these after encouraging a period of fasting and speed deprivation.
Anyway, outside of my area of expertise but something I consider interesting.
I don't think there's much in the way of peer reviewed papers because no ones going to deliberately dose one group on LSD for a long term study and most recreational users take other drugs and don't document and publish things but there are definitely issues.
http://jop.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/01/08/026988111456...
Classic psychedelic use is associated with reduced psychological distress and suicidality in the United States adult population
"Psychedelic users showed a significantly lower likelihood of recent psychological distress, as well as less suicidal thinking and fewer suicide attempts, than non-users. Users were 36% less likely to have attempted suicide in the past year.
Use of other illicit substances, say the researchers, are “by and large associated with an increased likelihood of psychological distress and suicidality.” The use of non-psychedelic substances is a suicide risk factor, they conclude, but psychedelics appear to have the reverse effect."
To be fair, I'm hardly an unbiased source, as a good friend of mine jumped out a window an hour or so after taking a rather large dose of LSD.
My other two friends went high to a houseparty and committed suicide by shooting themselves in the head. It was all over the national news.
I'm not going to share the name of the other friend, for obvious privacy reasons.
She woke up the next day, and didn't recognize her parents. She didn't recognize her boyfriend whom came running over.
She finished her degree 25 years later, and she still has trouble functioning in society. She never got back to that high functioning individual. She's still very smart. She can't wake up early. Can't function in a unfamiliar work setting. She basically falls to pieces if slightly stressed. She would be homeless if not for a caring/understanding financially well off family
(This is a true story. She might have had an underlying mental illness, but mental illness is not in her lineage. I'm just passing this story along.)
(That said, I've personally never heard of anyone who'd been severely damaged by drugs... well, except for heroin, alcohol, and cocaine. Six of my childhood friends had died of heroin, two from alcohol, and one from cocaine. Heroin is the scourge of the working poor.)
Of course, it's not guarenteed (they could for example be sprayed with another substance), but even in terms of economics for the dealer, it probably wouldn't make sense to try to adulterate such things. Adulteration is much more prevelant when dealing with relatively expensive, highly processed drugs, where there are many levels of people in the supply chain; the temptation to cut it to increase margins is just too high.
Not very reliable, as this is also what old wives tales and urban legends claim too ("I know this guy/gal that...").
In this case for example, you might really know that woman, and she might have been a junior at Dartmouth that had those issues, but unless you were there with her that day, there's no way to know whether she did take LSD that night (or something else, or even nothing), or whether she didn't have any issues before, etc. It could just be some rumor people tell about here, or what she wanted other people to know about it (e.g. not to admit a mental illness but instead cover it with "had bad acid").
Let's rather stick to the medical literature that describes several cases of LSD use, how it affected or brought up psychosis, etc (and after what frequence of use, and with what mental issues the patient had before, etc).
It almost certainly isn't. Do you have even a single reputable source? I mean, especially if you know her personally as you claim it should be pretty easy to pull up some news articles or something, right?
I can't say I think that people should be recommending psychedelics because the experience is so extreme and so personal, it can be life altering. As with anything this "far out", the outcome could be extraordinarily positive or also extraordinarily damaging. I don't believe it's merely about setting; it's the person doing the trips' responsibility to look after themselves. And don't be tired because you aren't sleeping for the next 14 hours.
If you want a new perspective on the world sure, go try LSD but if you want a better perspective I'd recommend Magnesium [1], Vitamin D [2] and some meditation first.
[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16542786
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D#Health_effects_of_su...
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry...
I had back pain sleeping for a long time, fatigue, and tons of muscle twitching (even in supplementing magnesium and vitamin d), and a methylated b-complex effectively eliminated my symptoms.
The test to check for an MTHFR mutation is expensive, but supplementing a methylated high-quality b-complex isn't.
Since when?
Any thoughts on microdosing as it related to your vitamin and meditation suggestions? https://hn.algolia.com/?query=microdosing&sort=byPopularity&...
Doesn't look like it stresses the psychedelic experience, but it should be less extreme.
Other than that you are fine. As long as you are in full control of what you are doing and you don't feel pressured by strangers then most people will be perfectly comfortable. And while tripping in nature has generally been more enjoyable for me, interacting with really good friends (especially ones also tripping with me, one of the best parts of the trip) and seeing your familiar surroundings with a new mind was the most valuable part to me.
The setting that matches that description is different for each person. If you trust yourself, you'll do just fine at picking the right time and place.
Be barefoot in the grass at least once while in that state, even if its in the garden.
"Brain: Hey! This scary thing I'm now experiencing must be incorporated into my behavior."
"You: Yay, I now have a phobia of something!"
I came here to write something along these lines.
About a year ago, I ate _way_ too much cannabis before a party then proceeded to have a terrible trip. The subtle meaning in people's interactions, which I had always been able to respond to intuitively, suddenly became apparent and burdensome. I saw a man who did not receive enough affection from his wife and spoke needily to others, reaching out for warmth. I saw a woman who appeared to be dissatisfied in her marriage, lingering just a bit too long in hugs with other men. I saw a man who was uncomfortable with parties, and wanted to corner me in a private discussion so he could disengage from the group. The feeling that these people were unable to mask their deep and private needs in this public forum combined with the feeling that something was expected of me that I could not give sent me into a spiral of embarrassment and nervousness.
