Seeing God and Burning Plastic
ofthetwodreams.substack.com
ofthetwodreams.substack.com
But I believe the experience on the drug would translate nicely if you were being pampered. You're going to confront every demon you've ever had, so being comfy might be nice.
If you feel nauseated from mushrooms, you may try psilacetin instead. It is shrooms without the shroom matter, available (not sure if still is, used to be) in a small-ish tablet form.
DMT is by far the most intense known drug except maybe datura - especially when ingested like in the ayahuasca ritual - and could possibly lead to real insights into our psyche and social conditioning, but instead it’s a bunch of celebrities and influencers peddling drugs that promise people they people can talk to god.
The most common trip report describes people talking to aliens or god, which is just so damn fascinating. I saw my life “flash before my eyes” on my trip, which is one of the possible explanations for near-death experiences (I’m highly skeptical of the original research though). There’s just so much to research here and none of it is going to get done in a Brazilian jungle.
> At the end of the hike, she told me that the best way to deal with the problem of plastic accumulating at her center was to burn it in large, ceremonial heaps. The smell of the smoke, she said, clears her retreat of bad energy.
In my mind this practically proves that these “shamans” have no actual insight* and are just exploiting the demand (good for them). By some accident of fate, the tribes living in South America discovered that combining a tea with MAO inhibiters and a tea containing psychedelic alkaloids could lead to a crazy experience. That’s it.
They’ve got no more insight into the nature of the universe or god than the first person to discover nixtamalization and make a tortilla.
> I’ve done Ayahuasca several times, each ceremony fundamentally life-changing. In one ceremony, the shaman helped heal years of abuse. One led to my divorce. The penultimate ceremony convinced me to make this film, instead of using my savings to buy a house.
I don’t know anything about the author’s circumstances beyond these few sentences so I’m not one to judge especially given my own “life changing” experience, but this reads to me like a manic response brought on by intense psychedelics. It brings to mind Arctic Monkey’s guide to Burning Man decompression. The first rule is that you don’t make life changing decisions right after going to Burning Man. The high/glow fades, the consequences stay with you.
All that said, looking forward to watching the documentary when it comes out. Thank you for reading my nonsensical rant.
* I’m nonreligious and don’t believe in anything supernatural so I never thought they did, but burning plastic to clear negative energy is beyond stupid. When does burning plastic not produce noxious fumes that should immediately signal that something is wrong? Just dig a fracking hole and bury it.
Mainstream industrialized consumption of... well basically everything that is productized and sold at scale will invariably hit the lowest common denominator.
Because each and everyone of us is in our own path, so it's not hard to think that to accommodate for the sum of all current experiences you have to accommodate for the median.
That being said you can pretty much gloss over all this if you stay true to yourself and your path, and maybe help those near you get out of the herd mentality.
Herd mentality is dreadful, but given how fickle and flawed the self is, this, too, can be terrible advice. There is a reason why Shakespeare had Polonius, a total buffoon, give the "to thine own self be true" speech in Hamlet. But our English departments have, for the most part, completely misread this passage, and, in doing so, revealed their basic worldview and moral orientation.
To borrow from Augustine, a man has really only one fundamental choice to make in life. Either he conforms himself and his desires to the truth, or he conforms the "truth" to himself and his desires. Both paths will entail suffering, but it is the latter that leads to misery. Self-absorption is the very prison that produced your problems in the first place. As Zizek would say, you just discover a lot of shit. Only the first one leads to authentic freedom. The self is not the source of truth, but can be its reflection. That is only possible if you turn away from the self and toward the truth.
So I would say: stay true to the truth. Anything else is a dead end.
that is quite a demand.. it means endless discovery and, awakeness to allow for that.
Not everyone would go there.. One easily becomes "inconvenient" to the everyday's mantra and its, er, broadcasters and.. manufacturers..
I know it's start sound like poetry, but it's the best way I can describe it.
Yeah the author seems to think this paragraph is pro ayahuasca. Healing years of abuse - definitely good. Getting divorced - could be good or bad depending on the situation. Spending all your savings on making a film instead of buying a house. This one is leaning (could be good) towards more of a bad decision than a good one to me.
Also: most breakups should probably be looked at in a positive light. If you aren't right for each other, why try to hold on and mash puzzle pieces that don't fit together. If one or more part of the relationship wants to leave, letting them go is the best way to show them you respect their autonomy. It may hurt, but without a hurt the heart is hollow.
But everyone is entitled to their own opinions on things. These are just some of mine. I know nothing about the author either.
If he never gets married and has kids - likely straight to the dump a week or two after death.
I worry that drug use is a kind of escapism, and evasion of what's actually wrong. A person with a genuine purpose and meaning in life is generally not interested in drugs. Usually, it's boredom or misery that makes drugs look attractive to people, and there is plenty of boredom and misery in rich countries. We're materially better off than we've ever been, arguably, but focusing on material prosperity is terribly reductive. Our culture has reduced human beings to isolated, atomic, consumerist, materialist individuals. We've defined meaning out of existence metaphysically, abolishing human nature in the process. We believe in homo economicus. Of course, those are beliefs, but reality continues to exert its influence regardless of what we believe, and when denied, exacts its revenge, expressed in unhealthy and deformed behavior and impulses.
In a strange way, drugs are a way of preserving this status quo. It may feel like you've broken free of something, because drugs act on emotion and emotions can affect perception, but in reality, they just entrench or deepen the problem. But only for a time. Eventually, something will snap, and often, this is not a pretty state of affairs, both on the individual level, but also more broadly at the societal level. Unfortunately, as the saying goes, experience is an expensive school, but humanity will learn in no other.