Hello, I am in the medical field and came across this site after discovering DMT from a medical perspective. I have never tried it and doubtfully will. However, my interest is peaked both as a professional, and one who has experienced DMT like chemicals in my youth and have had an NDE and OBE. I am contemplating the implications of the experienced as related by others and how it may fit into my own life experiences. I will start with the chemical experiences. Now that I know the chemical structures of some chemicals it experienced many years ago are much like natural substances in the body it opens up a can of worms for me. Then, to have survived a 130mph head on collision with a true obe, I can tell you, it was nothing alike. The obe was not, and I repeat for the sceptic, was not a hallucination. I know the difference. I had my accident in 1996 and until about a month ago I have wondered if the civil war era graveyard I wandered into was real. By a coincidental convergence of Google Earth, 2 civil war buffs I work with and my own curiosity finally getting to me, I looked into the matter. Not only did I discover that the graveyard I saw in the woods due to the all permeating light was really there, but the marker I saw dated 1852 was also there. It was so profound, I can't imagine anyone denying it. But it was nothing like a cylicibin trip - no colors or warped perceptions (except for the fact that even though the night was as black as this screen I only saw all permeating light. I do wonder if the DMT experience is different than that produced by other similarly structured compounds. Can anyone tell me? Don't need to experience it for myself. Of note, I work with psychotic inmates and know that hallucinations are not real, obe's are, conversely.

I never had any of the two...

But, are there really any similarities between OBE Dmt and mushrooms?
Beside the tunnel of light?

how do you know "hallucinations" are not real? How do you know psilocybin is just hallucinations? Why do you assume that other altered states that contain "real" experiences would be similar to OBE's or NDE's?

Just some things to concider. I have had many OBE's throughout my life..I have lucid dreamed and had OBE like experiences for as long as I can remember occasionally..I have also had natural DMT like experiences in the middle of the night many times. They are nothing alike.

However they can overlap. I have left my body in high dose ayahuasca experiences and DMT experiences, and those experiences were far more profound than any OBE I have ever had. The only thing that came close was one lucid dream or OBE(not sure which) that I had where I flew into space and looked back at the earth and had some kind of psychospiritual awakening. This was, however hours after an ayahuasca experience while I was sleeping..

The thing about OBE's is often people have meaningless things to report. Like they fly up above the house and look back at their neighbour cutting the lawn or something..I mean, great but so what? What can you do with that? Other times people seem to have some more profound realization about the nature of life etc..and those ones philisophically seem to be more in line with a DMT or ayahuasca experience.

In reality the only way to know is to take DMT yourself.

From my experience vaporizing it, it's dosage dependent.

Breakthrough dosages could be considered NDE or OBE type experiences. You can feel like you've been transported to another dimension/hyperspace/giant underground dome made of light, and I personally see giant beings of light that feel very real and alive communicating to me through means other than language.

Sub-breakthrough dosages would be more similar to a mushroom trip though. Very intense visuals, serenity/calmness, increase in non-linear thought processes and psychomimetic (hallucinations of beings speaking to you are possible), and no OBE/NDE type effects.

Welcome to the Nexus!

Very interesting experience you had, thanks for sharing.

Regarding the OBE vs hallucinations, I think its hard to make a generalization because it may be different things for different people. For example, OBEs can also be false at least in some cases and be more akin to dreaming. In other cases they might be real, for example in yours? Same for hallucinations, with the little experience I had working with psychotic patients, Ive also seen that some are clearly deluded, that hallucinations and thoughts are not true. But maybe, just maybe, some or other patient are having more than simple "random" hallucinations and are actually experiencing something that could be beneficial to consider (like maybe at least it talks about the patient's inner self and past experiences in a symbolic way and he can learn from accepting/going through it instead of medicating it out). And maybe, who knows, someone is considered crazy but has actually gotten in contact with a deeper part of reality beyond himself?

Same with psilocybin and DMT, I think that the visions one has cannot be reduced to one simple explanation. On one hand, I think a lot might have to do with specific neuronal activation patterns, it can be related to past associations, it can be related to natural perceptual pattern-finding processes, or might also at least in some cases go beyond that, and that we tap out into something greater than our own personal history and individual consciousness?

Regardless, I think its valuable to keep an open mind and yet maintain critical thinking regarding these issues, not fall into one or another belief and keep experimenting and studying.

One interesting related thread is: https://www.dmt-nexus.me...aspx?g=posts&t=11579

By the way, if I may ask, why dont you want to try DMT (or any other psychedelics anymore ?) ?

This is from what SWIM knows (SWIM is not by any means experienced).

I have had multiple experiences with mushrooms, and with all of those I still felt that I ever left the physical world that we are "in" right now. Sometimes i felt like that what i was seeing wasn't real. from what I know enough DMT sends you into a completely different plane (universe) if you "breakthrough". So it would be similar, but on a completely new scale compared to mushrooms.