Becoming terrified that I would be unable to control my emotions (that I might begin weeping in front of everybody for example), I disappeared without a word to hide in my car. Fearing that I would be seen and mistaken for a criminal waiting to commit a crime, I tried to stuff myself into a ball on the floor of the backseat. I was convinced that someone would see me and call the police, and I'd be arrested because I would be unable to communicate with them. The fear was so intense that I could feel myself shivering, and when my wife came to rescue me I was unable to speak in a steady voice.
Over the course of the following year, I struggled with depression and crippling social anxiety, which I had never experienced before. Things as routine as taking my cat to the vet were a real challenge, and I relied on Xanax to get me through a number of totally banal interactions which I had previously handled automatically. Granted, I was also experiencing intense social isolation and a weakening support system due to unrelated factors - I cannot definitively pin my struggles on this incident with cannabis. Still, it scared me enough that I began researching and critically examining my cannabis usage.
Ultimately I decided that it would still be a part of my life, but that I would no longer use it in public settings, that I would be exceedingly careful with dosage and reduce my usage in general, and that I would examine my current state before using it. I've recovered 100% from the depression, 95% from the anxiety (I still feel mild nerves speaking in group settings, like introducing myself at a meeting), and I have never had a bad cannabis experience since. I have also decided that using other drugs with psychedelic effects is not worth the risk for me, and I have sworn off them altogether.
I can attest to the fact (anecdotally) when you consume cannabis orally, you gain this meta-insight into social situations. But, this new found social consciousness varies from person to person.
Whereas you had a fundamentally negative experience, I've found the ability to discern people's subtle, true intentions in social settings to be quite comical.
It could be possible that you are a slightly anxious person by nature, in which case cannabis is probably not a good idea.
The first time I took LSD was under less than ideal conditions. It was in high school... and I mean during school hours my junior year. It was 1988. Yes, stupid and irresponsible I know but it was a great experience.
I only took 1/3 of a tab... a friend had it and we split the tab between three of us. Coincidentally there was a field trip that day for Jr's and Sr's and I had not turned in my permission slip and so didn't get to go. I suppose that's how I justified taking LSD in school to myself. Everyone else was already gone on a trip so....
The friend who had the LSD was a "bad kid" and was in in school suspension so he went to sit under out of class supervision all day. The other friend got on the bus and went off on the field trip. I went to mostly empty classes.
I had guitar class that semester. The class was mostly freshmen and sophomores with shag hair aspiring to be the next Metallicas and Iron Maidens. They were a pretty wild group. I on the other hand was outwardly at least pretty studious and responsible and respectful of authority.
The class had a sub teacher that day because the regular teacher was chaperoning the field trip. So there wasn't a real lesson... just a bunch of amateur Bevis and Butthead antics while the sub teacher read a magazine and I sat in the back watching the whole thing with a godlike sense of enlightenment. At one point one of the kids wadded up a paper and threw at the sub hitting her in the head. I didn't see who it was but did see the paper hit her. So she flips out and starts yelling. And I'm trying not to burst out laughing. Not because she got hit by a paper, but because of the utter ridiculousness of the whole situation. Here we all were, on a little ball of mud in infinite time and space and we don't have anything better to do but sit in a room wasting limited time and acting up and throwing papers and get upset when we get hit by a papers. And that's what life in society was... silly monkeys acting out because they didn't understand the deeper implications of existence. And now I knew how trivial it all was and it was entertaining to watch.
So the sub gets really mad and calls in the assistant principal. He come in and says "OK, who threw the paper?". No one speaks up. I'm just grinning away in the back at the petty foolishness of the whole thing. He sees me and singles me out.
(principal) - "Who threw the paper?"
(me) -"I didn't see who threw the paper"
(principal) -"Ok... if you don't tell me who threw the paper you will get detention"
(me) "If you have come to a place in your existence that it is your destiny to give me detention, than I will take the detention, but I did not see who threw the paper".
At this the assistant principal stops and does a double take. He pauses for like 30 seconds completely confused and bewildered (and briefly wondering about his destiny). But he can't back down so he gives me three days detention. So I tell him "I accept that this is who you are and this is what you feel you must do, but it does not in any way affect who I really am". At this he does another double take, gawks for a bit and then leaves the room.
Later he comes up to me at lunch and apologies for his anger and rescinds the detention. And he is looking at me like I'm some kind of strange wizard or something. I just smile and say ok, fine and keep eating my lunch.
I never looked at the social/organizational aspects of school the same again. I also never took LSD in school again. I'm in my 40's now and even though I did have other experiences later I haven't for nearly two decades and wouldn't take LSD at this point. I'm not against it.. I just wouldn't take it. I don't think I need to. I have gotten out of it what I think I can... some useful, some maybe not so useful and honestly I have zero interest in exploring it any further. Sorry for the long post. I think the original point is that sometimes being in a normal situation under the influence of LSD can give you a whole new perspective that is actually more truthful. It breaks the layer the mind puts on reality and you have no choice but to see a more objective view of the situation. It's certainly not reliable though and a lot of confusion results sometimes in people thinking things that aren't really so. And sometimes you mind needs to put a layer over reality for you to function. Just my opinions.
