Buddhist Temple Left Without Monks After They All Test Positive for Meth
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(IIRC, it's a dopamine reuptake inhibitor that can also turn into a dopamine release agent at high doses. The release agent is the dangerous part.)
When I first started my ADHD medication (dextroamphetamine), I had a dopamine high for around a week, and that helped me understand why people get so addicted.
My brain immediately worked far better than usual as well, but I couldn't direct it. I could socialize more easily, go about tasks more easily, but I was dramatically less cognizant of what I was doing and why. That part was even worse.
I can't imagine taking a proper dose of something like meth and feeling like that * 1000. I guess it might be nice in the strange way that things like meth are "nice", but... It's literally insanity.
The worst part of ADHD meds is the part where I do things without needing to think about it. I can go on autopilot and just get stuff done... But I actually don't have a good grasp on the what and why part. My brain is just like "alright, do do do!". Externally it probably looks pretty unremarkable. Internally it's quite unsettling, though useful at times.
I was extremely easy to distract, I immediately took every opportunity I saw. Clean the bathroom, take a shower, make dinner. As soon as I got reminded of the existence of something, I'd immediately do it.
At the end of each day I would have to catch up to all the tasks I started and never finished because I kept getting distracted. Draft messages or emails containing thousands of words, other essays, research and planning for personal projects, a million browser tabs, and so on.
Whereas unmedicated I do nothing... on amphetamine I did everything, always.
I no longer found any value in games, media or entertainment of any kind. I would write essays and do deep scientific research to occupy my brain. I never got bored; in fact I was completely unable to get bored. I could lay in bed for hours only using my imagination and still not get bored.
I can't decide if that was good or bad. I know that I at least shouldn't be getting bored constantly, that's an ADHD thing.
It's interesting to hear from someone who apparently had a similar experience, but considers it eerie and unsettling.
I likened it to unlocking "the other half" of my life. I want to be both on and off medication. If I was on medication 24/7, I would lose the life that I currently have. If I was off medication 24/7... well, I'd still miss being able to do things, even though the meds seem to have zapped my depression more or less permanently.
I can sort of imagine what taking a "proper" dose of meth would be like... it turns into a release agent at high enough doses, and that causes a much more intense effect... but also neurotoxicity. You do not want to develop a tolerance to dopamine itself. You can basically end up with ADHD much, much worse than what can occur naturally.
Here's a fun bit of trivia: there's a prescription drug called Desoxyn that is basically just methamphetamine hydrochloride.
> I can sort of imagine what taking a "proper" dose of meth would be like...
So I used regular amphetamines for years (which ended up leading to seeking my ADHD diagnosis) while my exposure to meth is very limited (due to not wanting a neurotoxic habit), but to me there is both a quantitative and a qualitative difference between the two: dextroamphetamine feels focused and urgent whereas methamphetamine feels more exuberant and capable, and I suspect that of those two flavours, the former is actually more compatible with my ADHD than the latter. I'm already capable, what I could do with more of is urgency and focus, and definitely not an excess of exuberance :)
I'd actually be inclined to agree! my norepinephrine levels already seem to be so high naturally that the levoamph in Adderall causes executive dysfunction to get way worse. (That's why I'm on pure dextroamph instead~)
Plus, even completely unmedicated, I can fling myself around, lift heavy things, and do tons of work just fine... as long as my stupid brain will agree with me.
Dextroamph on its own already raises that to such a ridiculous level that if I'm not careful on it, my body can actually act on thoughts before I even try to move. That has only happened once, but it was so fascinating that I noticed it immediately and committed every detail to memory.
Some people might've been properly terrified by that. But autistic brain does not care. :)
I'm actually looking into starting some sort of norepinephrine blocker because it's also the cause of my huge overheating issue that prevents me from being comfortable in any room above 15C/60F. Had no idea what it could be until levoamph tipped me off. Thanks ADHD! lol
I've spent a lot of time pondering how conscious I am and my answer is not very, what we label as "impulsiveness" and "hyperactivity" are just symptoms of the fact that our brain is in control much more of the time than the average person, whose abilities to self-sooth and visualise and utilise goal-directed behaviour mean that their minds take control far more readily than mine does.
As I side note I suffered anxious sweats for a few years - except when I took ketamine. Now there's a substance that can make you really feel connected to your body (operate your body in manual mode!) while also letting you experience your mind trying to retrofit a coherent narrative for the previous 20 minutes or so during which it had been basically turned off, leaving the brain in charge.
Hehe, ketamine is definitely something I want to try at some point. Dexedrine is probably going to end up being somewhat of a gateway drug for me. But there are tons of resources online for harm reduction, to learn how to try things safely, without hurting yourself or getting addicted. Ketamine and LSD are definitely on my list of "things I want to try before I die".
