Hacker News Reader

Comment by vokep | Hacker News Reader

Take LSD or mushrooms before you go. Not because it will make you no longer be suicidal, but because it is one of the most powerful experiences that you can achieve in this universe. To die without such experience, is incredible tragedy, especially for someone with your perspective. It also may inform you of ways you can optimize your impact on departure, given your reasoning about being a 'weak seed'.

But its really best if you don't kill yourself.

View on HN

Telling someone with mental issues to take strong psychotropic drugs for the first time, without anyone to keep an eye of them is one of the most retarded things I've heard in a long time.

They've already decided on suicide, so does it really matter?

Ethically: yeah.

Why?

Sorry, I'm not trying to be argumentative or anything, I'm just trying to understand your point of view.

The way I see it is if he's made up his mind, then there are really three possible outcomes by suggesting drugs: 1. best case, he feels better, yay! 2. worst case, it makes him worse, he kills himself, but was going to do so anyway. :( 3. he has an interesting experience before the end.

I don't see any ethical issues with suggesting something that if it goes wrong, leads to the same outcome as not doing anything. To me, it seems like he has everything to gain and nothing to lose. I'd like to hear your opposing view, though, so I can understand where the flaw in my reasoning is, if there is one.

Because you do not know how the trip will impact him. It could be that he self-harms in a way which only makes things permanently worse. It could be that he hurts others during the trip.

There are so many factors which could go badly wrong that it is (in my opinion) unethical to suggest this is a good approach.

If only mentally healthy people took psychedelic drugs, almost nobody would take psychedelic drugs. There is no true answer to who should take them. Even those who seem healthiest among us now could break under the mental strain of these drugs. And those who seem most mentally unhealthy could stand to benefit the most. And to assume that suicidal thoughts equates to someone being dangerous is just as “retarded” as calling the idea of this person taking psychedelic drugs “retarded”.

Thank you, I was going to upvote you and leave it at that. But I can't help but say that listening to hand-wringing busy bodies like the individual above was why I was in a prescription, broken minded hell for 7 years straight before the moment of pure eureka that the entheogenic experience can bring.

They certainly do not help folks like the original poster already prone to anxiety and in need of warm comfort rather than cold cynicism.

I will never understand why people fear that which they do not understand. The more I learn the nature of fear - lies that we tell ourselves and each other - the more I have a distaste for them.

Ok, I understand. Thanks!

What if they took some precautions, eg someone was with them to make sure that they don't do any harm (to themselves or others)? People generally recommend that one take psychedelics with a sitter, after all. Or is the concern also about their mental state in the coming days/weeks/however long after the trip?

Don't backtrack yourself. The day I took shrooms was the day I understood my place in the grand organism and the true power unto a god that each person has in their potential and the only inhibitor is how willing they are to confront that level of their own power. I only continue to understand myself and those around me, and how to forge my life to its fullest with every instance I take entheogens.

I have very little respect for hand-wringing types like those above. All it does is plant undue anxiety in a mind that could easily be calm waters. I could go so far as to say I loathe them. But I'm trying hard to see this person's point.

Also, I can't believe I'm becoming active after years again to infodump this. But I can only hope the original parent sees it and knows they're not alone.

Edit to be abundantly clear: Entheogens did nothing short of saving my life. And it has since only been an upward trend. To the extent that I hilariously enough stopped coffee after a powerful experience forced me to observe just what such things can do to anxiety and blood pressure and the like. On an intimate level akin to detached observation from outside a lab. Except one's own mind.

Oh, I’m not backtracking. I personally don’t have any issues with it, I was just trying to understand where AlegedAlec draws the line.

I’ve personally been what some people might call “careless” with drugs in the past, in that I maybe wasn’t the most mentally stable and I’ve taken drugs when others would have warned me not to (eg while depressed) and I personally feel like they helped me through it. Ketamine especially has made a huge difference, even in very small doses, although in large doses it gave me this overwhelming and lasting sense of connectedness with the world. Since I spent a lot of my life struggling with loneliness (and not for lack of friends or people around me), that really really helped me.

I’m glad to hear that you are doing better too!

I feel you re. integration and connectiveness. I do not envy you for having issues. But I can say that if I waited until I wasn't "depressed" (what does this mean in the wider scope of our stories we tell each other? When you can't know good without the bad? I think we're all depressed else we wouldn't know happiness) I likely would have dropped off a chair instead of dropping some caps and stems.

You have to understand where these mental hangups are coming from sometimes. And it is my most sincere hope the OP can see what all of us are trying to say before letting the abyss take them. I so hope they know we've felt it pulling. Even if they aren't interested in drugs in the least I hope they know they're not alone in any of this.

I'm not a bad enough dood to explore much of these new drugs. Mostly experienced in the classic 3 and once DMT (hope to again someday when I figure out how to make the rig work). But from what I've seen in this thread and vague posts in the past it seems like ketamine offers a very empathic experience.

I'll never forget the day I figured out how to cry again, cry healthily, thanks to these things. Like a ghost of all my missing emotions I sloughed off in the distant past came back to me. It is wonderful.

And can people please, please stop the senseless cynicism in this subthread. I'm being reminded why I stopped posting on HN. No matter what your personal position is. It is ultimately irrelevant to this OP and the energy you're putting into handwringing can easily be put into reminding them of the fact that they are not alone. There's someone right there with them and sharing in it for one reason or another. And we all have a responsibility to take care of them in the same way we do our better selves.

This is literally survivorship bias.

The people who were suicidal and who took psycadelics that didn't work for them can't comment here. They're dead.

Oh spare me. Not only do I not care to debate pseudo-intellectually in this fashion but my sample size is far beyond myself. Once again, cold cynicism doesn't make you cool. No more than unsubstantiated idealism.

where do you people buy this stuff?

I must be the most uncool person in the world :(

Seconding this. LSD and psilocybin provide transportation to a place within unlike any other.

I’d add ketamine to that list. First start with small doses. A larger dose where you fully dissassociate is quite an experience.

I'll add another one to the list: DMT.

I normally wouldn't recommend it, because, while the good trips are profoundly amazing, I've also heard of some pretty bad ones and unless you have some experience with psychedelics and have good mental health, it can be a traumatic experience, but since the guy has already decided he wishes to die, maybe it doesn't matter.

I personally find Ketamine quite therapeutic, at any dose. The recent research suggests it may be effective as an antidepressant, although I guess its still too early to say for sure that its a good long term medication (and of course, self-medicating is never a great idea).

(Of course, for anyone reading this, please do your own research before doing any drug and be safe!)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com