The rest of the night and into the morning was spent in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. Nothing special about the small city, and we both knew it very well. But my relationship with it completely changed that night, as we explored every nook and cranny, appreciating all the details of the landscape and its overall vibe that we overlooked the hundreds of times we hung out there before. From sitting on the river's edge smoking a bowl, to sneaking into the Brown University theater and goofing about on stage, to laying in a small park and letting the trees dance for us, to watching the sun rise on top of an historic building on the East Side, it was something else.
Point being, I agree with you on the value of experiencing the often-experienced places with a totally different mindset.
That said- I'm also quite pleased with who I am, like the author here, and I worry about losing that to the drug's effects. Eh, it's all fascinating stuff. :)
If "your parents" are an issue, it's likely you're too young to be experimenting with psychedelics.
Psilocybin helped bring clarity, motivation in my life, love for nature, and helped purge out some negative emotions by crying.
Ayahuasca has been the most therapeutic; it allowed me to revisit very early childhood memories I've completely forgotten about, which later helped my interactions with my family and friends. It also showed me why I was born, which helped give me a sense of direction, purpose in life.
Forever grateful for psychedelics and the guides that help facilitate a safe space.
What ADHD symptoms did it alleviate?
This experience can be as impactful as when people "find god" while struggling through something and then finally find the willpower to overcome it. Actually it can be more impactful; consider that a psychedelic user perceives that they are meeting with God and God is directly telling them what they need to change and how they need to do it, while the born-again Christian has only thoroughly convinced himself that his own will is actually God's will instilled within him, via faith. The psychedelic experience is much more powerful and much less fragile than the religious experiences that we are used to hearing about helping people through hardships.
And ADHD is a condition whose effects can be entirely overcome through willpower.
You might be of the opinion that mental problems are fixed however. If you are, there is nothing anyone can say to convince you. Many mental problems could be thought of as spiritual problems insofar as you're not understanding yourself and why you're here. This leads to secret fears, which drives the cogs of many people's gears, but their blindness moves them only in circles.
Again, you'll be without convincing if you are of the victim mentality. If you're not, psychedelics are widely known for inducing huge character changes because something deep happens. You can think of it as a rotted root made anew. The plant "out of nowhere" thrives. It's the same thing for your mind. Clean the mirror and the message shines forth. This is hard to understand for many humans who have many self-created messages dirtying their mind. Psychedelics literally turns all that stuff off and you get to have a real experience as a result.
The truth is, we only have so much time left on this earth, that it's impossible to understand everything that exists.. we can only try our best with the situations we're in and given.
Anyway, once I realized the importance of the present moment, it made it easier for me to do things I've always wanted to do, and neglected to do. I felt like my mind did a disk-defrag, completely nuked my old self, and started with a clean new slate to relearn things.
Out of curiosity, can I ask why you were born?
I've been on this crazy beautiful floating space rock for 43 years. My dad is 73 and ailing mother 68 this year. I have a wife who's tolerated me for 20 years. I have 3 rock springers 17, 12 and 8 years with her. I've met hundreds of other beautiful rock dwellers asking the same question you ask. I haven't lived a necessarily exceptional life and I don't claim to know much, but I do know that Oscar Wilde was on to something when he said: "With age comes wisdom, but sometimes age comes alone" ... and that kinda scares me sometimes when I enjoy my occasional misanthropy.
Let's keep the compassion flowing, everything else is part-time occupation.
If I continue, I start seeing colors swirl around the 30min mark, reminding myself not to get attached to it. After 40 min, the cognitive changes are VERY noticeable when I stop. Food tastes great, colors are vivid, and I can even feel the individual water drops in the shower.. I liken it to cannabis effects without the racing thoughts.
* ps, i have no affiliation with headspace
Rather, it's a combination of his accent and the 'meditation voice' thingy that just makes it sound nice to me. His voice is meditative enough to not feel like it interrupts, but "blokeish" (a certain British accent, I guess) and distinct enough that it doesn't feel too high-falutin and triggers my still rather primed anti-everything-new-agey senses.
To give some context: I'm currently dealing with the effects of what in hindsight was a slowly ramping up 'social burnout' that has left me with quite a bit of social anxiety, general anxiety, and somewhat unstructured lifestyle where I can easily spend days doing 'whatever I want' (freelancer with savings). I also at some point developed dependence on alcohol and weed, although that's been relatively easy to deal with when I keep my life simple and calm.
On top of that I've just been diagnosed with (mild) autism - the asperger's variety - although I suspect that I might not have been diagnosed as such without the anxious, stressful and unstructured life that I've been leading these past years. Too early to tell though.
I can have immense trouble concentrating on something, especially when there's some 'problem' in my life, and I have to all but give up on being productive if this problem is of the social kind. My mind just cannot keep from going back to it, analyze it, take it apart, and so on.
It can be ridiculously difficult for me to leave the house, eat food, get enough sleep, or do simple things like laundry or take a shower. Without external prompts, I just sort of sit around reading, play games, follow some obsession, worry, 'monologue' to myself, stop eating, and avoid social contact. This eventually turns my thoughts and behavior darker, if I let it continue.
On the other hand, it can also be ridiculously difficult for me to stop and take a rest when I'm in 'meet my one deadline' mode, or actively busy with things. I decide to do all the things at once and don't realize I'm in over my head until it's too late.
