Hello everyone, been lurking about for the last couple weeks as I researched psychedelics. Still have yet to do any myself, but something in my mind is pushing me towards them. That push started a month ago give or take a day or two. Let’s jump right into it.

I've been around weed most of my life. Smoking was always second hand, I didn’t smoke but people around me did. This changed about 3 years ago. At that time I hit a bong and a blunt heavy a few times at a party, but felt nothing. Then maybe in late 2018 I got a THC vape from a friend. That cartridge lasted about a year and some change because I would hit it and again feel nothing, so I'm in no rush to finish the thing. When the lockdowns hit I was given another. So eventually I start using the new cartridge and this one works. I don't know what happened, maybe I inhaled better, held it longer, or it’s just a better cart but this one I felt. I was with family when I first I used it, and it was a great time. I see how weed makes a good time even better. But when I vape now it’s not a good time I’m looking for it’s knowledge and understanding.

The second time I used it I was home alone at my computer browsing videos and generally doing nothing when I decided to take a break. I’m taking a couple pulls from the vape and some time goes by I’m laying on bed not really thinking about anything. For some reason laying there on my side with my eyes closed I stop breathing, just holding my breath. I didn’t stop breathing because of some adverse effect I just started holding my breath. As time goes on I’m thinking to myself “why am I holding my breath?” Another part of me says keep holding it. I think again, “I should really breathe,” but a thought says, “I’m all right I’ll breathe when I can’t hold it anymore.” I go back and forth with myself until one point I realize that I’ve been holding my breath for an excessively long time, but I feel all right I don’t need to take a breath, so I don’t. Then a quick thought flashes in my mind about why I feel like I don’t need to breathe and why is that okay? While all this is going on in my head, I can almost hear this sound. A sound similar to a pump used to inflate a bicycle tire, a rushing air sound. The sound gradually increases in tempo as time passes. A panic comes over me and I think to myself that if I don’t breathe I’ll die. That’s when this sensation comes over. A sensation that spreads all over my body as if I was falling, but like falling into myself. Like when you fall asleep and the tension leaves your body. When that sensation hit I open my eyes and I say to myself “I died.” From that point on nothing felt normal. I’m still laying in the same position in my room thinking to myself, how could I let myself die all I had to do was breathe. I’m panicked at the thought of having just died. I’m breathing now mind you, but the breaths I’m taking aren’t filling, as if there’s no point in taking them. They also feel cold, like breathing cold air in the winter. I still feel this sensation all over my body, like I’m being enveloped all over but nothing is touching me. Now I grew up with very religious people in my family, but I’m not, however with nothing else to go on I wonder what’s to happen next. Do I stay here in this dark room forever like limbo or until something comes to take me away? I then start to reflect on my life, and I begin to think how I just let my life literally slip away. Thoughts of heaven and hell come up, more hell than heaven, no way I’m getting into heaven. A million thoughts are coming and going but one that sticks is how this must be hell. To agonize over the life I lost and know it will never be again. I was thinking that was what death was. To know life and not have it, and regret losing it. Now I just have an empty feeling, stuck in this realm or whatever you want to call it. Then while pondering my “death” I come to terms with it. Personally I’m able to take situations for what they are and accept and work with them. If I have a problem then I deal with it and if I can’t it’s simply out of my hands, out of my control. I come to terms with my "death" as there’s nothing I can do about it now. With that thought, the feeling of panic begins subsides. Not going to say I didn't think this was the typical high panic people may get and think they died. I wasn't about to go find someone and start sounding crazy and high. Going around telling people I smoked weed and died.

This is where it gets interesting because I begin having these existential thoughts that were getting more and more profound. What first triggered this was I was thinking about the universe and existence. Things I think about even stone sober. I was like "if the universe is everything that exists and I exist then I'm part of the universe. But which part? Am I/are we the universe simultaneously observing and experiencing itself as it creates?" This is a thought I've always had but now it was like OH SHIT! That jump starts everything and then the flood really started coming like the secrets of existence were being funneled into my head and my mind kept blowing. By this point any apprehension about being "dead" is long gone and I feel like the universe is dumping what it knows into my head. So much just instantly began to make sense to me. Things like music and songs, certain art, what people mean when they try to explain to others how we're all really one, a bit separate but still one. All of that just made sense very clearly. Also that sensation I felt all over my body I still feel. To describe it now it was as if I could feel the world/universe around me, and I can still kind of hear that rushing air almost low wizzing sound. Some of you may or may not know who Alan Watts is but I enjoy listening to his stuff. I’ve listened to a lot of his lectures before from time to time, but again, now it all made sense in a way it didn't use to, it hit different listening again that week. I felt like I already knew everything he was talking about. Made me feel like I wasn't going nuts because here's this guy saying what I was feeling. The whole thing made me think that dying was like a surprise party when you get to the other side. Everything is just waiting. Like leveling up and now more is available to us. At the same time I couldn't stop thinking about life and death. Like to know what death is like, you'd have had to have life to compare it against. I don't know what being a burn victim is like, people who have been can try to explain it, but until one feels it themselves they'll never really know. I think real knowledge comes from experience. That was the last big revelation I had before things felt normal to me again. For somethings no explanation will do, you have to feel them.

