Comment by gchamonlive
8 months ago
I go to raves, I take very modest amounts of LSD (100 maybe 150 micrograms), and the whole experience turns into very spiritual session where I dance with my entire being and let myself disolve into the Great Void.
It has lasting effects that go way beyond the effects of the drug.
However I think it's complicated to derive generalisms like saying it's a drug for everyone and everybody should take it. It's definitely not for everybody.
I'm also not going to be a hypocrite and say that you shouldn't do it. What I'll go and say is that it's your journey to figure out what you are going to invite into your life. In any case, depending on what you believe, you aren't actually here to figure things out. You already did. You are here to remember.
In more secular terms, you are here to do the required work to understand yourself, your circumstances, stand on the shoulder of giants and study the great minds that came before you. That will give you the necessary foundational philosophy to withstand and understand these experiences, should you choose to go through them. This is the only way to acquire a foundational respect for these substances and these experiences.
Have I done this work? Have I achieved the required level of understanding to make heads and tails of these experiences? Not for a while at least. It was rough the first couple of times. Very violent and crude, like rushing naked through a sea of people while being completely sure that that night is the last night of your life (I wasn't actually naked, it just felt like that and that everyone was eventually going to merge with me and that I should feel ashamed of it).
But with time and with the necessary exposure to understand the basics of existencialism I think I managed to pin down a more gentle form of this experience that can help me remember how to lay myself bare to the goddess and just be there when I dance.
So I think I can extend this invitation to anyone that feels brave enough to lift the reins of existence and reality and expose yourself to the truth. That everything is a story about the end of the world. About the beginning. And about everything at once.
It's scary, it's blissful and it's totally worth it.
I read in a forum about psychedelics about a guy who had been carving up his whole arm while tripping on LSD. The response befuddled me and wasn't what I expected: "Classic newbie mistake", "Your own fault for tripping alone", and "You should put knifes and weapons away when you trip." It made me realize these people are like adopters of niche programming languages. To outsiders they tell everyone how great their language is and how you'll become 10x more productive switching to it. Only on bug trackers will you find out about lack of tooling support, stochastic compiler bugs, and bad api designs.
These are not normal reactions to being under the influence of psychedelics but latent mental illness being activated.
That they can activate latent mental illnesses that wouldn't be activated otherwise is the main risk of psychedelics, and is absolutely a real problem
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Consuming any substance really comes down to one thing:
Do you want to "feel" yourself more, or do you want to feel yourself less?
Many people are not interested (or ready) to feel themselves more. And when they do, they might not like what they find.
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"latent mental illness" sounds like a tagline for the human condition.
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They are 'classic newbie mistakes', but they are not normal? The drug messing with your neural pathways, messing with those particular neural pathways, is not normal, but rather just activates 'latent' messed-with-ness? This sounds like words without meaning.
Or just someone who is mentally ill taking psychedelics.
Bath Salts. If rabies was a medicine. LSD lets you keep your marbles, they just become more colorful and roll around for awhile. It is disassociative though in a way that pain can be experienced differently. Solitary is okay, but don't go into it alone with self-harm in your history.
Ask your doctor if placebo is right for you.
Just be careful with metaphors. It's useful for conveying ideas, but it's easy to mistake the original idea by the substitution. Psychedelics are not programming languages. It doesn't matter if you or I write the same piece of code in gleam, they will work the same if the environment is the same. The same cannot be said by psychedelics.
I see it as an unfortunate byproduct of the war on drugs forcing advocates to become boosters beyond what they otherwise would as a means to counteract the many years of bad-faith negative press. It was especially prevalent (still is to a certain extent) for weed, though I think that's dying down a bit now that it's been decriminalized in a lot of places.
I would have said that was both horrific and unusual, rather than ‘classic’.
Let’s not pretend it’s perfectly safe (what is?) but this is hardly ‘normal’.
While it might not be normal, that type of thing is not unknown and alone is enough to mean everyone should avoid those drugs.
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> I read in a forum about...
...something that likely never happened (and if it did, it wasn't the LSD)
People jump out of windows/off roofs all the time on psychedelics.
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Sounds like AI should guide us. (maybe an uncensored version)
This should've been horrifying I guess, but I found it rather amusing. And as a niche-programming-language-enthusiast: well done with the analogy!
> I take very modest amounts of LSD (100 maybe 150 micrograms)
PSA: 100-150 micrograms of LSD is a medium to strong trip. For beginners its good to start low, perhaps 75 micrograms or lower.
Edit: Also testing your reaction psychedelics in more controlled and calmer settings is highly recommended before doing in it raves or other public places. But also note that the effects may vary significantly even in the same person at different times and settings.
