Spot on (imo) Jamie..

I don't think it is delusional to see how much of what you call western lifestyle is in fact based on or at some point succumbed to increasing levels of delusion. The most frustrating aspect I feel is the level of hypocrisy and denial that are like central cores to this rot.

It is undoubtedly why more and more people start to seek knowledge, wisdom, lost secrets and the like from more ancient and indigenous cultures (imo). The whole thing just stinks of lies.

How you describe our relationship to the planet and sun (don't forget the moon and stars) makes me recall some of my "once upon a time" ponderings, wherein I pictures us (humans) as perhaps being like sentient pods spurned from plants (they were here first after all). At one point literally shat out into existence and evolved in order to keep things straight in the garden.

Somewhere along the line was an almighty screw up and we lost (or severed) a critical part of our relationship with the planet and in the process shut ourselves off from the vast part of ourselves.

Anyway without waffling on about more youthful times, this kind of led to similar thoughts on consumption (in many forms) and how what we consume we absorb and essentially bond with (on some level or other).

I think it's obvious that I am no scientist, just a guy with a semi decent vocabulary and wandering mind. I thought I would offer a bit what your very insightful commentary has got me contemplating.

hence why i said relatively.
the body contains quadrillions of viruses (10000x the number of bacteria) different types for which there are no cures.

Cool beans!

Jamie i do agree with what you said, however i dont see how this contradicts what ive been saying.

Maybe im not saying it very well.

Either way i do resonate with your most recent post

Depending on not depending, is still depending.
To be human is to depend on earth and all of the life of earth

Perhaps i maay be a stereotypical westerner of sorts, but its definatly possible to change

i myself have also reluctantly quit religion due to things like this ,

Here is one of my perspectives on the matter

I feel as I'f there are various tools, such as: a deciplined mind gained through rigorous meditation, entheogens, dance,drum and chanting rituals, certain eastern and native American schools of thought, and sensory deprivation tanks to name only some, that assist one on a path to a more fully enlightened and harmonious existence. They each serve different purposes, while sometimes overlapping.
Imagine a deciplined mind and knowledge of different schools of thought as a map of the land(life) your traversing, and entheogens as a compass. You can find your path with either, but a combination of the two is a much surer way to success.


Let me stray from conventional science now a bit. Lots of you are familiar with the belief that crystals have certain metaphysical properties, with different properties attributed to different crystals. Now take into account the fact that most psychedelics are crystalline in their pure form. Consider as well the fact that dmt, 5-Meo-dmt, and LSD all display piezoluminescence, a property where light is created from the application of pressure to certain solids. So the use of entheogens for healing purposes is another variation of crystal healing.

Nothing for sure of course, just musings and things to think about

Which is why protests aren't necessarily effective. It's much more effective to be for something rather than against it.

My experiences with psychedelics have been very spiritual, almost right from the beginning. I would say I see things with a spiritual tint and am very open to these types of experiences. So I agree that taking these substances don't necessarily guarantee a spiritual experience, at least not at first. With most of the powerful psychedelics, however, if you continue on and keep ingesting them, you're bound to have an experience that would be considered spiritual in nature. I've seen devout atheists become very religious after using psychedelics. It may not happen to everyone, but I think given enough time you're bound to be faced with something that your rational mind has real trouble dealing with.

Personally, my use of psychedelics has led me to seek out things like meditation. I had these very direct, very intense and undeniable spiritual experiences with psychedelics which led me to attempt other methods of bringing about the same sort of feelings and thoughts.

At this point I see psychedelics as a very reliable method of inducing spiritual experiences. You get your substance, weigh out an appropriate dosage, ingest it, and off you go. Something like meditation is much more indirect and inconsistent, but I don't think that makes it completely invalid. I've found meditating while under the influence of psychedelics absolutely astounding, so there's something to be said for learning as many techniques as you can to bring about these experiences, and using them in concert with each other whenever and wherever possible.

This is just the finest summary of how I feel. To progress in your spiritual development and life in general means above all to let go of your anger and frustration (which are all fear-based emotions). That is the true meaning of being free. I am still far from that point, but I can see progress, and to be fair almost all of it comes from meditation and almost none of it from psychedelics. Entheogens are seeds that should be planted in right soil, and meditation is a soil preparation process.

