Reflections on Cannabis, Ayahuasca and the mystery of plant teachers
grahamhancock.com
grahamhancock.com
Right, so it's only "skeptics" who point out the bleeding obvious?
I think we can safely say it is most certainly all within the brain. That's what the drug is directly influencing, and as a result your mind goes over the waterfall and you are forced to just go along with it, or suffer if you put up resistance.
The problem with long term fans of DMT, cannabis, and all manner of psychedelics is that you end up writing books about it that mean more to you than they could anyone else. There's exceptions (Castaneda), but that's generally how it goes.
The thing is, if you need to take Ayahuasca before your own brain tells you that your abuse of pot is out of control, then that points to something far less sophisticated than the exotic make-believe problems of spiritual junkies. It points to the obvious: that you're lazy. It really is that simple.
Not to undermine the importance of getting back to basics or nature, and sorting through personal issues, perhaps even under the influence of psychedelics - that can be a very cleansing experience. But you shouldn't need to go to Brazil for that and drink sewerage tasting cocktails of God-knows what and vomit your guts up. That is nothing more than conscientious stupidity (IMHO).
Here, brain, inside, outside, no idea what any of that means.
It's like saying what is outside of everything, or what is inside of outside.
Not one single thing can be explained, but as if by magic Scala 2.10 build times remain slow and another Ruby library gets hacked into.
And so it goes...ours is not to reason why
Occam's razor says you're probably right, but personally I'm holding out the slim hope that there's something much cooler going on, call it primitive telepathy or whatever. The next few decades will hopefully tell.
> But you shouldn't need to go to Brazil for that and drink sewerage tasting cocktails of God-knows what and vomit your guts up. That is nothing more than conscientious stupidity (IMHO).
This is less stupid than popping a pill whose side effects take longer to list than the rest of its commercial. I mean, just look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venlafaxine#Adverse_effects. That's stupid, and it was a good point made in the post.
One of the remedies I've been using to help with the side effects of kicking this, interestingly enough, is medicinal cannabis edibles, which has also helped with a gastroenterological problem I have.
What I've often heard is a good route is a couple of tablets of prozac. The half life is on the order of weeks, and so you can take these for a few days, instead of the venlafaxine, or maybe with (whatever your doc says).
Then, after building some up in your system, you can just stop. As you go through the half life decay, it's a built in taper, and it's slow enough to limit side effects.
Naturally don't take my word for it, talk to a doc.
I've considered it myself, because if I miss a dose of venlafaxine, I get terrible vertigo. really bad. But I do suffer from an anxiety disorder and it definitely has made a difference in my life.
Thanks for your reply :)
Good luck!
Just because you can name a pharmaceutical with dodgy side-effects doesn't mean that drinking ayahuasca brew is a great idea either. 'Western' medicine has enhanced and lengthened countless lives.
I've done a lot of things in my life and I very quickly came to realise that all this talk of mothers and teachers and mind expansion was basically crap.
Hallucinogens can make you think differently about yourself and your place in the world. Awesome. Lets not dress it up as a psycho-religious experience where we tap deeper levels of the universe to reunite with the mother-goddess and retune my soul-wavelength to that of my inner dolphin spirit from the world beyond... You got f*cked up, saw some shiny stuff and now you feel better about yourself. Hooray.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Castaneda#Reception
http://www.amazon.com/The-Antipodes-Mind-Phenomenology-Exper...
It's rigorous. It has tabular data. It's about ayahuasca phenomenology.
Why is it that so few here actually research psychedelics seriously?
I'm sure the book with the long title you linked to is a solid psychedelic reference and scientific companion, with a little adventure thrown in.
Castaneda was heavy on the adventure. "A Separate Reality" is hilarious and insightful. Stories can pass knowledge and Castaneda certainly supplied stories. The books are like psychedelic Mexican westerns, an average westerner protagonist on a quest to match the great Sorcerer's tripping skills and make new inorganic friends.
How could you possibly cast a dark shadow over that synopsis? :-)
That some became disciples of the books is no surprise, but Castaneda's words did the heavy lifting.
Romanticizing the word 'Ayahuasca' is annoying. It's just a name for an organic substance. The "mother" thing is SYMBOLIC guys - symbolism was HUGE way back in native times. Symbols and static icons also act as a safety net for the chaotic nature of our own minds under the influence, and the right symbols can turn a bad trip good.
The key here very much being "under the influence". That's chemical influence, on your very sensitive brain, which has a natural chemical balance that you are disrupting. No wonder dream states emerge while you're awake.
Seriously.. it's completely the wrong track to mix belief in intelligent other-worldly ghosts that say hi during your trip, and rigorous scientific psychedelics.
I would like to visit Brazil one day, I'll never say never. Does the Ayahuasca jungle-cafe serve peyote?
As a 10 year pot smoker I stopped rather randomly about 4 months ago. I didn't do it for any reason besides respiratory health, and probably wouldn't have changed if I had a good vaporizer. It's fine not smoking but I drink more and find my mind moving away from the broad thinking pot encouraged. I'll probably find a way to balance it in in some way again in the future.
