Hi There,

At the start of life there begins an 'epic' tale. From the first protesting intake of breath to the last, rasping exhalation of old age, life writes a many chaptered story of non-fiction within a book - hardbound by flesh and bone: but the 'physic' of the book is not the story; neither is it the 'hero' or the 'heroine'...truly, for such are simply 'virtual' psychological constructs that evolved as the story grew and lengthened out of the cyclic years of dynamic interaction with other heroes and heroines, of whom, life equally writes.

Life, your life, is one phenomenological story entwined and interconnected with that of other phenomenological stories that make up all that that we term human existence, and thus, it makes our presence here on this planet - our existential incubator - a multi-faceted experience. Sometimes, as if peering through a glass darkly, we may catch glimpses of uncommon 'existential' aspects, and find ourselves suddenly confronted with a 'behind-the-veil' reality, and in direct contact with what is normally 'opaque' and 'hidden'. On such occurrences in our lives we find ourselves encountering those rare chances of self-discovery and self-enlightenment that guide us, provocatively, into a conscious understanding of who and what each of us really are.

Thus it became for me -as life wrote its indelible print upon my memory - an unfolding story of an unconscious quest, seeking answers to unconscious questions upon the meaning of mine own existentialism. Whence, during quiet moments, I would silently ponder what purpose was there to man's existence? Why are we here and what happens when we die?
I did not understand at the time of my framing these profound questions the error of the manner in my asking them. By pluralizing the questions I did not realize that whatever answers I thought to have received would be quite general, and would only be relevant to me by small degrees: they were neither specific nor focussed towards what I was really asking, for I was really asking about 'me', 'my' existence, 'my' role, 'my' purpose, 'my' own learning.
I should have posed the questions in the 'singular': What is the purpose to 'my' existence? Why am 'I' here? What will happen when 'I' die? One's life is, after all, about one's 'self'! Why?

If you and I were to read the same book, our conscious experience of doing so would be quite different. What we each take from it, and how we respond to it will be different. There would, of course, be some common agreement about certain aspects, but each of our conscious experience of the book itself, we cannot share in: such experience is personal and private and non-immersive to the other.
Thus it is with the 'life' experience. By being 'alive' and 'existing' we share in the dynamics of living, but we cannot share in each other's conscious experience of doing so. My conscious experience of 'you, is not your conscious experience of 'you', and vice versa: hence, one's life experience is a phenomenological dynamic pertaining to one's 'self' through the virtual constructs of 'character' and 'personality' that emerged gradually over the years from the story that life wrote in your memory.

When you awaken each morning, you do so to the same virtual psychological constructs of character and personality through which your 'self' is expressed, and was expressed the day before, and the day before that, and so on back into your past. Indeed, you are so cognitive of your own 'self's' character and personality expressions that you feel that you could not possibly ever awaken to someone else's character and personality in your own self-sentient experience. Nor could you; you cannot have (or be the bearer of) someone else's personal and private memories without actually having lived their life experience exactly as they had lived it.
Thus, we are drawn to a conclusion that life is - for each of us individually - a personal and private experiential dynamic, and that the tale that is begun at birth, ending only in each of our individual death, is the telling of a journey...but does 'death' actually end that journey?

The preamble I provide to the statement in the title of the thread is merely a canvas device to give placement to each and every one of us in the condition and circumstance of being alive and self-sentiently aware. All manner of organisms are alive, but not all organisms are as self-aware to the level that we are, nor do they ask the same profound questions as we do.

Seemingly, we are born with no map, no chart or star to guide us through the many terrains of the life experience. We seem to simply wander willy nilly until we are able to cognize a more deliberate perspective on what we should or need to do. The purpose of life is to ask questions, and the best of the questions is that which asks...what purpose does life carry?

The purpose of life is to give itself purpose and meaning, hence the human organism's level of sentient awareness. Defaultly, we carry biological necessities; we need to eat and grow and procreate in order to carry the species into the future, but with regard to our psyche and psychology, we are still evolving within our biological incubator of the spirit...and we are not doing a very good job of it.

Our intelligence has become a Damocles sword upon which we self-harm and cut ourselves. With reason and logic we have disconnected spirit from experience and reduced it to myth. Yet knowledge is the reward of experience, and the food of psychical growth, made opaque by the ego construct. So the trick is...to ask questions and seek understanding with reason and logic, but allow wisdom to percolate into spirit, and the connection can be re-made.

Thus far, I have discussed more on the subject of 'spirit' than I have anything on the subject of psychedelic experience. As an unresolved fact, that is to say, as a truism of cognition, we realise that all experience terminates in spirit...it's final rendezvous.

