It's hardly my intention to "add words" to what you have said.

You present something like this--and you've talked about your OBEs before. You call them a "game changer." Honestly, I would now think WORSE OF YOU if you now mean to suggest these experiences are...nothing.

No. The only possible reason to bring them up is to at least offer the SUGGESTION they represent something real, and something beyond "the natural." To say anything else at this point is disingenuous.

Certainly, these are similar to NDEs--which themselves are ALWAYS brought up with the intention of implying a mind-body duality, and a "beyond natural" component of consciousness.

The "Who me?" act of yours at this point rings as VERY phony--especially in the context of this discussion: I've been here talking about materialism, and you bring up OBEs--what is the point of bring such a thing up if you don't mean to suggest they demonstrate a "reality" beyond materialism?? Just chatting??

Well, i must say, if you're attitude is any representation of what a life lived without the psychedelic experience represents...then i now have some serious misgivings about the sobriety enterprise.

Why spend years on the nexus, make almost 1500 posts, and countless arguments about the nature of reality and the psychedelic experience, when you have not even taken DMT or any other psychedelic once?

what is the point of constantly arguing about the nature of an extremely bizarre subjective experience which you have zero experience with?

I believe the point of the quote you are criticizing is precisely this. People delude themselves, so even if you think you know something it is helpful to try not believing it.

Delusions are just as much a belief as anything else. Again, I believe the point here is to highlight that you shouldn't accept your belief as fact and set it in stone.

Should one feel they are delusional they should certainly take another look over their current beliefs (believe nothing), which to me is very similar to the following 2 lines. Believing nothing means allowing your beliefs to have full freedom by questioning them. Never set it in stone (unless for posterity).

Lets be real here, the quote is a simplification/representation of a broader idea. It is there to impart meaning with minimal effort by the reader. True, you can't believe/know nothing (that would be an undefined equation) because I know that if I drop something from my hand it will usually fall. That could certainly change depending on a variety of variables, but let us not get lost in the nitty-gritty. I just see no point in expanding upon the quote to add technicalities that do not improve the intended message.

Believe Nothing.
Allow for Anything.
Question Everything

I think that is all I want to say. Also, I hope you enjoy your DMT experience and may it bring you many

What? Now I have to justify my...existence to people?

I think my posts and my stance speak for themselves. Certainly, my purpose here has not been to "argue about the nature of an extremely bizarre subjective experience." But I do, unquestionably, have as a purpose finding "truth," or at least expanding my search. I do have an abiding interest in knowledge and the process of acquiring it and discerning it. I also have considerable experience and erudition in that area--since you bring it up. If you do not find any insight or wisdom in some of the posts I've made I think maybe you haven't really had a look. But, specifically, I'm happy to discuss and consider any matter you wish to, based on it's merits and the merits of what you have to say--without asking you to justify your wish to take part...

As anyone else, I'm here to learn what I don't know, and offer what I might be able to.

Well, you quote joedirt, and joedirt followed that list by this:

Seems you are failing on point 2.
Probably better to be humble and say you don't know.... Because non of us really do.

So, in that less than humble statement joedirt, first, has violated his own rule 2 himself: He (it's directly implied) will not "allow for" the possibility that a materialistic approach and perspective might possibly EXACTLY and COMPLETELY describe and explain everything in our universe, including all aspects of ourselves and our experiences.

So, all at once, joedirt wants to tell us "none of us really know anything," while at the same time telling someone who takes a materialist perspective that they "fail," and thus joedirt knows they are wrong.

Unlike yourself (apparently), I do think it's a bit rude and uncalled for and hypocritical to list your own rules, proceed to immediately break them yourself, and then inform another poster making a reasonable and uncontroversial post, that he "fails" by your rules...AND HE SHOULD HUMBLE HIMSELF.