I actually do have a mind's eye, but I don't have the ability to focus on it whenever I want, or daydream whenever I want, without other mental distractions getting in the way. I developed it because I used it as an escape from reality.
Maybe I can't be entertained just by daydreaming, but I used to roleplay and write stories every day for years, using my mind's eye to visualize it and feel it with my other senses (not just vision). Like, I leaned heavily into that. That has always been my favorite thing to do. Because.... my IRL body would not listen to me, so being able to do things in my mind was endlessly valuable...
On dexedrine I can daydream for hours and control what happens. Because my mind's eye actually has the ability to entertain me in that state. But it's not particularly vivid (maybe it's not so well-developed after all?) which is one reason why I want to try LSD.
A couple days ago (I think my last day of dexedrine) I actually had some daydream I couldn't control, and it was exciting. Sure, the actual daydream was very dark and scary. I felt real fear in my body, I felt like I could die. But it was so exciting and fascinating the whole time. Even if I had a bad trip on LSD, I'd probably love it anyway.
Also, on dexedrine I appear to be a decent artist despite not having drawn anything for over 6 years. because, guess what, I drew some sci-fi weapon at school, a teacher confiscated the one single drawing, and I Never Drew Another Thing Ever Again. Thanks teacher, for ruining 6 years I could've spent practicing art. I used to love to draw and I could've actually gotten good. Sometimes these things make me so angry.
> And the other "bad trip" trap of getting stuck in a mental loop is also ineffective against the ADHD brain's inability to filter out distractions
Being autistic makes it possible for parts of my brain to get stuck in a loop even if "I" am not. It causes huge panic attacks. But only if it's logically something to be worried about.
But I don't really think a bad trip will happen. I'm pretty ok in terms of being able to perceive and change parts of my mental state (that is an essential skill to control DID, you know). Logically, everything is fine right now. Plus I'm looking forward to the whole thing so I'm pretty sure I'll be okay~
> And then you can try combining it with ketamine for even more consciousness alteration :)
PFFT, maybe one day~
If I could summarize it, it's that I lost my ability to buffer the various seeds of what the subconscious mind generates in order to spur the conscious mind into action. That strange boundary where thoughts "come from"; normally I'm able to observe that and contemplate it (usually too much and for too long, to my own detriment). With meds, it's like that boundary widens substantially and blurs as well... My ability to interpret what's coming across weakens, I become less critical of what I'm thinking about or doing, why I'm doing it, and so on.
I feel like I lose a part of what makes me who I am. Though people often say that because they feel less creative or something, I think I have the sense that I live a less conscious life on meds. I do get more done, but I'm not truly aware of what I'm doing. That's what's so unsettling to me.
It isn't like I become a robot or I forget hours of my day (in fact I might even remember more of my day). It's more like I act on unexamined thoughts far more often. It's probably just my personal philosophy getting in the way, but something seems deeply wrong with that. Akin to the unexamined thought not being worth thinking, I worry that actions based on unexamined impulses may not be worth acting upon. To some degree. Doing my taxes is always worthwhile and I can't delay that, so meds are great in that regard. On a day to day basis though, I get the sense that I lose a piece of myself to the noisy, urgent, relentless impulses to just do, do, do.
And again, it isn't an intense sensation and I can sit still and relax. I make it seem like the meds are getting me super wound up when it's not like that. The difference is quite subtle, but I suppose it changes aspects of my mind which I'm hyper-sensitive to.
Hopefully that makes sense!
It provides a laser-focus on whatever goal is in front of you, but if something catches your attention despite that then that laser-focus gets pointed towards the new thing and whatever it was you were in the middle of is now totally out of mind. You definitely need to realise this if you want to make effective use of amphetamines to improve focus, otherwise you end up with an unconsolidated melange of half-baked projects and aborted deep-dives :)
> The worst part of ADHD meds is the part where I do things without needing to think about it. I can go on autopilot and just get stuff done... But I actually don't have a good grasp on the what and why part. My brain is just like "alright, do do do!". Externally it probably looks pretty unremarkable. Internally it's quite unsettling, though useful at times.
For me the best part of ADHD medication was waking up in the morning and "just remembering" the thing I'd thought of before I went to sleep and had tagged as "I'll think about it in the morning". Our brains are designed to operate things without us having to consciously think about them and that's a good thing as consciousness is a scarce resource, especially for those of us who have to operate under ADHD's working memory and self-soothing deficits. Having parts of your brain start working as intended is pretty eerie in an existential way that I had to work through in my own head, but I think framing the autopilot positively is useful. I mean it's amazing how little conscious thought is required to get through the day if you think about it :)
Interesting, actually. I've gotten conflicting info on this before.
