If any of you out there feel like you've had your mind a little blown by DMT, or are feeling too humble or less secure in reality due to the monumentality of hyperspatial experience, having minor trouble with long-term integration etc, maybe try giving silene a try and report back... because Dreamer has been really grounded since his short silene dieting.

It would be good to see if anyone else gets this, or if it was just coincidence or something else was responsible.

To me it did a great job at first then after the two first weeks, the effects were more subtle. I didn't do a particular diet, but used the SC to do some dreamwork (understand why am I dreaming this or that)
The first two weeks I was energised (this and guarana few times a week) and I was surprised to feel the day color much more pronounced. I was uplifted by hte beauty of the spectacle which eventually faded away...

All the time, I didn't ceased to think it's not worth the trouble but I must admit towards the end I didn't have much apparent benefits from it.
I drink the SC straight in water every morning for two months. Maybe I will go for the foam another time.
I still think this herb is valuable and work on subtle side of perception and suggestion (the power of dreams are more in tune with what we ask for when using this root).

"= the effects are noticeable and wear off after about 4-5 hours, so I would think taking it upon waking would not do anything for your dreams the next night. I don't know.

= I haven't been able to use it and get to sleep. My mind becomes too active to sleep after taking dream root, so although I haven't had any dreams on ADR, it does noticeably increase hypnagogic imagery. I'll be trying to sleep, and visions of spirals and stuff keep popping up, can't get to sleep.
"
fnog
its taken in the morning because its effects take time to build.
its used in the mornings every day for best dreaming fx - taking it before bed keeps some up

Silene Capensis Documented Affects

Evening of the Third Day

My dreams have become incredibly vivid and intensely real. I’m very much taken aback by the remarkable shift in my dreams. My sensory perception and awareness is breathtaking. The visual colour pallet is astounding, I feel like I have finally woken up for the first time in my dreams. Silene Capensis is the most powerful dream herb I have ever encountered or used. The lucidity is phenomenal.

Evening of the Fourth Day

My dreams are amazingly lifelike. Geckos and lizards were moving and crawling through my dreamscape. Their skin was morphing with orange and green layers dancing through their scales. They climbed around my shoulders and my neck, moving in a downwards spiral. Instantly blindingly bright blue butterflies filled my vision. Thousands upon thousands of them were beating their wings in slow motion. Their wings started to tickle my eyelids and my cheeks gently. I felt so safe and warm comforted in my own soft giggles. I am immersed in absolute pure joy and contentment, each day the intensity and lucidity increases immensely, my dreams feel just as real as my waking life...

Evening of the Fifth Day

Things seem to be getting stranger and stranger. A dandelion baby blue sparkler plant appeared in my drams, it was shooting off bright baby blue sparkles into a dark liquorish black sky. Silene Capensis seems to influence my dreams with specifically natural flora and fauna, I find this particularly intriguing. The beauty and clarity within my dreams becomes more and more acute each day. My daily sensory perception as well as my focus and concentration have been significantly heightened. As each day comes to an end, I am filled with intense excitement to see what beautiful, surreal and lucid journeys await me...


Much Peace and Sunshine

Waow Aegle !

I'm starting Dreamwork with UVUMA-OMHLOPE - SYNAPTOLEPIS KIRKII : we should come up with a handier name.
This root is ammazing too.
I just want to compare a bit.
I've noticed with both SC and Uvuma that I start each cycle by being confront with dark side of my soul. I know I have to work on this one, what I see during my dreams is somehow reflected to a much lower intensity in my daylife...

This is actually very intriguing...
Day 3.

rom - i call the kirkii - white root - i made a post on it a while ago and now all my friends enjoy it - amazing plant.

Phlux, it's of curse your post which inpired me looking into this other oenerigen, I was at that time working with Silene Capensis.
After I finished my batch with SC, I missed the richness of dreams, so I start to take 4-5 Inoxia seeds to see its potnetial. It is quite good at dream enhancing.
But now with WHite Roots ... I start to feel fresh and full of healing potential...
Aegle, I didn't sleep longer with SC but was finding my sleeptime much more rewarding, so I could stay longer. However, I had to wake up early at work three mornings a week (sleeping at work), so I couldn't sleep as long as I could.

Day 1

In the morning, a little less than half a teaspon was swallowed with some water. Mild psychoactive effects on the waking consciousness were felt after a couple of minutes. I started to get very tired in the evening. Dream recall was bad. There has been one special occurence though. After a couple hours of sleep, i would wake up to find myself in my room but it wasn't dark but lit in daylight. I then would see mild open eye visuals before I'd drift back to sleep. Upon waking up in the morning i felt like my dreams gave me a confident boost and i felt encouraged to get dressed. But as i said...almost no dream recall.

I will keep you updated if i plan to pursue this further. I've taken my dose today so there will be at least one more update.

Day 2

Same dose as before (turns out to be roughly 100mg). The anti-anxiety proportions of the plant are now appearant. Eye contact is easier ...this is always a way to measure anxiety levels for me. I'm still getting very tired at the 4pm mark. In the morning i would wake beeing somewhat tired, but in a "refreshed" way. Hard to explain. It's not tiredness because my bloodsugar and bloodpressure is low or because i dont wanna wake. I feel really tired. Dreams were present and plenty. It felt like I've slept for ages...bbut i can't remember my dreams. Like there is a blockage of some kind. Day 3 will see an increase in dosage to 289mg. Not sure how long i'll keep going because i don't really fancy the psychoactive effects on my waking consciousness.

iv asked around locally - witchdoctors etc about ppl eating the silene capensis- they had never heard of that being done and said it should rather be prepared as it has always been prepped.
just out of curiosity - why are ppl eating this root ?