Balance is clearly not my talent, and, as is perhaps typical of those on the 'spectrum', I have trouble switching gears. It's like my mind controls like a big-ass tanker ship, while others are more like cars or trucks.
I still struggle with these things. And getting, if anything, has made it more difficult. Things are a bit quiet overall, but it takes me even more effort to snap out of things, to stop overanalyzing, to switch gears. I suppose that's what happens when you do a thing for so long.
Some things have helped a bit, like prioritizing 'simple' things like getting healthy food in me, going for walks/general exercise, taking in more sunlight, and setting small goals for myself. I've become more 'tactical' in the challenges I take on, as being only 'strategic' is not practical enough.
But the one thing that has, across the board, been most effective, is meditation. I meditate for about 20 minutes, and it's like rebooting my system. The effects are smaller when I keep getting distracted, which is frequently, but they're still huge in comparison to anything else I can do (nap, walk, read, etc.).
Sometimes I have a headache, and brief session makes it disappear. Sometimes I can't snap out of a social conflict I'm analyzing while I should really do some work that I've been putting off for days already, but after a brief session (which I'd also been putting off) I just sit down and start, which is more than half the battle.
Meditation has helped me eat better, because after a session I am suddenly aware of the hunger, and I have the peace to let myself make some food. It's helped me sleep better by quieting down a reeling mind that would usually keep me up for hours. It's helped me deal slightly better with conflicts, introspective 'insights', depressive days, and moods by reminding me to not take it all to seriously, and giving me some perspective (through absence of obsessive thought drowning everything else out).
Hell, if it's late afternoon and I have no energy to spare (quite common), a quick session gives me an energy boost and allows me to use the rest of my day (whether it's actual relaxation or work).
The form of meditation I do is mostly the zen variety, which is the form that is probably the most popular (mindfulness). It's really just sitting and the only 'effort' is to not go after every thought that tries to pull you with it, but rather observe that thought itself and try to let it go (but not try too hard!).
I use the Headspace app, which is awesome, but there are plenty of free resources too. I light a candle as a ritual, which means nothing to me in itself but helps me get in the mindset, so to speak. I have a little bench thingy that I can sit on, and simply seeing it in my room can 'trigger' me to use it.
As a 'thinking' type of guy, I also currently devour books on the topics of (zen) buddhism and meditation/mindfulness in general, because, well, my cognitive side needs some tickling too to keep at it. But the actual practice of sitting has been the most important part.
I can recommend the following stuff, in no particular order:
- books by Alan Watts, in particular 'The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are' as well as 'The Wisdom of Insecurity' - The Suzuki's: Shunryu Suzuki for practice and 'contemplation', and D.T. Suzuki one for the academic stuff) - Trying Not To Try, somewhat practical, mostly insightful, and just fun to read
And there's other stuff I can't think of right now.
Tripper 101: Bad trips happen because you get stuck in a bad place inside your head. Want something to change? Change something else. Easiest thing to change? Where you are physically and the music (or ambient sound) that is playing.
Reality Mantra: Cars are hard, fire is hot, and if you think you can fly, start from the ground!
And it's easy to understand why - because most of humanity's issues are consequences of the spiritual health of every individual living on the planet. If the group, as a whole, is spiritually and morally lost or deceived, things like wars, dictatorships or disregard for nature can and do take place.
If psychedelics can heal individuals, then we can eventually heal the whole of society, which is the proverbial moving on to the next level of global consciousness.
Without any kind of real data, instinctively I feel like the world is going through an explosion of psychedelic use, partly due to music festivals, partly due to dark markets and partly due to the good press and incredible amounts of information available online.
Another interesting aspect is that the users who experienced a powerful personal transformation often feel the need to spread the word and rightfully come to treat them as sacraments.
So I think more and more people will use them, which will hopefully lead us to a peaceful, healthy future.
AI, VR, Robots, Space exploration and Psychedelics .. Interesting times indeed.
The main problems I see is that 1) the use of psychedelics is a bit of a shortcut, and as such perhaps deceptively ineffective for long-term change (in contrast to, say, daily meditation), and 2) humans seem to be really good at always returning to some base-line of behavior, and I suspect that this applies equally to 'enlightenment'. This might explain the first point as well.
I only need to look at my friends and extended social circle(s) to see how relatively little their frequent use of psychedelics had on them. The ones where it seemed to have most effect were people who treated it as a more meaningful (and/or spiritual) experience, and especially those who changed aspects of their daily life through this.
Whenever someone brings up Steve Jobs, for example, and his mention of LSD as life-changing, my immediate thought is: 'yeah, but he also lived in an stark, empty house, was spiritually 'active' (don't remember what exactly, some buddhist movement), and went as far as changing his diet and not going to a doctor when he should have. Clearly it wasn't just the LSD, but an entire way of living to go along with that.
I'm afraid that if the use of psychedelics becomes a cultural norm, we'll just give it a small place in our lives where it can do little harm and is defanged of it's power. Like a nice rite of passage to go through before you get back to 'real life'.
It happened to me as a teenager. I had troubles concentrating, chalk boards would melt around teachers, trains coming in as snakes hissing, swallowing and spitting out people... at some point it stopped, but it surely wasn't always that enjoyable being "stuck" on a trip and feeling like moving through a dimension between dream and reality constantly. I mostly didn't care back then and thought it was kind of entertaining.