It’s also worth noting that there isn’t exactly strong quality control on the product. There is a good chance what is labelled 150 micrograms is actually closer to 50 micrograms. Or it could really be 150…
But that's true for any criminalized substance. It's not like the FDA or EFSA or so is going to do lab tests on, say, XTC and fine producers that lie on their ads or ingredient-list.
Though biological products like psilocybin (or weed etc) are harder to measure and control by producers, in strength than purely chemical products like LSD or MDMA. It's hard to trace what mother nature did exactly when producing this particular mushroom cap, but it could be possible to trace what the chemist did when producing this particular blot. If only it were legalized and we could have actual control, tracability, and prosecution of malpractice...
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Some countries (Germany, Holland) have (or had ~5 years ago when I was interested in this) legal analogues of LSD that are produced and sold in a fully regulated, safe, precise manner.
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There is in the Netherlands. You can test it there [1].
Ah, I see someone else already mentioned it. I'll still keep this here for increased visibility. Drugs testing in NL is solid.
Source: trust me bro ;-)
Second source: go see for yourself! It's anonymous.
[1] https://www.drugs-test.nl/ (use google translate)
>100-150 micrograms of LSD is a medium to strong trip
Did you get that from a government "risk prevention" website? 100 micrograms is a base, standard dose; There's a reason that that is the most common amount to a piece of blotter paper.
A medium trip would be something like 220(also a common dose), and "strong" can go anywhere from what, 500 to 1000?(1000 and above being commonly referred to as "heroic dose" and fairly rarely taken)
I do agree that a beginner might want to try sub-100 micrograms, but you rub up against the lower border of real perceptible effects around 50.
A friend in IT (and sharp as a tack to this day) gave me empirical evidence that LSD's toxicity is nil. He used to hang around in a subculture that were not 'street users' eating blotters by any means, they had plenty of concentrate and had plenty liquid solution to pour.
It was a Birthday Party, and almost a dozen people had the idea to 'dose him' without knowledge of the others. After the party it was obvious this was an extended journey and those who had done it came clean to the others. The dosage was off the charts. They cared for him in shifts and the ordeal lasted almost three days. But he was fine after, apparently only some people experience flashbacks.
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With medium trip I mean a base standard dose. You may mean something else with a "trip" or "medium". I'm just referring to one usage setting.
Also glorifying large doses especially when discussing first times in a forum with inexperienced audience is rather stupid. Too large doses for beginners is a recipe for unpleasant experiences and subsequent negativity about drugs in general.
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counterpoint: you only get your first time, one time.
Counter counter point: if you mess up your first time, it's likely you'll never be able to enjoy the experience.
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In my experience, first times with drugs like MDMA are very important just because the tolerance builds up basically forever. First time with LSD however... Better safe than sorry. My first time wasn't that impressive, but it was safe and didn't involve any negative emotions. I've had many other times since, much more impressive and important.
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Yes. And I wish I would have started with 75 microgram.
Imo not true for psychodelics
You just open the door for many more first times to come
Agree! Go into it with great preparation — be sure to read the manual closely.
Less is more
First time is rarely especially good. This applies to more or less all substances.
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> ...you are here to do the required work to understand yourself, your circumstances, stand on the shoulder of giants and study the great minds that came before you.
Just to offer a counterpoint:
“I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.” ― Kurt Vonnegut
The more I experience, the more I think maybe that's a pretty good point, too.
It's like the nihilist denying any meaning to the world. It's because they choose to see it that way even if they aren't aware of it.
If you choose to fart around, whatever that means, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Since there's no salvation, farts are also meaningless, and at the same time totally meaningful given the circumstances.
Vonnegut sounds closer to an epicurist.
A nihilist would say fart or don't fart it's all pointless.
As a nihilist my sense of meaning seams to be compatible to yours. I don't deny that we can come up with all sorts of meanings but the point is that there is no intrinsically higher meaning to everything, it's all made up. In fact, the awareness of this is the basis of my nihilism. That doesn't mean, that I don't like some meanings more than others, otherwise I had no reason to act whatsoever.
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> Since there's no salvation, farts are also meaningless
That's begging the question. I'd argue that all meaning is in how we fart around.
Meaning is what you want it to be.
If you don’t know what it is and don’t know what you want, you either fart around or resign.
I think you might be confusing nihilism with absurdism in this case.
I love Vonnegut. I don't agree with him on everything; semicolons are fine.
I don't believe Vonnegut beleived that for a minute.
> Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind."
Some babies hear that and just "nope" out? What was the narrative before seasons, science and over population?
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One is not counter to the other.
I would go as far as to say most people should have a psychedelic experience at least once in their life. There's nothing like it. It's one of the great pleasures of being alive.
My experiences have been universally negative often very much so. I have given LSD a good go. It has led to intense hallucinations with very long lasting PTSD like consequences for me. I have done it under the guidance of "professionals" (as close as you can get in a world where these substances are completely unregulated). Even in very small doses I have experienced intense anxiety and general feelings of dread.
