Psychedelics question

[Doktor Howl]

Preach it Dok!

Reading Joyce is like actually paying attention to a drunk on a barstool.  Not the kind of drunk who's had a few and is ranting entertainingly, the kind of drunk who has pissed himself and is telling you all about "THA BASSARDS WHO FIRED ME FOR NO REASON!  NO REASON ATALLITELLYA BORB HURK PUKE!".

Very true. In fact, I'm convinced he was drunk when he did most of his writing.

"Irish".

See also:  William Butler Yeats.

[Doktor Howl]

I believe the person was an apostate Christian when he took the Aya, and so that was the form that the divine took for him.  He may have rejected that reality tunnel on a conscious level but he hadn't really shed it.

Oh, that's that "telepathine" shit, right?

[Doktor Howl]

Preach it Dok!

Reading Joyce is like actually paying attention to a drunk on a barstool.  Not the kind of drunk who's had a few and is ranting entertainingly, the kind of drunk who has pissed himself and is telling you all about "THA BASSARDS WHO FIRED ME FOR NO REASON!  NO REASON ATALLITELLYA BORB HURK PUKE!".

Isn't Finnegan's Wake exactly that?

As far as I can tell.  Someone gave me a copy, once.  I wound up using it to support a window unit air conditioner, and it swelled up to the size of the US tax code, and eventually went moldy and turned to mush.

Which improved it greatly.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Preach it Dok!

Reading Joyce is like actually paying attention to a drunk on a barstool.  Not the kind of drunk who's had a few and is ranting entertainingly, the kind of drunk who has pissed himself and is telling you all about "THA BASSARDS WHO FIRED ME FOR NO REASON!  NO REASON ATALLITELLYA BORB HURK PUKE!".

Isn't Finnegan's Wake exactly that?

Not exactly, its more like a very drunk Irish bard trying to tell a story, rather than ranting about getting fired. I mean, there is a story there, and there are allusions and metaphors and its all a very traditional bardic way of taking a swipe at the problems of the country... unfortunately its almost unreadable and you need a fucking spelunking kit to even try to figure it out.

I've been told that if you are Irish and understand the Irish social scene/mind set and slang of the early 20th century its much more readable.

[AFK]

Preach it Dok!

Reading Joyce is like actually paying attention to a drunk on a barstool.  Not the kind of drunk who's had a few and is ranting entertainingly, the kind of drunk who has pissed himself and is telling you all about "THA BASSARDS WHO FIRED ME FOR NO REASON!  NO REASON ATALLITELLYA BORB HURK PUKE!".

Isn't Finnegan's Wake exactly that?

Not exactly, its more like a very drunk Irish bard trying to tell a story, rather than ranting about getting fired. I mean, there is a story there, and there are allusions and metaphors and its all a very traditional bardic way of taking a swipe at the problems of the country... unfortunately its almost unreadable and you need a fucking spelunking kit to even try to figure it out.

I've been told that if you are Irish and understand the Irish social scene/mind set and slang of the early 20th century its much more readable.

Well fuck, so why was my school insisting that a bunch of kids with French-Canadian heritage read the stupid thing? 

[BabylonHoruv]

Nice. Threads back on track. I never did Aya but I did do DMT, with high expectations. I was left somewhat disappointed. It was intense, and there was the temporal displacement, but I didn't get any spiritual lift from it at all. But I'm not one to dismiss a drug after one go on it, so I may try it again at some point.