I don't think that's the way that fair, upright, and genuine discussion should proceed.

i never said i disagree with all of you're posts, or that i don't find some insight in any of them



wasn't saying that's the sole reason you're here. But you've certainly been in many a debate in that area over the months

and i never meant to imply that you need to 'justify you're existence to people'..lets not make it more dramatic than it is man. I'm merely wondering why you spend an aweful lot of time and energy on the dmt-nexus and all this psychedelic talk without every trying them.. and why you seem to act as though you can gain a deep understanding of what is really going on with that experience without ever having it yourself

which brings me back around to the question you didn't anwser: why haven't you ever taken a psychedelic? I'm genuinely curious

I have very seriously practiced meditation for many years, made progress, and felt (and have always felt generally) that my "consciousness" didn't need to be "messed with." This, while at the same time, noticing and acknowledging that things which many have said about the psychedelic experience dovetail well with insights I have made through meditation, and intellectual insights I worked through regarding Buddhism, and other eastern perspectives.

At least trying psychedelics was something I had always planned to "get around to," and that remained the dynamic even after I joined this forum (after hearing about DMT).

I generally don't take things lightly--and when I engage I engage wholeheartedly and deeply. I'm at the moment in fact growing a large batch of mushrooms for my first forays in the coming months.

My age is also an important consideration: I'm 59 years old. What one can do at 29 with little aforethought is not necessarily what one can do at 59. I have to be careful and circumspect, and give good consideration to such things (and, as I said, my dynamic--since I work very intensely on many things--has been to "get around to it eventually).

But I AM VERY STRONGLY of the opinion that one can't "get enlightenment from a pill." I have done "pertinent work" MY ENTIRE LIFE which, in a broad sense, fits in PERFECTLY with the psychedelic perspective, and I continue to do such work EVERY DAY. Taking psychedelics is one thing, WHO YOU ARE as you take psychedelics is another, and IMO, extremely important and relevant thing.

This.

My first mushroom experience led to my first radical analysis of the socioeconomic/political state of the nation/world. It was like, all of a sudden about 8-12 different pieces of the picture (industrial society, corporations, capitalism/wage labor and a number of others) suddenly went from being individual pieces of knowledge I was holding onto, into a synthesized understanding of the interconnection of all of these pieces and the manner in which they are used to dominate/control our lives.

I have to say (and I find it a little embarrassing that it's the case) but I'm still surprised when I discover that other entheogenic users have not seen/synthesized these pieces or come to these conclusions, but then my aunt or friends or I remind myself that the reason that I had that experience is because I was the person injesting the substance, with all of my experiences, understandings and perspectives.

Psychedelics as a mirror (and more) resonates very strongly with me. Imo...It's the reason set/setting are so important...it's the reason that despite having so many similarities in our experiences, many of us find personal meanings and affirmations in our personal experiences...it's the reason why the experience can be either heaven or hell...in the grand sense it's US...but for me it's me and for you it's you...afterall the person who takes the substance is the one who interprets the experience finds any meaning within it.

I agree and I disagree with that statement. You have to have taken psychedelics to even be able to comment on this though IMO..

What you are talking abotu snozz I agree with..but you can take any person from any culture, give them a breakthrough dose of DMT, psilocybin or mescaline and you can basically bet they are going to have some sort of "mystical" or seeminly otherworldy experience..they might freak out mindyou...and if they were able to portray it to you without the all the miscommunication spoken language can produce I am sure it would look something like what we all experience when we go to hyperspace.

Who you are when you take psychedelics is not going to change the fact that if you take enough DMT you get hyperspace. Who you are might influence how you respond to that experience though. I have given DMT to people who have different views than myself and read different material, comming from different places in life..and I have spoken with people who drank ayahuasca in SA who at the time did not even know what ayahuasca was etc..there is always a thread of similarity in there despite the fact that people might explain some things a little differently.

If this is all really about who you are and not what these things do, that why would eskimos be given ayahuasca and see jungle animals?

I think this is important because this thread is about belief, subjectivity, materialism etc..of course if someone in the amazon knows nothing of the stock market and wallstreet they are likely not going to go into hyperspace and come back realizing wallstreet is bunk..but a native in the amazon and wallstreet banker could very well have mystical experiences that are relative on a more fundamental level.