But I know now that I have some mental issues and LSD actually amplified the symptoms. So if you find yourself on the autistic scale and you're feeling depressed - probably better keep away from LSD... Your head is already so busy - try to do something more productive instead. ;)
Have to admit it was super interesting, but it left me with more bad effects than good in the end!
But for autistic scale - experience of synesthesia is on the opposite edge. http://www.wired.com/2014/10/magic-mushroom-brain/ Though, the "lack of control" needs to be addressed before starting adventure.
I agree that "hacking one's brain" is not for everyone, and its better to be safe than sorry.
Ironically, I had a bad trip on LSD where I thought I had a brain hemorrhage, and the experience damaged me for years.
It can definitely understand why it can be so damaging.
I have taken hallucinogens since and have been fine. I've never had anything nearly this bad on mushrooms, if that says anything. Mushrooms seem to guide you to a place, whereas LSD drags you there, whether you want to go or not.
That's interesting. I've never taken mushrooms but I've always heard the opposite, that LSD is easier to guide yourself and mushrooms drag you.
The way I was freed from that prison, however was spiritual and it wouldn't add much to share it here. It did show me that even though some psychoactives can guide you, others come without a teacher and anything can happen to you.
Disclaimer: regular ayahuasca user
At first I felt that I was perceiving the chaotic source of the projection that is our reality, which was interesting. This turned into a super vivid nightmare in which I went through previous points in my life in which I had in fact died and all the following memories were just imaginations made up in the moment of death. After this I regained some awareness of where I was but was convinced I had stabbed myself in the stomach for quite a while.
The dose was quite high, but I didn't feel that I had control over any of this at the time. I wouldn't trip without a sitter again (or a long playlist queued up - only had one CD which ran out).
Afterwards I noticed that other tryptamines I tried (DMT, LSD) risked flashbacks to that experience, although this could have been placebo. I have since had positive trips :)
I find myself having similar thoughts whenever I talk or think about having similar experiences. I've had small doses of mushrooms and LCD before which were a combination of good and ok experiences. DMT terrifies me for the reasons above. I like how I'm wired for the most part. I also know that I can have (and have had) some very bad experiences, even just with weed.
I had a close friend that experimented with a few things I'd like to not say, and it changed his life profoundly for a long time, and still impacts him today 3 or 4 years later. The changes, for the most part, were mostly not good (from my perspective). I would say that he "lost his mind" for at least a couple of months. But he also made some changes that were absolutely positive.
I'd like to see what all the fuss is about. But do I need to? Will life as I know it survive? For the moment I'm not seeking this experience out. I feel like if it comes to me in the right setting I'll likely participate, but until then, I'll sit on the sidelines and hope for the research (and laws) to improve.
What sets me off hard on this article is that the writer hallucinated from hash. I suppose anyone can have an off-the-charts response, but I've never seen anyone hallucinate from it. It's also rather striking how much of a 'hero' story this is. Started as a 'typical busy guy', 'struck by lightning', 'fear of death', 'start of epic quest', 'triumphed by wonder potion'. It's all so perfect.
Maybe I'm just paranoid, and I applaud any (including this) discussion of taboos, but I can't help but feeling skeptic about the genuinity of this article.
I guess it depends on your definition of "hallucinate". I don't know anyone who's had the sort of obvious visual hallucinations associated with many psychedelics but plenty of people (myself included) have experienced mild auditory hallucinations and strong distortions in the perception of time and physical movement under the influence of a strong dose of cannabis.
This subject is extensive. Hashish can be extraordinarily psychedelic.
var self = (function LSD(self) {
if (self) {
return {
ontology: new Ontology(),
ego: null
}
}
else return self
edit: spacing. But seriously though, LSD can encourage/force you to re-think things you've taken for granted or never really understood. Like what time is, or how empathy works.
Reduces your ego to null and forces you to rethink things you've taken for granted, while contemplating your existence within rules of it.
There is the concept of the waking dream. That we are always in a dream which keeps being guided by our senses. Where the mind corrects the dream based on what we feel, see, and hear.
Psychedelics seem to break this process. When people say they have "Profound" experiences, do they mean they finally understand this? This sense of wholeness.
Reading the experiences people have had, I feel I have had similar ones through meditation.
Maybe these drugs are just a shortcut.
In a way that nothing else seems to.
That's exactly what they are. Few people reach through meditation what these drugs can show anyone, but meditation will get you there as well, perhaps with more control.
A fun passage from http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2011/07/dispatc...
"The serious heroin aficionado, if still functional, lives his junkie life surrounded by poor dumb muggles who believe they're getting "high on life." Bullshit! High is spelled heroin. Your muggle can't even imagine high. It's like trying to explain electricity to a blind man."
Heroin is a whole other animal, I'm not sure you're going to find many people comparing it to meditation.
The quickness that it achieves such shifts was mind-blowing for me - I feel that with meditation it is a long slow process of developing a sense of these things, such that you might put a much more spiritual meaning behind it rather than biological.
I always understood this as an emptiness rather than as a "bad trip."
"The dark night of the soul" usually occurs after you feel like you have made spiritual progress, in whatever tradition you practice, and then to have it suddenly disappear.