Because its impossible to foam ist up. Perhaps i shouldn't eat it. There must be a reason the traditional preperation is different. In the best case, eating it makes you nauseous...the worst case scenario would be, that there are other, toxic compunds present you don't want to ingest.

Rom

I have also taken Uvuma Omhlope, it has some really interesting affects that I have observed. My dreams become far more lucid and lifelike, I also experience something rather strange. While I'm dreaming I experience bright white lightening flashes that overlay my dreams, which I find greatly fascinating as Uvuma is called the white agreement. I look forward to reading your future reports and findings friend...


Much Peace and Respect

I've been having those white flashes of lightning nearly every night before I fall asleep recently. Does anyone else have any more insights about what this is or what it means? Every night as I'm going to sleep I encounter stranger and stranger conditions. I keep thinking that I'm getting closer to successfully lucid dreaming or something.

2CB= Xhosa dream chemical.

Day 3

~280mg orally. This time I had a definite effect on my dreams. They weren't more "vivid" and i couldn't recall them better, but it definatly seems to change the dream content in a very strange way. I would watch the dream like a movie and it was professionally cut. At the same time, i could feel the dream characters life, as if i would watch someones life story through the interface of a dream. Then I would wake up in the middle of the night with a strange prickling sensation on my forehead and i couldn't get back to sleep for an hour, because the dream felt so strange.







Every sequence had this strong spooky feeling attached. Like i would really tap into somethin very real. That the dream was just a symbolic interface of some sort, to actual truths. This prickling sensation on my forehead, where the "third eye" is located could be a sign of me recieving energys of some sort.

Interesting herb, but very spooky. Will continue with a lower dose today only because it just starts to work and i don'T want to waste the opportunity. I don't like the physical side effects. SC makes me tired ....

impossible to foam up ?
did u see the lil foaming tek i posted pix of ?

VERY VERY INTERSTING
Are the effects really PERMENANT

I want to keep a dream journal and record 5 months of dreams. One month before dosing till one month after. The three months in between would be the silene usage. Calea never did anything for me, but after dmt I've have a major increase in vividness and lucidity in dreams.

Is that Silene dioica a potent as Silene Capensis? I've seen it around here in nature so I'd like to try it out You say you eat the leaves, how do they taste? They don't make you sick or nothing.
Have you tried to use the root?

Yes, but Xhosa is more like a generic term in my understanding.

Is 2CB really present in Silene Capensis?

Hi, Traveler!

I'm having trouble figuring out the correct way to quote you, but I'm interested in your statement here:

"Then at the end of the week a problem arose: My blood pressure rose, I don't know how much exactly but I can definitely feel it in my head. It isn't giving me a headache (I seem to be invulnerable to that) but I can feel an unpleasant pressure on my eyes and when I take a bow, the pressure in my head is building up immensely.

I'm thinking towards the idea that Silene Capensis is a MAO Inhibitor.
This seems to be supported by the fact that the blood pressure was rising after eating pepperoni, a food source containing large amounts of tyramine and after drinking lots of coffee."

Here's the Wikipedia entry that describes the active compnent of SC, triterpenoid saponins:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triterpenoid_saponins

"Triterpenes are assembled from a C5 isoprene unit through the cytosolic mevalonate pathway to make a C30 compound and are steroidal in nature."

I have a sort of a steroid sensitivity that leads to very high blood pressure, so I'm very interested in your theory. I'm evidently sensitive to aldosterone, or something my body thinks is aldosterone. That's a mineralocorticoid the body produces to make us retain salt. If we have too much of it and retain too much sodium--abundantly found in pepperoni--we develop hypervolemia (too much fluid in the blood), which leads to extremely high blood pressure. With high blood pressure we may not notice many symptoms, but some with aldosteronism complain of hearing their pulses in their ears, excessive thirst, a pounding pulse throughout the body, slight constipation as the gut reabsorbs water in response to increased sodium retention, etc.

One thing we who are sensitive to aldosterone have to watch for is anything that tastes like licorice. My kidney doctor has warned me about this. Here's why:

http://www.vivo.colostat...ne/adrenal/licorice.html

perhaps the glycyrrhizinic acids present in licorice are chemically similar/part of a reaction with the active glycocides found in SC? I'm not enough of a chemist to say yes or no, but I'm enough of a hypertension patient to be cautious. Licorice, or other herbs that taste like it, have a sweet flavor, explained by their molecular composition:

". . .saponin glycosides which refers to the attachment of various sugar molecules to the triterpene unit. . ."

When I had full-fledged untreated "pseudohyeraldosteronism," I had the same symptoms you did
on consistent SC use. One other thing--I often had vivid lucid dreams. Just about all the time. I am now taking an aldosterone blocker, which might be the cause of my lack of lucid dreams.

But if SC can make a permanent change, I won't have to take dangerous doses over time. I can stop taking it and still have benefits. That's what interests me about it. I'd love to have your thoughts.

Best,

OneofTwo

I've never tried this plant (sounds interesting, though), but wanted to comment on the triterpenoid saponin aspect:




Generally any plant that foams up like this when it is blended with water is rich in saponins. Triterpenoid saponins are found in many adaptogenic herbs (ginseng, Gynostemma, licorice etc) and a lot of them have immune modulating, antiviral, anti-inflammatory and other medicinal properties. Some of them can mimic the effects of steroid compounds in the body, as can the closely related group of steroidal saponins.

I haven't been able to find much on triterpenoid saponins acting as an MAOI, but some plants (eg ginseng) which contain triterpenoid saponins are not recommended to take with an MAOI, so you might want to be cautious about combining Silene capensis with MAOI herbs.