While in whatever state I was in that night part of me felt that there was a lot more to learn/experience but I couldn't get there. Like a vehicle that doesn't have enough fuel to make the next leg of the trip. Hence why I am learning about psychedelics. If I vape THC and meditate I can get back to that state, but there's that feeling that THC doesn't have enough punch to get me to that next level. I didn't have any visuals while all this was going on, but I still felt like I wasn't all there. Time also seemed to be different because I'd see my desktop screen saver and the time wouldn't change even when it felt like hours.

Again this was all around this time last month. I haven’t done any drugs that weren’t OTC or prescribed. Haven’t done any psychedelics, but in about a week that’ll change. Gone from knowing nearly nothing to being able to produce my own. I’m not looking to have a good time, just to learn, which I guess for me is a good time. What’s more exciting than mulling over and contemplating your own and all of existence? If it’s all random then it’s a miracle we’re here. If it’s not then why are we here? Deep questions that most people will write off or tell you to get religion. As I said I’m interested in knowledge and understanding, and those aren’t the same thing. Just because you know something does that mean you understand it? What I was looking for is a place to at least talk openly about what’s in my head driving me. For sure can’t get that on social media. Social media is toxic anyway which is why I’m not on any of it and Reddit goes south pretty quickly. So here I am on the most stable environment to have a conversation online, a web forum.

Welcome to the club. Weed is wonderful and I know exactly what you are saying. This happens to me every single night that I partake of it. I hope you are well. I went down the same path starting 10 years ago. Dont forget to write down the revelations you receive and make sure to share them with others. What kind of trip are you preparing?

I want to say that I wish I had known about this part of weed sooner, but I'm glad I didn't try when I was younger. I'd have probably just cast everything aside as just high and not paid attention. I also dod write a lot of things down. I have a journal, but I find myself typing a lot. So much so I got a better keyboard for typing.

Hello Curated_Thinking,

It is not uncommon for people to be immune to marijuana the first several times. I smoked it 5 to 10 times before it had any effect, then it worked like a charm. Every time after that it worked as you would expect. There is something odd to it, and I have no idea what that is.

Anyway, good luck with your pursuits. Be careful though, you have picked a very accelerated path.

THC's effect for me is different when do it alone or around people. It makes me more social which I'm not. It makes me want to interact want to laugh. But alone me think, and meditate. There's time when I stop thinking. Feels really good to not do that.


I was wondering if I was taking this really fast. I've only just recently reacted to THC. I've never done any other drug that affects the mind. Now I'm jumping into the ocean with DMT. But like I said, there was a knowing the first night that THC can provide a lot, but there's far more beyond its grasp. I don't know or can't explain why I linked the two as the same thing or close to it. Seems like a stretch, but maybe not.

Curated_Thinking,

I don't like people telling me how to live, and I try to avoid doing that to others. But I will say this – marijuana is like an awesome motorcycle and DMT is like an inter-galactic space ship. I've never smoked so much marijuana that I had amnesia (black-out). DMT however can do it with ease. I did that the first night I tried it. It was amazing, but also had moments of strong fear as I came back from the black-out middle portion.

I don't regret it and will do it again, but I would NEVER advise someone to go from marijuana to DMT within a month or so. It could work out fine, or be mentally unsettling. On a positive note, DMT is short acting. That helps a lot in case of anxiety. Six hour mushroom trips and 12 hour LSD trips can be rough if someone gets in a bad mental place.

I've thought about maybe working my way up to DMT, but from everything I've come across there is no real working up to it because it's unlike anything else. I for sure feel some apprehension as I get closer and closer to getting this thing that I want. That I think I want. That maybe something else is navigating me towards. Since that night my thoughts have been more and more grandiose. Not that it wasn't before but now it's nearly all the time, and I'm not upset or put off about it. What's better to ponder than the meaning and nature of the universe, reality, and existence?

Curated Thinking, I just wrote my introductory essay, and a lot of it revolved around cannabis. Reading your experience with it brings me back to those 'beginning' days of getting high when it was insanely powerful. It can continue to be, but can also take on a different character if you do it too much. Thanks for reaffirming that I'm not totally insane to 'love' it so much. There is, however, too much of a good thing(assuming it was good in the end?) Like XA1 says, I don't wan't to preach or anything to anyone either, but also it's just worth noting. And definitely I've noticed before the whole first few times and not feeling anything, it's very strange... One time my friend didn't realize he was (and he so clearly was, you could tell by his eyes) until I clued him in by telling him about it... and he almost had to think about it for a second, until he thought it was insanely hilarious that he was. Not to encourage you but I guess in some ways you're probably right nothing can prepare you for it. I feel like I 'over prepared'... I got so into reading other people's experience's that it kinda created this whole 'mental miasma' when it came to doing it myself. It is without a doubt, insanely intense, and I have yet to fully experience it. That is a breakthrough. What I can tell you though is make sure your set and setting has NOTHING left to chance, with dmt you anything you can do to prepare yourself and your environment will not be in vain... clean your self and your environment up... you sound like you mostly know what you're doing but yeah, it's not a joke either, it makes a gigantic difference when you're coming back out of the experience. I feel like my limited experiences with the 'sprit molecule' have made me a tidier, more organized person. Among other things... Anyways, all the best. Keep us posted. Be safe & happy .