My absolute favourite Psychedelic is Psilocybin Semilacantea. I enjoy Acid, and other stuff like MDMA, but there is nothing that has ever come close Spiritually, to Liberty Caps. They are harmless, in the sense that there is no toxic amount that I've ever heard of, but I have never been more afraid in my life, than when The Fear™ kicks in.
But the best Spiritual kick, involves The Fear™.
When they throw you unexpectedly right in the deep end, and you know you're in for the duration, you can just sit there, on a tree stump, rocking backwards and forwards, muttering "Make it go away, make it go away, over and over until it wears off.  You can get to a point where you've just had enough, and you give up. You stop struggling, stop fighting off the nameless Horror that has been trying to utterly consume you for perhaps three hours, and SUBMIT.
At that point, you are fully aware that this submission can mean you are wiped from existence,  dragged away by some Grendel like monster of the blackest pit, to be consumed and eaten alive in it's lair. (Spiritually speaking, of course)  Sounds a bit dramatic, I know, but
It's real enough at the time.
Then you realise all of a sudden, that you had indeed been riding the correct motorcycle all along, and The Fear™ has taken you to a place you would never have reached, unless you'd really believed you'd been about to have your (suddenly very real)  Soul, sucked out and condemned to oblivion. The point you have been driven to, is ABSOLUTE SUBMISSION.  Not just Resignation, but total and abject Submission. All the Fear, and Horror, and Demonic, babbling insanity, just evaporates and leaves you empty of any recognisable emotion or feeling. You are indeed, consigned to oblivion. An empty vessel, floating in an endless ocean of nothing at all.

You know nothing, feel nothing, your senses have been stripped away, and you are no more than the tiniest spark of other.
What I know now, is this. The frightened, terrified creature that turned itself over to the tender mercies of the THE FEAR™, has gone. It wasn't you at all. It was just your Ego. Now, you are actually ready for the big one. The whole of reality snaps back in, like a cracking whip. Instead of experiencing it, from an Ego-Tagged point of consciousness called You, you become everything in the whole of creation. Every stone, every animal, every leaf on every Tree, everything there has ever been, across time, is now you. You fill every place, and your awareness is everywhere at once, and you are all there is. One with everything.
At this point, there is no longer anything you need to find out, discover, feel, or do. No imperative, no action needed, just pure awareness. Planet Earth is you, and there's nothing more to do. You know. Every Cell, every Atom, every piece of every puzzle. It's enough.

Then it all becomes nothing but light. Light with no source, or end, no shadow, no matter, no impurities. Just light. Just you. The light sucks in on itself, becomes a ball, gets smaller and smaller, until it / you are just a microscopic pinprick, tinier and tinier. Then there is nothing.

And. . . . . . . you're back in the room. The thing that rode here on THE FEAR™ is back. No longer afraid, and also, somehow aware of what you've just been through. Clean and shiny, pure and filled with what you can only describe as Grace. You welcome each other with love, and merge. You have your reconditioned Ego back. No longer disproportionate to it's place in the scheme of things, or trying to run everything, it quietly starts to tag the World again, from it's new point of you.

You have passed through something, bigger than what you previously thought of as just "Death". And literally been born, again. You were your own Mother, and the new Baby thing. And somehow, the Midwife too.  The person you were is now gone, and the person you are now, is both of you again. Or something.  And you're still tripping your Nut off, and the whole process has taken maybe 20 minutes. You feel better than you ever remember feeling. Filled with Grace, you are allowed to just reflect on what happened. You also realise that you are actully walking in the Garden again. Yup. That Garden. Et in Arcadia Ego. In fact, you realise you never really left it. It all had something to do with an Apple. And a Snake. And Knowledge.

Now you know why you were told not to eat that Fruit. So that you ate the Fucker. The Snake, the bringer of Wisdom, hadn't lied. "If you eat of this Fruit, you will become as Gods". (The Snake was also you, all along, and the Chick you remember was the same one who had just given birth to your newly enlightened arse)

I fucking love Magick Mushrooms. So much more than just "breathing walls, color trails, and incurable giggles"    

I've enjoyed Liberty caps numerous times, as well as Cubenses and Cyanescens.  Never experienced the fear, and I can't say I want to, I've also never experienced a space where I was in a different world, or gone, or anything of the sort.  I have always been me, just more aware of different aspects of the world around me (and also with a greatly increased sense of humor) It could be due to not having gone for extremely high doses.  The times I have taken more than usual they have made me vomit, which, while not really a terrible experience, did not feel necessary as it did on aya, more like my body knew i had taken too much mushrooms and was getting rid of the excess.  

Mushrooms (usually a tea blended from cubenses, cyanscens and liberty caps) is a sacrament in the church I was raised in (just on Winter Solstice) so they naturally have a very spiritual feeling for me even when i am taking them in a different context.