Appreciated

I feel far from it myself at times... But I see "that place" on my inner map and am determined to get there

Great post

Does it make you weakminded to use external help to achieve inner divination? Really?

OR... Is it perhaps the Egoic unwillingness to admit that we need help in achieving something? Because that is what I am now suspecting.
Think about it. It is so typically Egoic to want to do everything yourself &
accept no help from nobody in any persuit so the Ego can claim full credit for all it's achievements....even when it's clearly messing up & couldn't possibly succeed without outside help the Ego is still likely to stubbornly turn down all help and continue failing.

This Egoic behavioural pattern I very much recognise in "spiritual" people who argue that
a drug induced spiritual experience can never be genuine and that REAL enlightenment doesn't require outside help & can be achieved all by oneself.

To be frank, to expect to achieve divinatory states & (ultimately)enlightenment, without any outside help is arrogant, stubborn & small minded. What's so bad about accepting a helping
hand from the natural world? This is how I see it:

Nature observes 1 of it's creations: Mankind, and notices that Mankind has gone insane, delusional, violent & destructive. Mankind is an extraordinairily intelligent species, but with the heightened intelligence cam problematic side effects. Mankind couldn't handle the amount of intelligence it had. So Nature fashions various cures for the various mental ills humans commonly suffer from: Psilocybe Mushrooms, Acacias, Mimosas, Anadenantheras, Virolas, Salvia, Peyote, San Pedro, Cannabis, Iboga and many others plants & fungi.

Such a beautyfull gift; A cure for our madness(unwanted side-effect of our intelligence)
And so many turn it down condescendingly. "I don't need this to achieve enlightenment/sanity, I can do it all on my own" How rude to not accept such a sweet, well intended gift. And how Arrogant to think we need no help from other organisms to achieve enlightenment/sanity.

Also: What a disenchanted way of viewing nature: As if nature is Earthen, Material and therefor disconnected from the Divine. As if only the human consciousness is connected to the divine. In my view Nature is very much interwoven with the divine realms/spaces and as such it makes perfect sense to expect Spiritual Teachers to come in the form of Plants & Fungi.

And what fine Spiritual Teachers they are (DMT from MHRB, Ayahuasca, Psilo-Mushrooms..etc)
compaired to their human counter parts. Looking for a human Spiritual teacher you are much more likely to run into malicious, brainwashing charletans than running into a genuine, capable & reasonably enlightened Spiritual Teacher. So many human Gurus and "Spiritual" teachers have impure, egoic intentions & inadequate spiritual knowledge: I've never found
these problems of Ego-mania & deception in the Plant & Fungi Teachers I have experience with. So you might say that some plants & fungi are much better connected to the Divine than the best of human Spiritual Teachers.

Most Christians, Krishnas & Buddhists have no problem with the idea of a human teacher.
They see Priests & Gurus for general spiritual teachings and moral guidance.
So I wonder what drives them so up the walls about the idea of a plant or fungus Spiritual teacher? Do they harbour delusions of the superiority of mankind's intelligence & spiritual awareness over all other life forms, that would be shattered if they were to admit that
some plants & fungi can teach us more about spirituality than other humans ever could?

I wonder. In the meanwhile I'm fine with the idea of other organisms extending a helping hand to help mankind transcend it's own madness.

"I recently watched a video where the Dalai Lama was asked what he thought about people using psychedelics to achieve spiritual experiences. His comment was simply that you shouldnt use drugs, and dont need them, to achieve this."

He also said that Buddhists should not engage in homosexual activity, because the texts say it is sexual misconduct. Take what anyone says with a grain of salt and never, never deify them. The Dali Lama is just another man.

I kind of doubt the guy has ever even taken a psychedelic so his opinion is worthless.

I also feel that Buddhism without the psychedelic plants is likely a degraded tradition. That whole area has a rich tradition of using many entheogenic plants. There is enough evidence to assume it was always part of Buddhist traditions as well. You have to look at what traditions Buddhism(especially Tibetan) was born out of and synergized with as well.

The only relevant options come from those who have tripped? A bit elitist maybe?

Why is it elitist? I would not ask a virgin about the usefulness of sex. Would you? People should speak from experience, or just admit they don't know. Not make up some load of crap they just pull out of they're ass.