This isn't to discount your experience but rather a general warning: all drugs aren't for everyone. It's easy to take away from these threads that psychedelics are universally positive and that negative trips are generally the result of misuse.
Which isn't true. Before going into this doing some deep introspection about yourself and your abilities is really important. Use these drugs with extreme caution.
I did say "most" people. There are people who if they eat a peanut will die. It's a universal truth that everyone reacts to things differently. I will say, you jumped right in the deep end with LSD. A small dose of mushrooms is an order of magnitude tamer and much better for first timers I think. In the end, if it's not for you, it's not for you. I still stand by my statement.
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so who did you kill
Totally. It's just that that realisation must come from within, because the experience changes the very perception of reality and the relationship between yourself and everything else. With the wrong circumstances what would otherwise be a blissful experience can turn into a nightmare and this gate is likely forever closed for this person. I'd never forgive myself if I had this happen to someone else because of ill advice given by me.
> It's one of the great pleasures of being alive
Had one once. It was not a pleasure at all. Best I can say is that it was interesting and that I did 'experience' interesting stuff. But that has no profound effect on me, since I consider it, like a dream, to have no basis in reality.
Generic statements like this are dangerous since different people may respond VERY differently to the same substance. This can depend on long term traits like personality or short term like the current state of mind. People reading such statements might think there's no way it can go wrong. If it isn't a profound experience, they might also think there's something wrong with them, which isn't the case.
The people that could benefit the most are the least likely to ever try it. There are some people so blind to their own flaws they’d simply shatter under the influence of psychedelics.
And if that’s the case, do it in your early 20s in college or shortly after. Don’t do it in your 70s.
Why not in your 70s? Purely due to being more physically fragile, or more spiritually "settled"?
Would it make a difference if it was a 70 year old who is still open minded and curious about life, the universe, and everything? (given that I'd guess that any 70+ year old willing to do LSD is likely to be as per this description).
Legitimately interested in your answer / reasoning (mainly because my plan was to experience a number of different drugs once the rest of my life, that could have been put at risk by drugs, is kinda setup and done well enough).
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That is assuming everyone is ready to do it at the age of 20. If you are only ready to take them at 70s, why not do it? At that age you have other things to worry about anyway.
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This reminds me of the grandpa advice scene in Little Miss Sunshine:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiU96IEr0jU
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It is a fine cure for arrogance too.
I used to think this until I learned the most racist person I knew dropped acid every weekend. Seemed to only make him more racist.
It amplifies things. If your core it truely rotten, only rotten stuff can come out.
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The best cure for arrogance is a rough and dirty sparring session with a strong, experienced fighter. It's the most grounding experience you can have. Punches that come through openings you didn't know you had, kicks that seem to bury themselves into your flesh and marrow, and if you get to grappling you'll experience wonders you never knew existed.
I think some people are shown to be more arrogant and egotistical after psychedelics.
I know some folks in the HN audience will not like this example, but Elon Musk is one.
An older cannonical example is Timothy Leary.
No names are coming to mind, but I feel like there have been plenty of psychedelic informed cults, with cult leader narcissists who continue to abuse people despite experiencing psychedelics.
It may open some doors and cause you to consider more angles, and for many people it helps them with empathy and connectedness, but in another sense it's amplifying what you've already got. A "bad" input can get amplified too.
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I think this notion that one must engage in philosophical study or appreciate "the goddess" to survive, enjoy and appreciate psychedelics is ridiculous.
There is no special 'truth' in LSD, certainly no truths outside the self - while you can learn some things about your internal experience from it, it also repeatedly provokes in its users a false sense of the profound. People experience 'realisations' which are pure nonsense when recalled or examined later.
It makes your brain go haywire in all sorts of fun and interesting ways. But if you're looking for the meaning of life in there you're doing it wrong, and I dread to think what you might find.
Joscha Bach summed this up in a very succint way in an interview once. Paraphrasing him, psychedelics tend to result in overfitting. Suddenly, everything is about them. Leary and McKenna are actually good publicly known examples. And the phenomenon of "I have found the soltuion" without being able to actually name it, is also pretty common.
Found what I think is probably the video if anyone else is interested:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Pif-1bTmQZc
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It will strip the user of it's self obsessed focus on me, my wants & needs, and allow you to see life from a very far distance.
Therefore for some people it will show them their "truth", its not that lsd or mushrooms contain the truth.
This goes from very practical truths in where you see patterns of yourself that are not very useful but even more important you will see & feel the impermanence of your being & experience the world in it's totality making your impermanence a joyful feeling of being part of the world instead of being seperated from it. This is why in some studies people fear death less.
> I think this notion that one must engage in philosophical study or appreciate "the goddess" to survive, enjoy and appreciate psychedelics is ridiculous.