[Doktor Howl]

Preach it Dok!

Reading Joyce is like actually paying attention to a drunk on a barstool.  Not the kind of drunk who's had a few and is ranting entertainingly, the kind of drunk who has pissed himself and is telling you all about "THA BASSARDS WHO FIRED ME FOR NO REASON!  NO REASON ATALLITELLYA BORB HURK PUKE!".

Isn't Finnegan's Wake exactly that?

Not exactly, its more like a very drunk Irish bard trying to tell a story, rather than ranting about getting fired. I mean, there is a story there, and there are allusions and metaphors and its all a very traditional bardic way of taking a swipe at the problems of the country... unfortunately its almost unreadable and you need a fucking spelunking kit to even try to figure it out.

I've been told that if you are Irish and understand the Irish social scene/mind set and slang of the early 20th century its much more readable.

No, actually, it's a steaming pile of shit.  It's fucking awful.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I believe the person was an apostate Christian when he took the Aya, and so that was the form that the divine took for him.  He may have rejected that reality tunnel on a conscious level but he hadn't really shed it.

Oh, that's that "telepathine" shit, right?

Yep. People initially mislabeled the Harmine as some new chemical compound. Turns out it was already known, documented and had been used for thousands of years as a psychedelic on the other side of the planet.

The interesting thing about aya is the weirdness of the mix. The Mimosa Hostillis root bark does you no good without the leaves of the Viridis plant. (Or, the Harmine is not usable by your system without an MAOI). The plants don't necessarily grow near each other, nor do they appear to be 'special' (nor do they do much of anything on their own)... but somehow the native people figured out that root bark + leaves + hours and hours of steeping + drinking that shit gave you visionary experiences.

Not magical, just interesting.

[BabylonHoruv]

Ahem.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn9522-magic-mushrooms-really-cause-spiritual-experiences.html

Yeah, the chemicals in your brain are the same.  That doesn't mean that they "really" cause spiritual experiences.  Like ECH said, he hasn't had a spiritual experience on them.  However he almost certainly did have the same chemicals in his brain as a saint or yogi undergoing a spiritual experience.

Well, to me there is no difference between what "really" is a spiritual experience and the chemicals in my brain.

I don't get it, you just called yourself an atheist and then you say there is a difference between a spiritual experience and a certain chemical configuration in your brain? Then what is the difference made of? Hypothetical invisible pink unicorns?

For me, I mean, there is no difference in some sense*. Cause you know those people, the rationalists that say "love" is just a chemical configuration in your brain? It's the same thing, they are right, in some sense, but IMO life becomes pretty boring if you only look at it that way. In fact, you could almost literally say, life loses some of its magic

Now, I'm not saying that if you consider "love" to be something more than just chemicals, you also should consider a spiritual experience more than just a hallucination or whatever. I'm perfectly alright with everybody having their own opinion on that.

(* sorry but here it means exactly what I want to say)

I'm not an Atheist, I can't understand atheists at all.  I was raised pagan, in a tradition that includes direct experiences of the divine.  I DO believe it has a spiritual quality when I have a spiritual experience and I don't believe that experience can be quantified, or measured.  I know that there are a ton of variables even in the chemical side of things, and obviously ones attitude toward the substance is going to induce chemicals in their brains that are different.  Perhaps it would be possible to measure those differences, but I still don't think that if you were able to change that chemical to the same as the one for someone who did believe it was a real spiritual experience that that would make it so.  Not without destroying the person's Atheism.

To Lysergic.  I would agree that using archetypes Aya has a feminine energy.  For me it was a bit like taking a tour of another dimension, with a tour guide.  Aya (the MAOI containing plant, in this case Yage vine) was there, telling me what was going on and keeping me safe from the things I encountered.  Guided felt more accurate than guiding, she didn't tell me what to do, where I could go, how to fix my problems, nothing like that, she just explained what I was seeing, the only directive she gave me was don't do DMT powder.  It definitely did take me to another world, for timeless periods, My friend who was trip sitting said they were about 20 minutes each, but he did not have a watch, then I would be back in the "real" world, but in a very altered state.  Interacting with the fire, or the crickets, or the stars (actually, the stars did not respond to me, the fire and crickets did, and my friend saw and heard that too, although admittedly fire will respond to anyone who puts wood on it or blows on it)

Aya is certainly more "expensive" in a physical sense, it induces puking and you have to be careful about your diet or the MAOI can kill you.  I also restricted my diet for spiritual reasons for about a month beforehand (not quite as tight as the Aya Shamans, but I tried to follow their guidelines) No idea if that is necessary or not, Aya didn't really say.

