[quote=gibran2 quartz crystals held over your third eye, [/quote]

lol thats the one I do!

Ahh whatever this is a psychedelic website about a molecule of which it's historical use is rooted in shamanism and still holds strong in that position. If I had to tell everyone to go seek allopathic mainstream medicine just to be safe thats the day my account here would end.

"To my knowledge, no one has ever died as a result of hearing evil voices. But people have died as a result of brain tumors that, as a symptom, may cause them to hear voices or other sounds. To my knowledge, no one has ever died because of “negative energy” surrounding them. But people have died as a result of acting on what voices in their heads tell them to do."

People hear a voice in their head often when smoking changa or drinking ayahuasca. These voices often times give very helpful advice, and information about events the participant of the substance does not know, this is not temporary insanity. Many people hear voices with out a mental illness or ingestion of an entheogen and the voices give them advice and assistance, answer questions and help them solve problems. SOME people however that have paranoid thought disorders can hear voices that can make them dangerous. You are perpetuating a social stigma that all people who have mental illness are dangerous to themselves and others. That hearing voices i pathological when in actuality it is often part of various transpersonal experiences.


People in many belief systems other then yours do believe and do die from being around negative energy. We can look through out interviews with other cultures for weeks finding references to like cultural perspectives.

"If someone has stated that he has already taken action (moving to a new state on short notice) as the result of voices/sounds in his head, I don’t think that the most responsible thing to say to such a person is to take a salt-water bath. Sorry if that isn’t agreeable with your worldview, but I couldn’t in good conscience say such a thing."

the two people whos comments your refering to sound to me as if they are working from a very similar congitive system. Which you do not agree with or understand, or tolerate honestly judging from your responses. TO these folks they CAN say those things in a good conscience... you on the other hand could not because it doesnt fit into your belief system. Magical thinking is very common like this around the world. Go to a root workers or hoodoo forum and just read those posts for a while and you will see lots of references to golden orbs and soda baths with sea salt.
Here is an example...
http://forum.luckymojo.c...aths-and-washes-f7.html

You might not believe in these things but there are lots of people that do. And they are not MENTALLY ILL for their beliefs or their experiences.

lol thats the one I do! [/quote]

OMG FRAC... you must be mentally ill!
I must be mentally ill too, because I hear voices that guide me in my life and tell me to do things... I also see visions of the future and spirits which must be grandiose delusions and hallucinations of an obviously sick mind!

This is not exactly true. When I was studying this stuff in school I can remember various accounts of shamans, bokors and houngans, witches etc who were basically at the mercy of the spirits(to them anyway they were)..they basically HAD to shamanize or they would die(again in they're words). They had no say in any of it..they were like gang raped by the spirits, pulled into that life weather they liked it or not. They do the work becasue they must. The shaman might very well live out they're entire life with the spirits that once invaded them..the only difference between them and the patient is that the shaman has made deals with these spirits and now comes to them as familiar aquaintances and "coworkers".

The third example is what the original poster said. The section in single quotes is a direct quotation. Please re-read the original post.


It is true that not everyone who hears voices is mentally ill. I never said that, and I don’t understand why you insist that I consider belief systems other than my own to be inferior.

Here are just a few things that might cause one to hear voices:

----- brain tumor
----- stroke
----- dementia or other diseases of the brain
----- any disease that can disrupt the chemical balance of the brain, such as kidney failure
----- schizophrenia
----- any number of other psychoses
----- any number of psychological conditions
----- sleep paralysis
----- other sleep-related problems or conditions
----- post-traumatic stress disorder
----- actual sounds in one’s environment
----- inner-ear (middle-ear?) problems causing tinnitus or similar “buzzing” sounds
----- diseases of the auditory nerves, such as an auditory nerve tumor
----- a benign neural or psychological condition of some sort
----- entity or “spirit” communication

I’m not a medical professional. If I was, I’m sure this list could be lengthened quite a bit. Given all the possible sources of unexplained sounds, I still believe that a medical doctor is best qualified to diagnose and treat the problem.