Cool. I think it's very important. I'll think really hard about philosophy when on drugs, you go do your thing ;)
> There is no special 'truth' in LSD, certainly no truths outside the self
What is the "outside of the self"? Isn't that smuggling in the assumption that there is an essential separation of the self and the rest of the world? What if everything is world? And what if everything is self? Does it make any difference?
> while you can learn some things about your internal experience from it, it also repeatedly provokes in its users a false sense of the profound
What is the correct sense of the profound and who is going to be the gatekeepers of the profound?
> People experience 'realisations' which are pure nonsense when recalled or examined later.
I have all my notes and they still make a lot of sense to me so I don't think this argument hold by experience.
> But if you're looking for the meaning of life in there you're doing it wrong, and I dread to think what you might find.
Is there a meaning to life to be found? I always thought the meaning of life is something you never stop pursuing, every day all the time. So please, tell me the right ways so I don't dread you. I'm being sarcastic in the same proportion you are being arrogant.
Ah and thanks for proving my point about the necessity of philosophy.
> I'll think really hard about philosophy when on drugs, you go do your thing ;)
Yeah sounds great. It's the imputation that it's the only way that got my back up. I don't imagine 5% of people who've taken and enjoyed LSD have taken the time to understand the basics of existentialism or done "the required work to understand yourself, your circumstances, stand on the shoulder of giants..." and all that guff.
And we still had an absolute blast.
> Isn't that smuggling in the assumption that there is an essential separation of the self and the rest of the world?
There is, it's called your body and other humans generally recognise yours as distinct from themselves and from other objects.
> And what if everything is self? Does it make any difference?
Acid-like thinking detected.
> What is the correct sense of the profound and who is going to be the gatekeepers of the profound?
Well, given the nature of the 'profound' realisations people on acid tend to have, I think "a modicum of common sense" would suffice.
That fascinating plastic lemonade bottle you're contemplating so hard probably isn't going to have much impact on space travel, no. Or on a larger scale, many of the proclamations that LSD will fundamentally change society when people 'realise' one thing or another that they 'learned' while under the influence turn out to be hopelessly naive - see the various late-60s to early 70s hippie communes in the US that generally fell into disarray and outright collapse when it turns out optimism and LSD weren't going to solve everything and someone still has to do the dishes eventually.
> I have all my notes and they still make a lot of sense to me so I don't think this argument hold by experience.
Your experience is certainly a data point, I would be surprised if this is as widespread as "I wrote it down and now realise it's all nonsense, it felt so meaningful at the time", but I don't imagine anyone's done a study.
> Is there a meaning to life to be found?
That's an interesting question, but looking for it in psychedelic experience seems to me a path that could lead to all sorts of odd places, mostly concerned with weird echoes of your own mind.
> Ah and thanks for proving my point about the necessity of philosophy.
The necessity of philosophy to an internet argument is one thing. Its necessity to a fulfilling life is arguable, given so much of it is navel-gazing bollocks, and the necessity of deeply studying philiosophical principles before dropping acid even less clear.
You do you, but your original post was full of pretty arrogant assertions about how everyone else should do them. I agree, I shot back with some of the same.
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> I go to raves, I take very modest amounts of LSD (100 maybe 150 micrograms), and the whole experience turns into very spiritual session where I dance with my entire being and let myself disolve into the Great Void.
Cool. And good for you, but this has honestly ruined 'raves' for me.
I'm a huge fan of different types of electronic music and really, really enjoy it. The music itself is a spiritual experience and allows me to 'disolve into the Great Void'. But these days when I go to a festival or something, I'm surrounded by people I can't share this feeling/experience with, since everyone seems to be on some type of drug and either in their own world (X, LSD, etc) or think the world is in them (coke).
I recently prematurely left an artist I was really looking forward to because of exactly this. It was incredibly disappointing, though not surprising.
Totally get your point. And I feel the same way.
It's really hard to maintain a healthy state of mind when there is a dude overdosing with several paramedics trying to stabilise him. I still remember that time and it hurts me every time I think about it.
But there are smaller raves, with 50-500 people, where I think this feeling is maintained.
I'd maybe recommend avoiding what we call here "commercial raves" and go to "pvt's", private raves, which are not private, just with more modest economic goals.
Some of the best writing on the uses of LSD come from Alan watts. In his early life he said "it was impossible to bottle mysticism" and yet on dropping acid the first time felt like "they have completely bottled mysticism!".
But then he noticed that the results really depend on who is taking it and what their world view is. If you do not have any inclination towards that mystic space, you will not get the ego death. It is as Eckhart Tolle said "just your senses turned up to 11", that is if there is nothing else you can get out of it.
As Douglas Rushkoff said "If you give tech bros a hit of psychedelics, all you get is tech bros on psychedelics." There is no higher sense achieved.