Well in that sense that Aya is the taking of a tour of another dimension with a guide, DMT kinda just throws you into another dimension and leaves you to figure it all out for yourself.

I'm a natural escapist, so that is very appealing.  That's about what I have heard from other people too.  It also sounds like something that would be very bad for me.  And not something I'd suggest for all, being tossed into another dimension could be traumatic in a bad way for a lot of people.

Well, the way I think about it, if you were to ever only do one "hard" drug in your life, it should be DMT.
It'll either scare you off all drugs for life or keep you content until your next life.
Sometimes, people need a traumatic experience to "wake up", so to speak.

And as far as I know, no one has walked away from a DMT experience and thought it to be a bad thing.
A very intense, very earth shattering thing, definitely, but negative, I've yet to hear of.

I know someone who used to have schizophrenia until he did DMT. It set him straight and he never did it (or any other hard drug) again...

I did that to someone with Dramamine.  Dramamine is a deleriant, same family of chemicals as Belladonna and Jimsonweed (well, there's also atropine in belladonna, which just kills you) He wanted to try the hardest drug out there, I told him that it was dramamine in my experience, and after that he was off drugs.  It damaged him though in ways that I didn't see the extent of becuase part of his change in life was cutting off contact with me.

I haven't heard of DMT doing anything bad to people, I have seen people get some really whacky ideas after Aya trips that they took quite seriously.  Some changed their diets in ways which were harmful to them.  One became a really obnoxious born again Christian. 

I got high on Dramamine once when I was 17. Hardest I've ever tripped in my life, and thoroughly unenjoyable. About a week after I tried it, a kid that went to the high school across town from mine drowned in a mudpuddle while high on dramamine. A month after that, a kid that wen to my high school got killed by a train while high on dramamine. Needless to say, the fad was pretty short-lived.

Yeah, being a hardcore escapist I tripped on Dramamine twice.  Definitely completely unenjoyable, and extremely extremely intense.  I am grateful for it because from what I can tell the experience is not entirely dissimilar from Datura and Belladonna, which I had been curious about, and the dosage on Dramamine is much easier to control, so I was able to experience that family of drugs with a much lower chance of killing myself that would have happened if I had gone for Datura or Belladonna.

[Kai]

I believe the person was an apostate Christian when he took the Aya, and so that was the form that the divine took for him.  He may have rejected that reality tunnel on a conscious level but he hadn't really shed it.

Oh, that's that "telepathine" shit, right?

Yep. People initially mislabeled the Harmine as some new chemical compound. Turns out it was already known, documented and had been used for thousands of years as a psychedelic on the other side of the planet.

The interesting thing about aya is the weirdness of the mix. The Mimosa Hostillis root bark does you no good without the leaves of the Viridis plant. (Or, the Harmine is not usable by your system without an MAOI). The plants don't necessarily grow near each other, nor do they appear to be 'special' (nor do they do much of anything on their own)... but somehow the native people figured out that root bark + leaves + hours and hours of steeping + drinking that shit gave you visionary experiences.

Not magical, just interesting.

Is this Ayuhuasca (di-methyl triptamine) we're talking about here?

[Doktor Howl]

I believe the person was an apostate Christian when he took the Aya, and so that was the form that the divine took for him.  He may have rejected that reality tunnel on a conscious level but he hadn't really shed it.

Oh, that's that "telepathine" shit, right?

Yep. People initially mislabeled the Harmine as some new chemical compound. Turns out it was already known, documented and had been used for thousands of years as a psychedelic on the other side of the planet.