I've been told by my doctor that he'll happily raise my dosage over time to meet tolerance, but been told by others that developing this tolerance is Bad(TM) because I'd reach neurotoxic levels, and the only way to use stimulants is to constantly take week- or month-long breaks, entirely defeating the purpose of trying to treat ADHD.
My entire problem is that I have periods of being able to do stuff but then long periods of not being able to do anything. The periods of not being able to do anything are the problem!
Do you have any opinion on this?
But that aside the urgency and focus that dexamphetamine provide is tiring over long periods I think, which is why I've not sought it out as a medication option and settled on slow-release methylphenidate - I get a tiny dopamine kick in the morning after taking them, which is enough to wake my mind up from hibernation in time for the stand-up, and it's otherwise... just better than when I'm not on it? It's been almost 15 years now and it still helps, tolerance is when your brain adapts to the medication and that's actually what I want, right?
Not sure if any of that was helpful or not, but that's roughly how I see things.
Haven't been able to get my new prescription yet (ran out yesterday) but other than that, I take 30mg/day dexedrine XR.
> ADHD makes us time blind and that robs us of motivation to do things.
That's one way to put it. I like to put it as "your own brain will stop listening to you", because it will. No matter how much you yell and plead at yourself to do something, it won't happen if your brain just won't let you.
> But that aside the urgency and focus that dexamphetamine provide is tiring over long periods I think, which is why I've not sought it out as a medication option and settled on slow-release methylphenidate
I've consistently been recommended ritalin/methylphenidate as something to try, I do plan on trying it at some point but dexedrine helps me so much I don't think I need to go to anything else. I still want to try methylphenidate though to see how it is.
> tolerance is when your brain adapts to the medication and that's actually what I want, right?
Probably~ I was somewhat high for 4-5 days at first but it was actually incredibly distracting because I would do crazy stuff like fall over in the shower because it felt too good for me to focus. That shower was just repaired, I nearly broke it again.
> Not sure if any of that was helpful or not, but that's roughly how I see things.
Always nice hearing someone else's viewpoint~
Heh, snap. I ran out of my medication yesterday and haven't got my new prescription either. What got me this month was that I only got 28 days worth of pills which is so petty - I don't get 31 days worth on the majority of months that have more than 30 days! But anyway, that aside I'm glad to be in the UK where I get my 108mg/day methylphenidate and 10mg/day Ramipril for a tenner a month.
> I've consistently been recommended ritalin/methylphenidate as something to try, I do plan on trying it at some point but dexedrine helps me so much I don't think I need to go to anything else. I still want to try methylphenidate though to see how it is.
Be aware that you might be underwhelmed when compared to dexedrine, the effects are way less obvious immediatetly - methylphenidate is closer to cocaine chemically than amphetamine in fact. There's an old (2006) book called "Speed, Ecstasy, Ritalin: The Science of Amphetamines" that's pretty interesting if you want more detail.
> Probably~ I was somewhat high for 4-5 days at first but it was actually incredibly distracting because I would do crazy stuff like fall over in the shower because it felt too good for me to focus. That shower was just repaired, I nearly broke it again.
Lol, I've managed to destroy a freezer and my own PC through amphetamine-induced over-zealous housecleaning sessions.
> Always nice hearing someone else's viewpoint~
Likewise! If you've never watched this lecture from a renowned ADHD expert to parents of ADHD children about how it affects them then I found it very illuminating about a lot of the effects of ADHD that aren't so obvious but can have a profound influence upon your life i.e. having aphantasia explains why being told to "imagine this" was always something that frustrated me because I couldn't do it in the way the other person would be able to do - but I didn't know that I couldn't, and neither did they.
...it costs $50 just to get 15 days of Dexedrine. But that's with the complimentary "I had no idea my insurance wouldn't cover this" discount, which is only valid the first time. Now it'll be something like $300. That's almost half of the monthly income that the government took from us because we're apparently not poor enough to need it! (The government is wrong, btw.)
> Be aware that you might be underwhelmed when compared to dexedrine, the effects are way less obvious immediatetly
For me, the main differences between being medicated and unmedicated are:
- I don't feel tired all fucking day, I can actually stay up until night time and then sleep for the night. As it should be.
- I can do creative things like art or story writing without getting bored and giving up somehow, which INVARIABLY happens with ADHD.
- I don't end up trapped in bed unable to get food when I'm hungry.
Anything that does those three things is good enough for me. As long as it doesn't have side effects (after 2 weeks dexedrine no longer has any side effects other than reduced hunger).