Perhaps a salt bath is a true cure for evil spirit possession – I don’t know and I don’t claim to know. But given that spirit possession is just one of many possible causes of hearing voices or sounds, I still say that it would be irresponsible for anyone on this forum to suggest a particular treatment for a problem that cannot be diagnosed via the DMT-Nexus.

If you consider this to be disrespectful of other cultures, then I suggest you examine why.

You were complaining about gilbran2 being disrespectful and what not. But now you are the one posting in an sarcastic tone which adds nothing to the discussion (IMO) and doesn't help proving any point you might have. I suggest you question yourself and the attitude there.

Personally I think gilbran2 has posted very sound advices, with good critical thinking that does not at all deny other world views, but instead it puts them all equally in question in a pragmatic way (and specially considering the well being of the OP as the key here). I would love if you would directly answer his question about how to chose one world-view over the other, and how one unsupported claim is in any way more valid than another. Please think a bit and put your own thoughts in question before answering.

Note that what I say is nothing personal or an attack, just trying to reinforce critical reasoning and respectful prudent posting here.

You are confusing the actions of a practitioner and a “patient”. A shaman is a practitioner. The one “invaded” by evil spirits is the patient.

[/quote]


This is not exactly true. When I was studying this stuff in school I can remember various accounts of shamans, bokors and houngans, witches etc who were basically at the mercy of the spirits(to them anyway they were)..they basically HAD to shamanize or they would die(again in they're words). They had no say in any of it..they were like gang raped by the spirits, pulled into that life weather they liked it or not. They do the work becasue they must. The shaman might very well live out they're entire life with the spirits that once invaded them..the only difference between them and the patient is that the shaman has made deals with these spirits and now comes to them as familiar aquaintances and "coworkers".[/quote]


That is true and there are PLENTY of ethnographies and interviews with traditional peoples to support that.

There is a woman in tibet, or was rather she died recently. She was your classic paranoid schizophrenic, homeless very violent and delusional, she would attract people and growl and chase people in the villages he would wander through. One day a lhaman or god-man from a nomadic tribe in tibet saw her and was told by the spirits (obviously mentally ill himself) that this woman was to be a lhamo (god-woman, its their version of shamans, they get possessed by these wrathful deities, obviously primitive and psychotic people...) This shaman went into a trance and saw that this woman had a block in her pranic tube. he released it and or cleansed that blocked energy and the woman got possessed by one of the demi gods that is a consort to the white tara. This was a wrathful demi-god that was associated by healing. They diety told those present at the healing ceremony that the womans previous incarnation that she was a devotee of this deity at a temple that did healing work with people. There was a statue and a monestary dedicated to this entity and it had been attacked by foriegn tribes and destroyed, the nun was raped and killed and this was her next incarnation currently. The block was her past life trauma, now that it had been healed the lahman was to teach her to again embody this deity and preform healing work like he did. ( this was all coming from this crazy lady who threw cats at people mind you)
Tibetians are a very rational and skeptical people and seeing how no one had heard of this temple before they asked the crazy lady where it was. They where given dirrections by the diety and they went off in an expidition to find it. And they found it, it had been destroyed a very long time ago and had a statue of the diety in it, no one had known of these place prior and it was far away from where the woman was born. This woman had never heard of it nor had she ever been there, nor did any one near the place have any knowledge that it existed in the first place.

They decided it was authentic and she was trained to be a lhamo. She became a very powerful lhamo and was no longer mentally ill by any ones standards. She even got married and had a family and was considered by the dali lama to be one of tibets national treasures. She was flown all over the world to preform miraculous healings, that where extremely wrathful and frightening, she would bite people and pull their hair and talk in other voices she would suck black tar out of peoples bodies. It was quite amazing. These people would get the spirits, demons or withces that where causing them illness called into their bodies and the woman would nearly beat the crap out of them some times slapping them in the face all while possessed by this wrathful buddhist diety. Then she would do these very sweet blessings.