The dark night of the soul is a period of disconnection, of feeling as if you have been abandoned by God, of not knowing how to get back on track.
^ that sounds to me a lot like a common "bad trip" on LSD.
The author paints an image of conflict between himself on lsd, and himself off lsd. Himself the perceiver, and himself the analyzer. I don't think these are integral to the experience. He mentions perceptions like '...the notion of “teetering” was meaningless too—I was on both sides of the precipice at once'. I can identify this dissolution of boundaries and commingling of opposites in my own experiences. If you try to interpret the experience in terms of dichotomies and distinctions, your words will be inadequate to describe it. The inadequacy of such understanding might agitate you. There is something here for the analytical mind to gain too: learning to coexist with uncertainty, doubt, paradox, and mystery and yet keep going and keep analyzing. You don't have to lose your head on LSD, but you'll find in the deepest places that there is no distinction at all between the analyzer and the dreamer.
In regular old life, too, I believe that distinctions, drawing a line between 'this' and 'that' can be as much a handicap to understanding as an aid. Distinctions tell things apart, but unity and continuity are as integral to reality as difference and change. The wholeness of being engendered by psychedelic experiences is difficult to describe because distinctions are the easy aspect of language, and wholeness the difficult. True ugliness and true beauty walk hand in hand in that strange place. It does one well to let go of the distinction between good and bad when one is on a trip. Forcing it won't help though. "Have you ever tried to relax? It is a paradox!"
I read Laozi for the first time at the end of a "bad" trip. It was a joy. To this day, it is the only text that makes perfect sense to me in the waking world and that other world, the world of dreams. That was my last trip. I wonder how the next one will be, when the time, place, and person are right for it?
No, it's not. Anger management is possible. (Often other emotions as well).
1) "It is a paradox": Relaxation is not the absence of anger, relaxation is the abandonment of stress.
Stress is the clinging resistance to things as they are.
You can't "try to relax" because trying implies dissatisfaction with your un-relaxed state, and dissatisfaction is stress.
You can only relax fully by not worrying about whether you are relaxed or not.
2) "Anger mgt is possible" : strong emotions, even positive ones, also cause disturbance.
Disturbance is a form of stress. So to relax, one has to first learn to deal with emotions. Not to say you have to try to get rid of emotions, which would make them stronger, but to find a way to experience them without struggle.
Once that is achieved then you can relax.
But more subtly in order to relax, one does have to begin by first being dissatisfied with stress, which is itself stressful, but if this dissatisfaction is used skillfully it can help lead to relaxation. :-)
So, in order to fully relax, one has to engineer disturbances that are less stressful than the stress you are trying to eliminate, and to modify your approach as you go.
It also gets complicated because there are feedback loops in the system. Manipulating one thing, brings up another thing to deal with etc...
I understand the philosophical point you're making, but it's an abstract, philosophical, existential stress that you're talking about, not everyday stress. Simply the non-enlightened state of mind, caring about distinctions etc.
And then you go on explaining how you can't rationalize yourself out of that state-of-mind. That's true. When you want to relax you step back. You don't "engineer disturbances" or whatever. You step back and calm down. You breathe, you shake off the ballast etc.
> So, in order to fully relax, one has to engineer disturbances that are less stressful than the stress you are trying to eliminate, and to modify your approach as you go. It also gets complicated because there are feedback loops in the system. Manipulating one thing, brings up another thing to deal with etc...
I think you're trapping yourself in your own traps. Relaxation isn't an intellectual thing like that. You don't need to think through all the small-scale biology of muscle contractions to walk, either.
It depends of course what kind of "relax" we are talking about. Do you mean getting rid of anxiety? Where you can worry about the fact that you worry? Sure those are tougher nuts to solve just mentally. You often need external things for that, like exercise, therapy, medication etc.
But I often feel worked up on some issue to the point of faster heartbeat etc, and then I feel like "hey, let's not get worked up so much" and then my heart slows down again. People are often advised to "count to 10" in such cases. This monotony looks a bit like meditation-chants. Perhaps it's a kind of mini-meditation, I don't know.
One thing I know is that trying to engineer it, thinking with that usual nerdish attitude doesn't help (at least me). Relaxation is an action, it's not a logical mathematical derivation.
Sorry, maybe I was trying to be too clever. Basically I agree with you.
Breathing and counting to ten are perfectly fine ways of dispelling stress. Breathing deeply counteracts the sympathetic response to stress, counting is a way of waiting it out, allowing the mental loops that can sustain a stressful train of thought to dissolve.
I still maintain though that "You can't try to relax".
Notice that the techniques you describe don't consist of willing yourself to "relax" they are other means that break a physiological or cognitive state that then allows the relaxation to re-establish itself, one physical the other cognitive.
Or maybe not. Maybe you can do self-suggestion. I certainly know people who can easily dig themselves into hole of fury, getting angry at someone (not present), making assumptions, getting more angry at them, imagining further nastiness about that person etc. If you can make yourself more frustrated, perhaps you can also make yourself less frustrated. Whatever.
I think that worrying and analyzing this very topic (whether you can "try to X") too extensively is not terribly useful either. It's a bit like ivory tower programmers who read all sorts of Agile books, Clean Code, The Mythical Man-Month etc. without actually spending lots of time writing code. One can do lots of philosophical back and forth based on principles, but in the end it comes down to actions.