There is a nice quote by Robert M. Pirsig: "The only Zen you find on tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there."
This translates well to psychedelic drug use.
I think the mountain does help with Zen. How much, depends on the individual.
But yes, I do feel (in my limited experience) that for most people the thoughts they carry are more important to work on, than the environment they are in.
> "If you give tech bros a hit of psychedelics, all you get is tech bros on psychedelics."
This is an amazing line. I must admit: the first time I tried LSD I had some code open on my laptop. Before the trip I was curious what programming on LSD would be like, so at some point dutifully I sat down in front of my editor. I was immediately utterly transfixed by the colours of the text cursor as it pulsed. Then I lost myself watching hover states as I moved the mouse around. Needless to say, I didn’t get any programming done.
I remember thinking how strange and hilarious it was that, while sober, I care at all about programming. It all seemed so hollow.
A lot more happened on the trip - the whole thing was incredibly profound and insightful. But all these years later, I still have a crystal clear image of that pulsing cursor etched in my memory.
Ok, that was a theoretical lesson I learned before when reading books about it. You cannot do productive work while tripping.
And I also had my laptop close by to maybe take notes, but the screen was really stressfull.
Watching wild nature in the sun was much more enjoyable.
Ahh I had a similar trip with Ableton GUI on acid, all the gui controls went in fire and animated in a psychedelic way
It depends on the dose, I've successfully programmed and written about programming while high on acid. Though usually just a half tab or even a quarter. I felt like it was useful, improved focus and creativity.
One time I played CSGO on acid, my brain might be exaggerating the memory but I swear I played like a master. Maybe I just had easy games but it really felt like I was playing much better than usual and I was dominating.
Also played satisfactory once, though with that I just ended up painting my factory in neon colors and stuff like that. It looked pretty cool though, I kept the color theme I made.
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It's because meaning isn't essential to the universe, but derived from human experience. The universe needs us just as much as we need the universe. Actually this separation is an artifact of reductionism we have to let go.
In any case, this is why I think philosophy is the required work to be done so that we can invite spiritualism and mysticism into our lives and potentially experience them with these reality altering drugs.
Nothing is essential to the universe, the universe does not need us. We need it exactly as it is today, and that is it. Everything else is stuff we made up to understand the universe weakly, or to cope with life. This is not nihilism, but meaning to life is meaningful only in the context of humans and has nothing to do with universe needing us.
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I have nothing more to add but... Yep, spot on!
Meaning seems to be both — otherwise we wouldn’t mind it.
> If you do not have any inclination towards that mystic space, you will not get the ego death
I am as agnostic-atheist as they come and would go as far as to say I find mysticism offensive to good sense. But I've experienced the ego death parts of LSD, and consider I have come to know myself more through it. I don't think it reveals some fundamental truth outside myself so much as being simply a phenomenon of the action of psychedelics on my brain.
Frankly I think this idea that you have to be studied in philosophy or open to mystic woo-y nonsense to fully appreciate or even fully experience psychedelics is hilarious and self-aggrandising.
"would go as far as to say I find mysticism offensive to good sense."
How come?
The mystics of all the religions are the most approachable to agnostic me. Mysticism to me means mainly, the universe as its whole is a great mysterium and those who claim "it is exactly like this and this, because this holy book says so!" are rather the aggressive fools to me. So genuinly curious, what do you perceive as aggressive from mysticim?
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Experiencing ego death is a mystical experience. Perhaps it is the mystical experience.
You describe it in terms that make sense to your culture. Perhaps the term mystic has been contaminated for you by all the nonsense and bullshit.
The experience is very difficult to communicate, generally relying heavily on metaphor. Those who are uninitiated often wildly misunderstand. We see this in other areas of life too, cargo culting for example, but the deep and very personal nature of the mystical experience pretty much ensures confusion.
A perpetual motion crackpot probably describes themselves as a "physicist", but that's nonsense and bullshit too.
You are a mystic in the real sense, having an esoteric experience and then integrating it into your worldview.
Psychedelic drugs are just one way of doing this, but one of the more accessible.
I think your attitude is completely appropriate, by the way.
The other replies were making me think "maybe this shit isn't for me", but your comment made me actually want to try it, so thanks for the alternate perspective.
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Would you say the following are (individually taken) red flags for trying it:
* being terrified of letting loose (even with something common in the local culture, for example alcohol)
* having zero belief in the mysticism
> being terrified of letting loose (even with something common in the local culture, for example alcohol)
In that case, I would suggest working a bit on that first. Meditation can help, but "terrified" sounds strong enough that trying out therapy if available may be worthwhile.