The interesting thing about aya is the weirdness of the mix. The Mimosa Hostillis root bark does you no good without the leaves of the Viridis plant. (Or, the Harmine is not usable by your system without an MAOI). The plants don't necessarily grow near each other, nor do they appear to be 'special' (nor do they do much of anything on their own)... but somehow the native people figured out that root bark + leaves + hours and hours of steeping + drinking that shit gave you visionary experiences.

Not magical, just interesting.

Harmine.  That was the name I was trying to remember.

Just another drug.

[BabylonHoruv]

We'll have to agree to disagree (basically, I don't believe in the concept of spirituality), but it is refreshing to see someone who's stance on the subject actually seems well though-out and researched as opposed to the typical "no, man, you just don't understand the MAGIC of it!" that I usually hear. So thanks for at the very least forcing me to think through and reaffirm my own point of view on the issue at hand.

This was basically the point I was discussing with Lysergic.  An atheist with strong convictions isn't going to have a spiritual experience, even if his brain chemistry is identical to someone who believes in spirit having a spiritual experience.  If you could change that part of the chemistry that constitutes his disbelief he might, but you'd also be destroying his Atheism (not because the experience is "actually" spiritual but because you chemically changed his beliefs)

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I believe the person was an apostate Christian when he took the Aya, and so that was the form that the divine took for him.  He may have rejected that reality tunnel on a conscious level but he hadn't really shed it.

Oh, that's that "telepathine" shit, right?

Yep. People initially mislabeled the Harmine as some new chemical compound. Turns out it was already known, documented and had been used for thousands of years as a psychedelic on the other side of the planet.

The interesting thing about aya is the weirdness of the mix. The Mimosa Hostillis root bark does you no good without the leaves of the Viridis plant. (Or, the Harmine is not usable by your system without an MAOI). The plants don't necessarily grow near each other, nor do they appear to be 'special' (nor do they do much of anything on their own)... but somehow the native people figured out that root bark + leaves + hours and hours of steeping + drinking that shit gave you visionary experiences.

Not magical, just interesting.

Is this Ayuhuasca (di-methyl triptamine) we're talking about here?

Auyahuasca, depending on the recipe can have several chemical compounds in it including DMT, Harmine and some kind of MAOI.

[BabylonHoruv]

I just took a really spiritual shit.  The ghost of Gandhi began speaking from the commode, remonstrating me for my evil ways.  So I flushed his ass.

To hell with spirituality.

The other day, I was doped up on Lexapro for the first time in several months. About an hour after taking it, I was sitting in class and began feeling strangely excited, like my body was in need of a long hard run, or three hundred pushups or something. Then the headache started, and the nausea, I felt my stomach slowly come to a boil as my brain melted behind my eyeballs. It was like my organs were swimming in slightly off cheese spread.

Suddenly I sprang up and ran out the door, nearly falling down the stairs. I could hear the toilet calling to me, bidding me kneel to it's porcelain beauty. This powerful feeling of internal upheaval lead me to begin my offering, a stream of steaming stomach acid. My eyes rolled back into my head, as I convulsed, and then lay on the ground dazed.

So, was that a spiritual experience?

Only you can say.  I've had spiritual experiences shitting before.  A few times while on drugs, a few times not.  The times not on drugs were really unpleasant, but spiritual experiences aren't always pleasant.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

We'll have to agree to disagree (basically, I don't believe in the concept of spirituality), but it is refreshing to see someone who's stance on the subject actually seems well though-out and researched as opposed to the typical "no, man, you just don't understand the MAGIC of it!" that I usually hear. So thanks for at the very least forcing me to think through and reaffirm my own point of view on the issue at hand.

This was basically the point I was discussing with Lysergic.  An atheist with strong convictions isn't going to have a spiritual experience, even if his brain chemistry is identical to someone who believes in spirit having a spiritual experience.  If you could change that part of the chemistry that constitutes his disbelief he might, but you'd also be destroying his Atheism (not because the experience is "actually" spiritual but because you chemically changed his beliefs)

Though I know two atheists that saw aliens when they were tripping. Which of course ties in the the Cosmic Trigger argument that the brain sticks whatever available metaphor it can over the thing it doesn't understand.

"Hey, its something weird... must be God!"
"Hey, its something weird... must be Aliens!"