If you think you can't try to relax, you probably also won't be able to. Or maybe yes. There are limitations to what can happen in the brain, but there is too much self-referencing going on when talking about chainging one's own conscious state. It usually leads into a lot of bunk, new age whatever magic stuff.
Anyways, one way to get rid of frustration is to not worry about ways to get rid of frustration. Including this one.
You have to do it quick enough so that your consciousness doesn't jump in and say "but I can't try to follow this advice either". You have to let the advice act on you. "But I can't try to let anything" :D But then a point comes when you notice that it just happened. The best summary is to "let things be", while knowing that letting or not letting it is bullshit, there are no permissions involved in this type of thing anyway. (Seems like I couldn't resist to spill out some text like this. I think there is some value in thinking about this, but not too much and definitely not if done too deeply and seriously.)
But to get at the subtler levels of stress, you need a plan.
The strategies that work on the everyday forms of stress become a disturbance when trying to eliminate the subtler levels of stress.
We agree I think, we are just talking about different levels of stress.
Theorizing isn't the goal. There are a lot of "theory buddhists" who get really into the esoteric philosophy in the scriptures.
I think they are wasting their time.
Stress reduction is something you practice, the theory is only there for when you encounter unfamiliar situations and aren't sure how to proceed.
Of course this whole thread shows how I don't always remember to follow my own advice.
They have actual clinics in Mexico where they hook you up to an IV of the drug (oral ingestion problematic for whatever reason) and assign you a trip-sitter who has two jobs: for the first hour or two, when the drug makes you ill in an ayahuasca-like way, they help you get through it, go to and from the bathroom, etc. For the second part, which lasts around eight hours, the trip-sitter just hangs out and chats with you.
According to my friend, it was an emotionally much deeper journey than ayahuasca, with much more pronounced long-term results.
Evidently it gets rid of a lot of your deep-seated emotional and psychological issues (specifically, she says she's parted with "a shitload of petty little grudges against random people"), but it also, as she puts it, "takes all of your armor off". For example she reports that aggressive drivers used to be a source of mild amusement, but now she gets very saddened and anxious when another driver gives her the finger and refuses to let her change lanes.
document.getElementById("abnm").remove();
ITT: a lot of 100% accurate suggestion that understanding the concept of 'set and setting' is invaluable when experimenting with altered states...!
I think that quote was the most meaningful part of this article for me, declassifying / rescheduling drugs that are currently relegated to the "Scheduled 1/No accepted medical use", and the DEA almost NEVER granting research permits, not only creates unnecessary criminal felons in the United States, it has a second harm of suppressing research into as-yet unknown presumptive medically beneficial aspects of these substances.
2 nights ago i had My First #Ayahuasca Experience. The Quick Post Mortem
- 10yrs of therapy.. in 1 night. - 2x more energy. - full chacras alignment - 3x more focus - 3x less stress - a more positive attitude - 100x more confidence - deep sense of gratitude - mega bursts of creative non-linear thinking - less physical pain ( stemming from long-term computer use ) - awareness & empathy ( which is hard for me being a lonely child ) - due to the pre-diet prep..i've now finally become vegan.
You know that that is mumbo jumbo BS, right?
Well, isn't that true for anyone believing in mumbo jumbo? Shouldn't truth be even more important?
It's pretty hard to describe something so outside the everyday experience with 'normal' words - I try to view such 'mumbo jumbo' as just another metaphor, doesn't have to mean something supernatural is going in.
It's not just your brain that thinks, you know. Your body has a way of knowing, processing and remembering experiences.
Sure, it's a pre-scientific system, but there are insights to be gained from it.
[1] http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/gut-feelings-the-s...
I'd recommend Anodea Judith's "Eastern Body, Western Mind" for a solid introduction - she has a master's in clinical psych and it's a good book that isn't all new age BS, though you do have to be willing to try and understand how metaphors work... it's just a model, much like software is really only insubstantial thought-stuff that through the interface of hardware, actually can interact with the world.
The problem with a lot of "New Agers" is that they can't think abstractly - they are like the early Christians who got laughed at by the pagans for believing their version of the "dead and resurrected god" myth was the literal truth. But from a psychological angle, such a myth is very informative about something part of the "human condition".
Psychedelics aren't for me, personally, due to anxiety, but they are fascinating.
Jobs also rated LSD as "one of the two or three most important experiences of my life." His experimentation with drugs is well-documented in his SF-86 (USG security clearance form), since he knew no matter what he said they had to clear him.
The whole document is kind of hilarious. Imagine Steve Jobs sitting across from Federal agents explaining a traffic arrest for his driving antics, and talking to them about acid blotters.
But the story of Jobs' clearance is especially funny.
Remember, this is the same Steve Jobs that only ate fruit for years, didn't often wear shoes, put his feet up on other people's desks, refused to put a license plate on his car, parked in handicapped spaces, and was generally an anti-authority hippie his entire life. It's fun to imagine him being grilled by the CSS.
That said, don't falsify a clearance document. It's a Federal crime, for starters. But the most severe typical consequence you'll face is having it committed to your clearance record forever. So if you lie on say a Secret clearance application form, there's no way in hell you're getting a TS/SCI.