I bet the dali lama is totally irresponsible for thinking that this woman is a national treasure... man what a ignorant bald asshole he is...

you know what man... when you patronizingly tell me to reconsider my attitude... i just shut down completely.
latter...
I am getting really tired of the mods on this forum to be honest.

^that quote at the top is not from me

fractal enchantment wrote:

So every shaman in the world who ACTS on spirits needs to be evaluated by a mental health professional huh?

^^that one..not me

If something works, that’s great! If you’ve read any of my other posts on this forum, you’d understand that I respect other cultures and that I freely acknowledge my profound ignorance concerning the “true” nature of the world and what lies beyond. And it is this very ignorance that leads me to question ALL belief systems rather than just a select few.

Sometimes modern = bad, and sometimes modern = good. Likewise, sometimes traditional = bad, and sometimes traditional = good. The problem is figuring out which system to use and when. To believe that modern always equals bad and traditional always equals good is very closed-minded and potentially dangerous. Sorry, but that’s just the way it is.

And your attempt at sarcasm by hurling vulgar insults at the Dalai Lama is in poor taste.

would you kindly explain to me why am I being patronizing? I am ready to admit any mistake or misdoing from my part. Is it not true that you were complaining of gilbran2 and him being sarcastic? And is it not true that the quote I posted from you was exactly in a sarcastic tone in reference to people considering the possibility of mental illness (and grossly misrepresenting what those here meant when suggesting the idea of at least considering mental health care help for the OP)? I saw incoherence and strange attitude and I noted it, no harm intended.

If you are tired of the mods, you can very well pm mods to tell us (me?) why you are not satisfied with what mods are doing. We're all people, you know, and I bet if you have a good argument, all the mods/admin are more than willing to listen to you. Also, when I ask you to reconsider your attitude, Im not talking from an imposing mod position, if you read all my posts in this forum I think you'll see thats really not me, Im talking as a nexus member just like anybody else, as I saw an incoherence in your posts.

I dont understand why you seem to get so offended as there was no personal attack to you in any moment. But each one has their own way to react and I respect you. You are not obliged to like me or anybody else, and you stay in this forum only if you want, its your choice to be here or not.

If you feel there is anything more you need to discuss personally, feel free to send me a pm. Sorry for the OP for derailing the thread even more.

Hey, if you can't get into wrathful Tibetan dieties, try
"Pyramid Power" (Burt Reynolds as quarterback Billy Clyde Puckett in Semi Tough, 1977)

But seriously, a good professional analyst will respect if not understand where you're coming from, and help you deal with these presences. So many shrinks these days spent time tripping through the 70's and more, and have more understanding of the consequences of spending time in psychadelic states than we give them credit for.

*sigh ... I know I helped push the conversation in this direction because it's interesting and I wanted to see it hashed out a bit, but at this point this is way more about our egos then it is about helping the OP. It's a touchy subject. But at this point we are worse then voices in anyone's head.

update, thank you everyone who has continued to support me and provide suggestions for this
situation, by the way i have tried the bath with sea salt and baking soda (i hear baking soda
helps clear and strengthen the aura)

last night it made an audible sound in my head in the form of a brief
sigh, like ugh, your not listening, this is hopeless, thats the impression i got from that, though it lasted
a second that was the tone it was in,

havent heard mosquito buzz scare last night, did make contact though, the hum background noise intensified and
became more louder and audible briefly for a second, like a spurt in a higher pitch, (it seems like it takes a lot
of effort or intention for it to make contact) just like its saying 'here i am'
im still here, instead of reacting emotional and thinking about it in my head i just paused immediately after it
happened and decided to drop into my heart and focus my listening from there and knowing that it can hear my
thoughts i just layed still and was like, ok i know your there and you want my attention, im paying attention,
what is it that you want? (thanks for the advise from an earlier post) how can i help you?
and i said that it could communicate to me telepathically what i can
do to help it, later i got the strong impression of the word 'forgiveness' though i did not hear it, it was
my own thought, it may have been inspired, influenced or even possibly randomly generated by the mind, but i
think that it may be related,