If he's never taken a psychedelic then yes his opinion on the value of psychedelics and whether or not people should use them is most definitely worthless and completely irrelevant to me

There is nothing elitist about not putting stock in a totally inexperienced persons opinion on the usefulness of yoga and whether or not people should do it...So then why is this elitist?

People that believe psychedelics will lead them to the same place as deep focused meditation are wrong. They are not the same and there is no reason to try and make them the same. Each has it's own gift. Psychedelics are often useful for introducing someone to altered consciousness which can then lead them to study meditation and self work, but the deep psychedelic experiences can ultimately be described by the same 3 characteristics (tilakkhaṇa) that all phenomena share.

1) It's impermanent
2) Because it's impermanent clinging to it will lead to unhappiness (Dukkha)
3) Because it's impermanent and leads to dukka it is not self (anatta).

Buddhism deals with ending Dukka as outlined in the Four Noble Truths:

1) The truth of dukkha (suffering, anxiety, dissatisfaction)
2) The truth of the origin of dukkha
3) The truth of the cessation of dukkha
4) The truth of the path leading to the cessation of dukkha (noble eightfold path)

There is nothing in the Pali Cannon to suggest drug use at all. In fact the entire Cannon is very practicle and down to earth. It has one aim and that is to bring about an end to ignorance which is the first casual chain in the 12 links of dependent origination (Pratītyasamutpāda) which can be summarized as thus.

With ignorance (Avidyā) as condition mental formations arise.
With Mental Formations (Saṅkhāra) as condition consciousness arises.
With Consciousness (Vijñāna) as condition Mind and Matter arise
With Mind and Matter (Nāmarūpa) as condition Sense Gates arise.
With Sense Gates (Ṣaḍāyatana) as condition Contact arises.
With Contact (Sparśa) as condition Feeling arises.
With Feeling (Vedanā) as condition Craving arises.
With Craving (Tṛṣṇā) as condition Clinging arises.
With Clinging (Upādāna) as condition Becoming arises.
With Becoming (Bhava) as condition Birth arises.
With Birth (Jāti) as condition Aging, and Death arise.

BTW I'm helping to maintain some of these wiki's so if you see errors please point them out to me. Also if you have questions I'll try to shed further light on individual topics.

In my experience I have found that psychedelics can only take you so far down the spiritual path before you get lost in delusions. They can be very good for lighting the fire in someone. It can be good to occasionally touch higher mental states. But the reality is the psychedelic state is impermanent, clinging to it will lead to unhappiness and because of that it is anatta (not self).

I have seen time and time again people on various message boards trying to link Buddhism to psychedelics. I say shut up or put up (some references that is). There is no evidence of drug/medicine use in early Buddhism what-so-ever.

Some tibetan traditions (Dzogchen) have made VERY limited use of some visionary compounds, but Dzogchen is not Buddhism and while there is agreement that some of the states (non drug states) are the same they are in fact seperate practices. I want to repeat this. The visionary states of Dzogchen are used very sparingly and they don't use tryptamines or phenethylamines. They also treat the visionary state as an illusion. Dzogchen was highly influenced by the Bon shamanic tradition. Early Buddhism was not. Nor are the majority of Buddhist sects on the planet today.

Have there been Buddhists in the past that used them? Sure there have. Some might call me Buddhist (though obviously not a monk and I refuse to label myself Buddhist or by any other religious label) and I have used them. That in no way correlates to the original teachings of Buddha. This guy wasn't a drugged out homeless guy wandering around like modern day sadhus....OK technically he was for a while, but that all changed. After his enlightenment he went on to setup not one but two major monasteries in his lifetime and he travelled extensively teaching and sharing this dharma. He had thousands of followers and many of them also attained enlightenment or lesser fruits such as stream entry or once returner. I won't dive into all of this unless others want it.


Now with that said. Yes I do believe psychedelics can have a role in spirituality. But IMO/experience they can only take you so far. They are kinda like turning on the light of curiosity in a child. They can even show you some lofty states and allow a person to experience deep compassion/empathy and a whole host of other very desirable traits. What psychedelics CAN NOT EVER DO FOR YOU is teach you how to access these states under any circumstance via nothing more than your own mind.

