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Comment by ProllyInfamous | Hacker News Reader

I am a fellow psychonaut, and have plenty of experience across plenty of entheogens... I DO NOT RECOMMEND SALVIA TO ANYBODY (not even experienced dissociative users). It has no beneficial purpose, and is quite terrifying.

My best summary of using Salvia is it typically leads mental isolation on par with what most never-used-drugs persons think a "bad LSD trip" might be like.

Should you still want to play with this ornamental plant, I would recommend you become comfortable with psilocibin, ketamine, LSD, and especially high-dosage mescaline. If any of these should become addictions, mushrooms are probably the least-harmful entheogen (I'm not counting marijuana, which is "nothing" compared to any drugs discussed above).

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I don't recommend anyone to experiment with drugs, but, nor would I in the case of salvia advice against it or caution people, with the exception that they should have a "sitter" the first couple of times. I view drugs as potentially enabling people to have incredible otherwise unobtainable experiences, and I don't want to "gatekeep" and stand in people's way from that, unless the case was highly addictive and degenerating drugs such as heroin, amphetamine etc. I absolutely do not consider salvia as a risky drug in that sense.

I have tried both LSD and psilocybin mushrooms, and while LSD was very interesting I did not like being tied-up for half a day with no immediate way out of it. Psilocybin mushrooms were to me similar to LSD but a very bumpy and somewhat unpleasant ride, in lack of a better description. Similarly, I did not like being stuck with that high for roughly 8 hours, nor did I enjoy the recovery afterwards. With salvia none of these feelings weighed on me since with tincture and smoking it was a short and to me fully manageable experience. I'm aware that when chewing fresh leaves the entire process is much longer.

A sitter isn't going to save you from a lifetime of HPPD or visual snow.

It seems likely that HPPD, if it doesn't go away by itself, can be cured by 50-200 hours of practicing focusing on the noise and then trying to consciously move it, changing its colors etc.

There's at least anecdotal evidence of that

https://www.reddit.com/r/CureAphantasia/comments/1cc01zl/why...

Spare me and others the FUD. I tried salvia after years of reading about people's experiences with it.

I wish tech people would stop using the term "FUD". "Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt", or "FUD", is how you don't ruin your life in one shot: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=shipscode

> I tried salvia after years of reading about people's experiences with it.

So it's all about you.

> So it's all about you.

No, it really is about everyone else and not forfeiting their chance to experience something new by dissuading them with misinformation or some cautionary tale about an isolated fate that possibly was not at all about salvia.

I didn't bumble into salvia with no information on hand. I went there after reading about it, its effects, potential risks, chemistry, first-hand experiences etc. for years. A lifetime of side effects is not something associated with salvia.

I disagree.

Salvia was the most profound experience I’ve had from a drug. I got to witness a reboot and POST of myself, with discrete functions coming back online in stages.

Nothing has been like that before or sense.

Twice was enough. I learned something from it but it wasn’t fun and that lesson need not be repeated.

During your "reboot," which parts of you did you decide to let go of / "change"?

I agree that the intensity / experience was enough to only try a few times (3x myself).

None. Salvia, at least in my experience, doesn't really have the executive function operating until very late in the process.

I would add Muscimol to the list of things to try before.

I've only heard stories about Salvia, but from some pretty hard core psychonauts whom I wouldn't expect to be afraid of anything.

I get bad vibes from what I've read about side effects of Ketamine though, nothing I feel like doing to my body.

Salvia is the closest thing to witchcraft I have experienced.

After a few incredibly strange experiences, the last time I smoked it the trip came on then it told me "don't ever come back here" and that was it. The whole trip was like 30 seconds. That was almost 30 years ago.

A bad LSD or mushroom trip is scary in a much different way. I was pretty fearless when younger with these things but never wanted to see what that salvia demon thing would do if I went back.

Anything amanita related never sounded much fun to me.

>the last time I smoked it the trip came on then it told me "don't ever come back here" and that was it.

This is absolutely chilling because this was exactly how I told myself to "quit," 20 years ago, after only my third time smoking Salvia. *Specifically: "it told me:" because IT is YOU, which you're entirely unaware of [disassociation] while experiencing an intense few minutes of horror/wisdom/input as a bodyless spirit.

Thanks for sharing.

I've never tried Muscimol (don't even know what is), but psilocibin is the only entheogen I'd recommend anybody experience more than just once / casually.

Cannabis is a daily part of my life, for two decades. In the same way I'm "trying to drink less coffee," I'm trying to vape less, too... but everybody should try LSD and/or DMT at least once in their lifetime (but not before becoming comfortable with psilocibin).

I don't know much about Ketamine. I thought it was just what they use to knock you out for surgery.

Ketamine is that but it's not just that. One enantiomer (esketamine) is FDA-approved (as Spravato) for acute suicidality. It's dosed as an intranasal spray.

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