The likes of psychedelics, however, are framing or pivotal events in my life, generally done in the wilderness. My feelings are similar to Steve Jobs... they are incredibly powerful experiences and I yearn to share them with those I'm close with. I imagine I'll be having these experiences throughout my life.
"a mixture of foot-rot, raw sewage, battery acid, sulfur and just a hint of chocolate. Within about 45 minutes of drinking it you frequently begin to suffer bouts of severe nausea, vomiting and diarrhea."
This is NOT anything like mushrooms unless you've taken the wrong kind.
You will vomit, however.
Same boat, I smoked a lot of herb growing up (never drawn to drink particularly), but stopped in my 20s for about 6 years.
No longer clear, smoke every couple of weeks, and trip a couple times a year, 1/4 of shrooms and off into the woods, goodbye world.
foolish pride in you I am broken praise
The love in and beyond all things, is there anyone more blind than myself?
Sorry, got a bit off track there...back to "reality"
> Have you tried not smoking AND not drinking? ;-)
And i noticed that my home remedies for asthma and respiratory stuff all involve either smoking (legal, non-tobacco) herbal remedies (Verbasculum thapsis) or binge drinking ;-). Fortunately it's only required a couple times a year at most. In both cases, I find the duration and severity of respiratory problems goes way down..... (In comparison to modern pharmaceuticals.)
Likewise. I have only used them twice for that reason. I will also say the two times I have had terrifying hallucinations, they were induced by intensive meditation, not by drugs. The thing is, I think that you get out of these things what you put into them. The time I tried mushrooms, I could move in and out of reality as I chose. I attributed this to preparation because many of the others who tries mushrooms with me could not do this.
The time I tried LSD was different. I could not move back to reality, but I spent most of the time in meditation. Finally later I gave up on meditating only to have a series of life-altering epiphanies and hallucinations immediately following.
These experiences can happen without drugs to be sure, but there is something about taking oneself out of the normal world that seems to facilitate them.
http://america.infobae.com/notas/57978-Peru-joven-estadounid...
http://peru.com/2011/11/28/actualidad/otras-noticias/video-m...
I am not saying don't do it.. just be careful with what you do.
However, brief anecdotes like this are not incredibly useful without a great deal of additional information.
* Did your friend or others in her family have a history of mental illness?
* Was she depressed or otherwise suffering from mental illness at the time of the trip?
* Was she on any other drugs (prescribed or not) apart from ayahuasca?
* Had she had much previous experience with psychedelics?
* Did she try to fight the experience or was she able to surrender to it and go with the flow (a very important skill to have, when using psychedelics)?
* Was she in a safe environment, among trusted people during the trip?
* Did she have a concrete, positive intention for the trip? Or was she just taking it for the hell of it?
* How much did she know about what she was getting in to?
* How qualified was the shaman she took the brew with?
Unfortunately, many self-styled shamen don't have the proper training, or (occasionaly) any training at all. There could be incentive for people to misrepresent themselves and their credentials, especially when money is involved.
Yes, one should definitely be very careful, and avoid taking psychedelics when one or one's family has a history of mental illness, is currently suffering from mental illness (including plain old depression), or is using any other psychoactive medication (such as antidepressants, antipsychotics, etc).
You should also seriously check out the credentials of any shaman or guide you're taking the medicine with, and be sure you are in a safe, supportive environment during the trip.
Finally, thoroughly educate yourself on the substance and constructive ways of using it.
I certainly have also seen people benefit from psychedelics but the danger is real and it's difficult for the dilettante to predict who is at risk and who is not.
She was not on other drugs at all as far as I know.
I don't think she'd ever done psychedelics before.
I don't know too many details of the environment she did it in, but it was with an apparently-experienced shaman I think recommended by her yoga teacher friend. It was the yoga teacher who recommended to her that she try it. All that she knew, she likely heard from this friend who had done it before.
She is a Buddhist, but I don't know what her intentions were.
I don't know anything about the shaman.
I know that it was a medical doctor good friend of hers that committed her to the psych ward afterwords, so she really needed it.
anyway, hope this helps. be careful!
Apparently the roof of the sky ripped open and voila, GOD. Was a bit much as he took 2 years to recover and, AFAIK, has been substance free ever since.
Also know a guy who lived in the Amazon taking Ayahuasca daily for 6 months -- came back stateside completely & utterly beaming with joy.
it seems, YMMV ;-)
p.s. why do threads on the use of psychedelics pop up on Hacker News? Thought this was for start ups and general technology topics...
I actually gave a hit of LSD to a Zen priest from Japan once. Said it was interesting, hallucinated and so on.
However, he was quite clear that psychedelics as a path to awakening is...off the mark.
Anyway, monastics are on a permanent trip...just like you and me, even off the mark, we can't help but nail it, life is the biggest bulls eye around ;-)
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_Hancock#Orion_Correlatio...
or my body is a cocoon of truths being ripped apart by 'them'?
Well I know what i'm choosing.
http://jacquesmattheij.com/this-white-powder-will-kill-me-on...
One lives life weeding out things he do not like, burning down bridges, building new ones, exterminating problems and severing connections, building new ones when needed.
Sadly, only one of them will accept other.