Regarding substances, I found mushrooms to be easier than LSD, with a kind of warmth that softens the psychedelic experience (without taking anything away from it). The effects also don't last as long. A non-psychedelic which can allow one to face difficult emotions is MDMA. In some countries you can find MDMA based therapy. This could prepare someone to become more open to what psychedelics have to offer. (Edit: Also, all of these substances have effects that are not comparable to alcohol at all. Trying to understand the effects of psychedelics/empathogens based on experiences with alcohol is a category error.)
Based on my limited experience, I would roughly categorize the relation of these substances to the idea of control like this:
LSD: you might feel like there's some control, but you're actually the playball of the substance
Mushrooms: the substance draws you in some direction, and it's best to just lean into it, but it'll support you in doing so
MDMA: there's no need for control, things are okay the way they are
> having zero belief in the mysticism
That depends on what exactly this means.
Have some knowledge of "mysticism" or some eastern worldviews / philosophy, without taking it too seriously, would be a good basis IMO.
Actively rejecting any ideas related to mysticism while clinging tightly to a specific world view / metaphysics (and related beliefs like "I can only allow something if I understand / can explain it") may lead someone to have a really bad time on psychedelics.
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Note that this isn't advice about whether to consume anything or what to consume, and experiences can vary widely between individuals, settings, dosages etc. (For both assumptions above, is possible to construct higly positive outcomes, where the substance helped overcome problems, opens one up, etc. and negative ones, horror trip, lasting trauma from the trip, ...) Having someone experienced present when doing something like this for the first time is highly recommended.
> being terrified of letting loose (even with something common in the local culture, for example alcohol)
Do you have good reason for this fear, like fantasies of hurting yourself or others? If so, yeah, you probably shouldn't ingest substances that can lower your inhibitions.
I am not terrified, rather scared of loosing control, hurting people I like, feeling ashamed forever afterward, the usual. I use to not give shit but I’m old now and I have a much bigger social net I care about.
But I do know people which I would categorise as really terrified of loosing control.
Maybe “letting loose” was the wrong expression here, I meant “loosing control” rather.
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> having zero belief in the mysticism
Good, belief has nothing to do with mysticism. It's about experiencing the ineffable, something beyond yourself, which is often terrifying.
1. yes, that can be an issue, up to the point that you willingly or unwillingly "go on the trip" so to speak. i kinda prefer take more than less (not a brag - never done more than 2 tabs of acid at once before) because of that - it's a lot easier to ride it out when your conscious brain isn't making you self-conscious and anxious.
2. i never have and probably never will be a spiritual person. doesn't lessen the enjoyment or impact. i literally just think of it as a "reset button" - it makes you forget some previous anxieties, reframe others, let go of stuff that's dragging you down. it's not therapy but sometimes just shaking things up a bit gives you enough of a new perspective to really benefit you. or... you know, sometimes you just watch tv with your roommates for 3 hours. whatever.
I'm terrified of letting loose with alcohol because alcohol is a terrible drug. I've tried lots of different drugs and alcohol is in my opinion one of the worst. Culture pushes me to drink more (people buying drinks for me etc), and the more I drink the less concerned I am about moderation.
When I wake up the next day after taking it too far I'm riddled with anxiety and usually feeling sick, the whole day and maybe even the next day is ruined. And yes of course it's my responsibility to moderate my intake, it's just hard for me. The solution I've come up with is I try to never have more than 4-6 drinks in an evening.
I have experienced both myself and others saying and doing things while drunk that we never would have done or said sober. I have experienced myself and others being seriously injured solely due to alcohol.
There are other drugs that scare me the same way, particularly pills like benzos and such but I have never had a bad time with MDMA or LSD. It's much more of a "I love you man", "Everything is awesome" vibe. At least at the doses I use I'm completely lucid and in control, I'm just also having an amazing time.
Alcohol just makes me forget stuff, LSD and MDMA have given me some of the best memories of my life. I can't remember the last time I drank alcohol and woke up the next day thinking "last night was awesome". I've definitely had some good times with alcohol but the amount of bad times completely dwarfs them.
And again maybe this is all on me, maybe I just can't handle alcohol. But I'm definitely not alone.
If it wasn't for the social stigma and the fact that I generally don't want to associate with the people who supply drugs, I'd never drink alcohol again. I'd smoke weed and for special nights like festivals etc I'd use MDMA and maybe LSD.
The main thing to keep in mind if you want to try LSD is it lasts a long time. 8-12 hours, there is no off switch. Start with low doses, do half a tab or even a quarter tab. You don't need much, it's really powerful. A small dose will completely change your state of mind. If you like it, do more next time. Personally I don't really experience hallucinations, I'm completely aware, present and in control. Maybe patterns like wallpaper and leaves will seem to move and stuff like that, but aside from the dilated pupils you can't really tell I'm high. To me it's like seeing the world with new eyes, mundane things you pass by every day are suddenly interesting. Look at that beautiful tree. Look at your friends and loved ones, they're amazing. It makes me think differently, see things from a different perspective and be thankful for the things I take for granted in my daily life. It's awesome, I've done it maybe 20 times and I hope I get to experience it many more times. Just wish I could get it without buying from criminals.