That is where the noble eightfold path comes into play:

1. Right view
2. Right intention
3. Right speech
4. Right action
5. Right livelihood
6. Right effort
7. Right mindfulness (sati)
8. Right concentration (samādhi)

BTW For the longest time I assumed only the last 2 actually mattered. I was wrong. In order to establish mindfulness you have to live in such away that your mind isn't constantly fighting against you. This is also the reason I seldom drink any more. I'll make a bold statement here. People who drink regularly can not establish mindfulness for more than a few moments at a time...(yes i know of several famous lamas who drank. I can assure you their mindfulness was impacted and they likely learned mindfulness long before they ever started drinking)

I think many people that come to Buddhism are frustrated by the lack of progress initially. That is because most people have minds racing to and fro worrying about what was done are what is still to come. Also most people are looking to add something to themselves to make them feel whole. Buddhism is pretty much the antithesis of that approach. Buddhism teaches you to deconstruct yourself in such away that all delusion of you being a seperate entity from the rest of samsara is abolished. It is only with a gradual stilling of this process that true mindfulness can be established.

So my words to the original post on egodeath.com would be this:

Why don't you try using the same energy you have applied towards resisting spiritual practices of others and apply that same intensity and focus into seeking the truth? The first step in that search is to openly admit that you simply do not know. Can you do that? Can you openly say that


Peace

We have like a 10 page thread here on the Nexus of reasons *NOT* to take DMT. So if someone chooses not to take the drug, perhaps because of something they read on this board, their opinion is no longer valid? Also, saying something is "worthless and irrelevant to me" is not the same as saying his opinion is worthless. Even if the Dalai Lama never took psychedelics he most certainly is a spiritual leader, and this thread is about spirituality. I would like to think his opinion would at least be acknowledged.

When I brought up Alan Watts, who most certainly took psychedelics, jamie shot down his ideas because he liked to drink. It just seems all to common in this thread for people to straight out attack the ideas of people they don't agree with rather then simply disagreeing.

I love Alan Watts.
I find his words ring as true to me as the sky is blue.

Peace

I believe you have taken his comment of of context. If I'm not mistaken he was referring to psychedelics with regards to Buddhism which he is quite familiar.



Yes I agree opinions are worthless.

I'm not flat out saying everyones reasons for not taking DMT are invalid just because they haven't tried it...That is different, and your extrapolating too much from what i said. They could even have interesting thoughts about DMT without taking it, sure, but if they think they have attained some level of unquestionable truth and understanding on their true value and whether or not people in general should take them then i think they are deluding themselves. If you disagree with that then thats ok, i really don't care either way..Don't take this the wrong way, as i honestly don't mean these words to come off as negative or confrontational

I'm not against drug-free spirituality, just ignorant drug-free spirituality that thinks all spirituality should be drug-free like them.
(And btw there is no such thing as drug-free spirituality...drugs are in our food, our bodies, and our brains because we are made of and run on drugs. Now, i am not a reductionist materialist person, but people who think psycho-active chemicals are not at all involved in their "drug-free" spiritual lives/altered states of consciousness are just kidding themselves.)

How was i attacking the Dalai Lama's ideas? All i said is that his opinion on psychedelics is basically worthless to me because he's never taken them. I don't agree with everything he says and does but i respect him as a person, and i do like other good things that he says and has done. If you put weight on his opinion on psychedelics then that's fine, but please don't accuse me of attacking him when really i just don't put value in his opinion on the matter at this point in time

I agree that it would be overkill to completely disregard watts as not walking the talk just because he drank a lot ( although jamie did say he just didn't resonate with a lot of his ideas as well) since he genuinely was a great guy in a lot of ways- and this is coming from the people who knew him well. I personally love watts but i can understand where jamie is coming from, and it was disconcerting to learn that he was a drunk. But hell, on the flip side, some of my favorite authors were drunks...I'm no advocate of alcohol, but believe it or not there is even some amazing psychedelic people here who are well known members and lead great lives while doing all sorts of good things but they too drink pretty heavily.... Although all of this is way way different than someone claiming to know whether or not psychedelics hold value and if people should use them when they've never bothered to even take a psychedelic themselves...so i'm not sure why your relating that to what i said about the Daili Lama.