maybe this entity is an earthbound spirit and it afraid to cross over because it fears judgement or punishment
form the other side, when i woke i tried to communicate with the entity with my thoughts with compassion saying
that there is no judgement or punishment or pain on the other side, only love and caring and that i really believe this to be true, and that its ok to transition
if it chooses to and i invited it to transition with compassion, crazy stuff eh, i appreciate your continued feedback and support,

Sounds like you've found a good way to deal with this spirit.

Please keep us updated on how it goes!

update
hasnt made mosquito buzz scare like it used to every night in the past 3 days, though it does still continue to make
contact, last night it made contact by increasing it vibrational frequency sound, the bottle hum i hear in the background
during the last, its like that but a couple notes higher and louder briefly like a spurt for a split second, just to let me
know thats its still there, this happened twice, however something new and unusual occured which was quite disturbing,
it seemed to have fuse with my being enough to make me make brief 'ah' sounds lasting a second repeatedly like every 6 or 7 seconds
about 13 or 14 times until i awoke and jolted out of it, i first noticed it in my dream it was happening in my dream as it was happening
in real life, then i slipped from the dream to a hypnogogic state, where my body was asleep and my mind was barely awake i heard it
then like 3 times and realized it was coming from me and i was not intentionally doing it, i was not happy about this at all,
this was very similar to the snoring sounds before except now i was making an audible 'ah' sound, i cant imagine what this entity
wants, either to bother me for its own amusement, to try to make my body its own, i dont know but it seems like its not very
concerned with my own well being,

All the advice has others have posted has been good. Here is my non-professional recommendation, but one that comes from my own experience.

As another poster mentioned a few pages back, it sounds to me as if it wants to communicate to you or through you. I have talked to mediums/channelers about how they became conduits for non-physical consciousness and their stories very much resemble what you are describing.

As I believe Fractal said, sometimes shamans have to shamanize...Try talking to it, ask it what its name is, ask it what it wants. You may not get any answers, you may get the answers you are looking for. If you approach it with love, it cannot harm you, and will in fact flee from you.

Is there something/someone you truly believe in? Such as Jesus, Buddha, Truth, Justice, Grandma Ethel...something you have complete faith and/or trust in? If so, challenge this spirit in the name of that which you have complete and unwavering faith in...if it stays, open a dialogue. It could be a teacher sent to help you, to set you on a path you agreed to prior to incarnation.

If you are unfamiliar with channeling/mediumship, watch this video, it gives a good basic understanding of what it is, and how/why the people became what they are...

Tuning In
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNsh4IPs2mc

That sounds ALOT like sleep paralysis, something I have expereince my entire life. I have had all of those symtoms you described. I suggest learn to work with and accept the state..you cant fight it..go with it. There might very well be entities there, but its gunnahappen either way so might as well learn to get by while your there.

Evenmore, sleep paralysis is culturally assoiciated with spirit attacks and things like that..like the "old hag" syndrome.

Hey avatar,

This sounds completely like sleep paralysis, something everybody goes through every night before they enter into deeper sleep. I would suggest you take a read through Robert Monroe's classic book 'Journeys out of the body'. This books deals with his early experiences of out of body travel.

One of his experiences that spring to mind is when he went to sleep one night only to suddenly feel this panting over his shoulder as if someone was hanging onto his back.

Sounds freaky but this turned out to be his physical body asleep and breathing onto his astral body that was floating just above. I wouldn't say I have mastered out of body travel but on the many occasions that I've had one, I have heard all sorts of metallic sounds, rising pitch sounds, crackling, whistling and the odd voice as well.

Overcoming the fear and going with it could have you floating over your own body one day.

Gluck