I sometimes wonder - if the sensation of a "spiritual state" can be defined as a quantitative amount of some neurotransmitter in some circuit. That might be a sad day, though, for something that sounds so profound, to be reduced to numbers and probability....
The "out of body experience" ppl describe in near death always seemed to me to be a glitch of the brain's 3D perceptual space, i.e. a forced linear transform of 3D coordinates or something.
Just be careful when applying reductionism, it's always a tradeoff and you are leaving qualia behind to make these simplifications
> I wasn't actually naked, it just felt like that and that everyone was eventually going to merge with me and that I should feel ashamed of it
This reminded of Deep Space Nine’s Great Link. The drop becomes the ocean, and the ocean becomes a drop.
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Great_Link
If you're up for it, the next time you're trying out LSD at a venue see if you can watch the GUNSHIP video "Ghost" on your phone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUJuwNxNUWQ
Kind of suspect it'll make for a extra trippy trip. ;)
Opinions may vary of course, but I think LSD is best enjoyed without a phone at all.
In more secular terms, you are here to do the required work to understand yourself, your circumstances, stand on the shoulder of giants and study the great minds that came before you
Is that what kids who are born into starvation and poverty think ? Or just white guys with money ?
In the extremes of the human experience everything is meaningless. I remember I last time I sat down on my sofa after a rave and I just cried thinking about the kids in Gaza and how much life is unfair.
I don't deserve so much, not more than these people that are starving, and yet I'm here. And I know that if I renounce everything I'll just be another starving person, albeit white.
So I enjoy my life and you won't be able to make me feel any worse than I already feel about it. But I dedicate myself to charity and to serving people whenever I can. It's important to use your privileges to care and serve. There is always someone that your abilities can help and renouncing them, renouncing your condition is a disservice to society.
Now answer me. How many people did your comment feed now? Which revolution did it fuel that will feed the masses?
Why is Gaza such a focus for your tears ? What about all the starving North Korean kids, dead Ukrainians etc?
The point of my comment is to point out while that's your opinion on what the meaning of life is to sit around high, on couches contemplating philosophy (and good on you), it's very very far from a universally shared view, especially if you're born into starvation somewhere in Africa...
Nah, if you think you want to do it, do it, and I think a lot of people would benefit from a little peer pressure of having a half dose. It's all social stigma, all of the fear is from bullshit stories of turning into a glass of orange juice: that shit doesn't happen. Take a half hit of acid and you'll wish you took more. Every person I've I introduced it to has agreed. It's not that big of a deal. You aren't going to wreck your brain. It's not something that will ALTER YOUR LIFE PERMANENTLY!!! It's a drug and you'll be fuckin fine.
It very much IS set and setting and the powers that be really want to fuck up the set. Try it. You won't regret it.
My point is, even though there is no unsafe dose of LSD, bad trips are real and can totally lock yourself out of it psychologically.
My advice has to be very careful in order not to incentivise unprepared people who would otherwise have a great trip. We have to be responsible, even if it'll only gonna negatively affect a very small percentage of them. Applied philosophy of care 100%
Other than that, I totally agree.
I think the bad trips are good though, it's almost the point. Why are you feeling bad? It's usually because you're in a physical or mental place you don't want to be, yet, when sober, you think it is where you should be. The incongruity of the situation is the lesson and the point.
When I was in college, I tracked down some mushrooms, bought em, and ran away on my own to trip out. I found myself on a bench, next to a river surrounded by trash in a mixed industrial area. I saw cig butts and empty beer cans on the ground. Looked at my ripped jeans and thought "Am I trash? Why am I here?" It was a shitty feeling and I got really down. I realized that getting fucked up for its own sake was stupid, and it's about sharing time with others that's actually important, no matter what drug you're on. I started crying and felt horrible, but the next day, I had a new sense of worth and a new frame of reference for the world that has persisted for 20+ years. I'll always remember that shitty trip on that shitty bench.
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> there is no unsafe dose of LSD
Other than being a psychedelic, LSD is a stimulant and vasoconstrictor, so while physically unsafe doses are quite high (yes I've read about 'thumb print' doses), it's probably not wise to say that there is no unsafe dose of LSD.
It is unlikely you'll ever come across that much LSD, but LD50 is estimated at about 100mg, which is about 500-1000 ordinary doses.
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I think this is too dismissive of the transformative power of psychedelic drugs. They absolutely can alter your life permanently. They certainly altered mine. I think, in a positive way. But that power cuts both ways. I also know people who had harrowing, traumatic experiences and developed PTSD.