> having aphantasia explains why being told to "imagine this" was always something that frustrated me because I couldn't do it in the way the other person would be able to do - but I didn't know that I couldn't, and neither did they
Honestly, I've always been aware of every single ADHD symptom that I have. It's just that I didn't know where they came from, I thought they came from laziness.
I definitely don't have aphantasia to that degree or anywhere close. I can imagine entire scenes in my head, imagine being an Umbreon in a forest, walk around and feel the grass and the breeze and the sun and everything. It's just, you know, hard doing that for longer than 10 seconds before my brain gets bored.
But it makes me incredibly upset when someone assumes that I can't do something because I'm not trying hard enough. Even people who know what ADHD is, seemingly don't believe that cases can get as bad as mine. That only comes from understanding that my case of ADHD is a disability. I didn't do that before when I thought I was just lazy. Ugh.
Yeah, I had to recontextualise a lot of my life after getting my diagnosis, there's a real trick in not over- or under-blaming things on the condition, although I'm not sure if that would be as big a job if you already had lived with one condition - going by what you've said matching a close friend of mine who's also autistic and got an ADHD diagnosis a lot later in life.
Anyway, I can't say if methylphenidate would work better for you but it should help with the things you listed, in my very subjective opinion. Good luck with things :)
One would also want negative results for aids, Covid, herpes, and bunch of others!
In fact, the fifth of the basic five precepts for lay-people ("Sura meraya majja pamadatthana veramani sikkhapadam samadiyami") which is in fact voluntary, explicitly talks about refraining from any intoxicants (drugs, alcohol) that may cloud the mind. Every novice monk or monk-in-training must compulsorily conform to this precept, let alone the senior monks and the abbot.
It is also interesting how the other senior monk Luang Po Tuanchai mentioned in the article made claims about powers of omniscience and was driving around drunk. Making such claims [1] is in fact one of the four *disrobing offences* in the Theravada school followed in Thailand and in other countries.
Note that the appellation "Luang Po" or "Luang Por", sort of like "venerable father" is typically used for senior monks who command significant respect and veneration. Seeing such a senior monk fall in this way obviously hurts the sangha (monastic community) and their relationship with the lay-people.
Thai people in general respect and venerate the monastic community, and I can see how such behaviours by even senior monks and abbots start to erode faith and trust, and start to cause schisms within the faith itself.
These incidents are not surprising though. Even in the past few hundred years in Thailand, monks like Acariya Mun Bhuridatta Thera [2], Acariya Mahā Boowa Ñānasampanno [3], Buddhadāsa Bhikkhu [4], Ajahn Chah Bodhiñāṇathera [5], and several others not just clearly saw the cracks and problems with the traditional Buddhist structures and administration, but actually set out to do something about it and they did this in very powerful ways.
These types of incidents have been happening on record right from the early days of the Sangha and even during Sakyamuni's (Buddha's) time, which is why the monastic rules for monks and the sangha were gradually developed and refined into a very comprehensive, clear and unambiguous structure [6] [7], not just for the sake of "making up rules" but to ensure that the sangha and the lay-community would co-exist in harmony and support each other. These rules are __supposed to be__ followed by all monastics, though some centres appear to ignore them when it suits them.
[1] https://bswa.org/teaching/vinaya-four-disrobing-offences/
[2] https://buddho.org/about-the-author/ajahn-mun/
[3] https://forestdhamma.org/about/ajaan-maha-boowa/
[4] https://www.suanmokkh.org/buddhadasa
[6] https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/vin/sv/bhikkhu-pati...
Curious. I wonder if giving food to actual poor people instead of profession mendicants would still count as a good deed.
This looks like a form of Tanha - the villagers are so attached to their ideas of how a Sangha _should_ be supported, that they are disappointed when they cannot donate to monks who need much more than monetary donations.
Edit: I’d also criticise the description of monks as professional mendicants. In many places the local monks provide education services or council locals in a similar way to a western psychologist. They aren’t just resource sponges, they can provide important community services in places that would otherwise go without. Thus I think of them more as professionals who beg. That is excluding Monks in the article who are obviously LARPing.
Kind of like how fasting isn’t about saving food.
Sadly it shows that people are doing things because they expect some form of reward in this life or in a further one instead of for the core value.
It's not like a priest in training. The poorer they are the more likely to send some time, kids needing food or 20 years olds adding to their resume.
Thailand is now an SE Asian Amsterdam for pot - https://travelhappy.info/cannabis-legal-in-thailand/
It's interesting people in the region seem to chose Meth/Yaba over pot. Always been the case. Not sure why. Perhaps without the meth is evil ads, a pill is easier.