You can absolutely get a clearance with past history of criminal behavior and drug use, provided sufficient time has elapsed and you've demonstrated reform.
Just don't lie.
That's a tricky one. They can be very helpful for anxiety and obsessive disorders. Getting a whack with the chemistry stick can help you settle into a better place. But it's not ideal to go in afraid, no doubt.
The cultural terror of drugs comes and goes over time and at some moments we can actually have real discussions and research. I hope we're swinging around to that again.
I hope you find something non-chemical that helps you.
Personally, psychedelics are just too high risk with my default internal attitude, even if they could help.
I have some odd form of somatic anxiety. It's basically chronic pain that varies with situational anxiety. I've had seizures, so it's probably some neurological disorder we don't really understand yet.
Mindfulness meditation, sensory deprivation therapy, CBT, journaling, and (by far most importantly) extremely intense exercise all help. All the first and second line treatments have failed (Benzodiazepines, SSRIs, pregabalin, MAOIs, etc.)
Basically, learning to live with the pain was a long and difficult process. It initially eroded my intelligence by about thirty IQ points, which was terrifying. My LSAT score, for example went from very high 170s (near perfect) to around 150 (dead average), before going back up.
I think most people around here could relate to how scary that can be, especially when intelligence is a key aspect of how you self-identify.
But eventually I learned to manage it, and my normal functioning has mostly returned.
I didn't have any profound experiences, it was just fun to do. I did liquid and blotters, started at two doubles, then over time usually two "quads" which is 8 hits of insane quality Sand produced acid. It was way too much but I was never out of control, when it got crazy I just thought wow this shit is great.
I did however always get sick whenever I tried Shrooms, that was pretty awful tripping and puking at the same time.
I'd be getting a testing kit, along with trusting your source and all the other sensible checks.
NBOMes won't kill you but they are not without risk. High dosages not recommended. They are not LSD and should never be sold as LSD.
I didn't read the whole article but anyone writing about LSD today should warn against NBOMes.
Personally though, I feel we shouldn't be promoting the use of psychedelic drugs for recreational purposes in any form(such as commenting how awesome the experience of using LSD was) and especially not in public forums.
Please speak to people who have used it (like me) and can assess how you personally will handle it. I will say LSD is a broad-sword drug and should be used with care. It is not playful. It will last as long as the dose, which may be longer than you had planned to trip. Generally only sleep will stop you tripping, and if you are tripping hard, you will not e able to sleep. One does not 'sober up' like beer.
A lot of the effects depend on your personality, id, self confidence and any bad experiences you may have locked inside. Your biological reaction may be the lesast of concerns.
LSD takes you on a journey, and you may not come the same person. It may give you a bad-trip, where your worst fears and memories manifest x 1000.
I have seen many stable friends flip out, even when having the same dose in the same environment.
Always have supportive straight friends who understand each time you are experimenting. Bear in mind you may be up for 36 hours as a result and they need to lead their normal lives.
LSD starts as a liquid. Eating a drop or two is sometimes is how you take it. But frequently that liquid is dropped with an eye-dropper onto cardboard. This cardboard is perforated and torn into tiny squares.
Roughly one drop per square [also called a Tab of Acid ].
But there you go.
1. How concentrated is the liquid acid?
2. How much was put onto the little square?
3. How long ago was this all made?
4. How accurate was the (illegal) chemist who made the LSD in the first place?
I will say that one TINY drop of acid is enough to make you trip for 24 hours. And on the square of cardboard the LSD is not necessarily evenly distributed, so a corner of the square can be where 90% of the active ingredient is. The effects vary wildly: Some LSD is quite visual, some has almost no visuals but plenty of mind-messing.
All of these factors combine to mean it is EXTREMELY difficult for anyone to estimate what a low dose is. Especially someone experimenting for the first few times.
Please research carefully, and if you still decide to experiment, ensure you are in a safe environment with understanding people.
-------
"I've read that if you take an extremely low dose it's non-psychotic but still has a number of positive cognitive effects"
Non-psychotic depends a lot on who-you-are: not the dose. I don't know you, and further I don't know anyone else reading this in the future.
Depending on the type of person you are, you could flip out badly on any dose.
LSD can unleash things inside you. People who you love... you may see them as snakes/undead. You may see your face melt off. More importantly you will feel horrified when this happens. It takes a lot of training to overcome the horror (if it happens).
I am not going to give the green light for experimentation with something that has such power when the downsides are so grim.
All my friends who flipped out were sold on the Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds version of events. But the variability of the ingredients, their situation and their personality sometimes made it awful.
-----------------------------
[1] This is from my 2009 HN post
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=654676 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=655559
It seeps from your pores & gets on their fur.
They'll groom themselves & have a HELL of a bad trip.
Then their liver will fail & they'll die a miserable death.
Out of nowhere, indeed. Doing drugs is not a harmless activity, folks.
Get some facts about LSD: http://www.drugfreeworld.org/drugfacts/lsd.html
I would encourage you to read the wikipedia entry about the organiztion behind the site: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_for_a_Drug-Free_Wor...
Almost everything on that site is misinformation, and no sources are ever cited. There is certainly danger associated with the use of any drugs but misinformation and fear mongering are not the way to go.