My advice to people who haven't tried it tends to be that if you're scared, you should abstain. Your presuppositions of what the experience will be, will in themselves shape the experience. If you expect a bad time, you're likely to get one.
There's also a group of people who are curious about using psychedelics to treat mental disorder. My advice to those people is to find a way to do it in a clinical setting. Psychedelics have enormous potential for effectively curing anxiety disorders, but it's not just a matter of taking the drugs. The experience must be guided by a psychologist who knows what the goal is. And then integrated and processed afterwards, also with expert help. Psychedelucs are not a treatment in and of themselves, more like an accelerant of psychotherapy. The therapy is still necessary, it's just that psychedelics allow you to do in a handful of sessions what could take years in a sober patient. As a case in point, I have a severe anxiety disorder myself, and my many self-initiated experiments with psychedelics haven't magically cured it. If combined with therapy, it might have. I'm still waiting for clinical practice to catch up, so I can have psychedelic therapy.
While most people are fine after taking psychedelics, some people experience lasting visuals after a trip: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallucinogen_persisting_percep...
There are some interesting videos on YouTube from people experiencing this.
Are you referring specifically and exclusively to LSD? Or to hallucinogens in general?
A friend of my brother was doing shrooms with a couple other guys, had a bad trip and actually offed himself as part of the trip.
Please don't try to convince people that all of this is completely safe.
This is demonstrably false and dangerous to repeat.
Just because everyone in your sample size has been fine doesn't mean everyone will be or even that your group will continue to be. Contrary to simplistic thinking, the law does exist for a reason and these substances are also scheduled for reasons other than conspiracies around free thinking.
Please spend some time reading about drug induced psychosis and educate yourself of the risks.
At first I read graves instead of raves. Now that would also be an interesting session with some deep dissolutions & insights, although maybe disrespectful.
Muscimol and Mescaline likewise; unless you're on big pharama med, I'd say most hallucinogenics are worth trying.
"We are the ones we have been waiting for" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-qw0Ud8Yx8
The truth is fully accessible through reason, you don’t need to take drugs to know things
This makes sense because experience doesn’t affect how a person reasons. This is why all truth is agreed upon
I know you’re being sarcastic but indeed if we reasoned properly we would all agree
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I've seen your post below about your bad trip. I fully respect your position, but that is not my experience. I realised I can't access things I find important through my reason. I'm just too dependent on my body for my mind to function, so I just followed what my body was telling me.
But I agree that you don't need to take drugs. That's why my advice wasn't a definitive one. It's an invitation for people to consider what they want in their lives.
Wish you all the best truthfully.
You don’t need to take drugs to know things, but reason only covers a portion of what can be known. Reason doesn’t really help one understand the nature of experience itself. That’s a whole different kind of meta-factual knowing, an infinite subject that some people approach through meditation (and psychedelics too).
Reason can know the entirety of all necessary truth. There are experiential contingent things such as what I ate for breakfast that it of course cannot know. But it can know all universal truth, such as all metaphysical and philosophical truth
I’m a Hegelian though so I’m biased
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No, but LSD helped me see things that couldn't be learned from outside. For some reason, it helps me recall childhood memories better. Sure maybe there's some guided therapy session that could have done that, but LSD gives it to me for free, along with a whole lot of other stuff.
Did it let you recall childhood memories, or invent new ones? How would you know the difference?
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All knowledge that can be gained through LSD is contingent and experiential, not universal and certain
I’m well aware through my own testing
EDIT: I’m not saying it is useless information for your life but it is particular to your life, not truths of the universe like the person I replied to claimed
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Reason is overrated. Knowing that smoking is unhealthy is not sufficient to stop oneself from smoking.
It’s not overrated if you want to know the universal truths of reality, which is what the person I replied to spoke of. The truth is fully reasonable
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Qualia. Black and white room.
How do you know your experience is not a placebo effect?
I don't know and honsetly I really don't care. What matters is what I do with it. It's really fun, I get a ton of physical exercise, I meet and talk to a lot of people, I help the organization with taking care of the garbage (I can't enjoy a rave fully if the land looks like a garbage dump).
I then get all my insights, because my mind never stops thinking about philosophy, and I write them down. Rinse and repeat.
It has profound effects in my life. Full disclaimer, I also exercise a lot, I have a fulfilling job in tech, I go to therapy, I dedicate myself to arts, I dedicate myself to my partner and my pets (which are almost like familiars for me).
Is it placebo? Is it my lifestyle? Is it the drugs?
I just apply non-interpretation to all these things that happen in my life and I go with it.
All you touch
And all you see
Is all your life
Will ever be
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Why?
For some people there is only the serious life for the serious man. Everyone else are just manchildren.
And they are right. Give these drugs to these people, they will turn into manchildren because it's their reality, and it's true for them.