Perhaps, a question percolating in your mind - and possibly formed by prejudice, is to ask, is 'spirit' actually real? Of course, there is no definitive answer, no actual 'beyond doubt' scenario that proves it so, but through a choice of believing we can say that it does. Such is my current stance. I choose to believe that spirit is real.

However, I do so in a limited fashion. I believe that between birth and death, spirit emerges and matures over the years and expresses itself through the mental constructs of character and personality. Spirit adopts a unique and individual person-hood throughout the physical life experience. In me it became the personable entity I am, and in you, the personable entity you are.

So far, so good. It follows to ask the next important question. Does spirit continue once death takes the physical organism away? Does spirit continue a post-mortem consciousness and existential dynamic? This question is not for this forum. In any case, not overtly, so I will place it aside and come more to the subject of psychedelic experience.

The first thing we need to cognize is that life and the life experience itself is in fact a psychedelic experience. Even without ingesting powerful chemicals from various substances our normative consciousness is a psychedelic experience mediated by a pulley-system of many chemicals naturally occurring within our body and brain. When one chemical rises another one lowers, giving and mediating against the normative life experience and the consciousness state.

Chemicals such as DMT, LSD, Psilocybin, Mescaline, Cannabis, Opium, and Heroin, all alter the experience of the body state and consciousness, but the chemicals DMT, LSD, Psilocybin, and Mescaline are the true psychedelics, the true antagonists of our conscious experience. In what way do they alter our conscious experience?

In simple terms, they interfere with the tuned chemical balance of our neurotransmitter chemicals and alter the brain's translationary faculty of sensory experience. That is all they do. They are not keys that unlock the 'doors of perception' to alternate real worlds, but encrypt further an already encrypted language of experientiality. They make a kaleidoscope of normative experience, and it is this which is an important point to consider, even though it is too late to save the psychedelic experience from being religionized.

I fully accept that early man ingested hallucinogens within the food he ate, and that over time they had a profound evolutionary effect on his brain and consciousness, making him more self-sentiently aware, and also giving religion its foundational springboard. The first religion was a natural paganism which flourished and grew out of the conversations early man held with the entities he encountered within his altered normative state of consciousness whilst under the influence of the hallucinogens he accidentally ingested while eating. The correlation is there for all to see. As man's sentience became more perceptive and organised, so did his society and its idioms.

Pretty interesting "trial" we're being put through in these vessels huh?...

Aweens:

Thanks for the reply. To be honest, I personally do not perceive the life experience as a trial, and I certainly don't perceive the psychedelics as a means to enlighten ourselves, our lives, with purpose and meaning. I do perceive them to be a means to understand how our bodies function, how all the electro-chemical interactions and hormonal messaging carry and transpose the experiential data of external (and internal) stimulations that make up the presentation of reality.

I accept that until we solve the problem of how mind and body relate, of how our conscious state is induced, and how our brain is able to interpret all the data into sentient experience (which is the experience of qualia), we will never cognize our true position in the existential state.

My current stance is that spirit is nothing more than a temporary spark of sentience that physical death wholly snuffs out, that memory (the holder of the data of character and personality) fully dissipates. Death places the temporary entity we become back into the same oblivion of non-existence before each of us were conceived and birthed.

However, from your statement, you are suggesting that we had pre-existence, and that this physical existence is a means for some form of growth in spirit. It may be, I just don't know, and nor does any one else?

Mind = blown.
I think i'm going to have to look further into consciousness & the human experience just having read that.
Brings up some serious questions in my mind about what life really is & why its here, as well as what happens when it's over.

Interesting write-up.. most certainly comes with a lot of mixed opinions.. especially in terms of knowledge / experience. No one really knows what is going on, but many do strive and thrive for further, and a deeper, possibly more fulfilling existence..



Psychedelics are mostly partial agonists.



Have you ever taken entheogens yourself? It would seem rather unorthodox to bear all this knowledge in mind when one has not taken steps to take these substances. Most times than ever, those who do explore these plants begin to merge with many realizations, and / or discoveries that they did not see before.. or perhaps were not clear enough on.. readily engages with and implements visions / ideas within their reality. Not that everyone needs psychedelics on the other-hand.

Cognitive Heart:

Indeed, you are quite right, thanks for the clarification. I still think that psychedelics By this I mean (to illustrate the point), they jumble up the translation of normative conscious experience through their capacity to inhibit the neurotransmitter chemical serotonin.



I agree with what you state here. From a philosophical point of view, I do 'engage with' and 'implement visions and ideas' within my reality. I have a deep interest in asking the human existential question, and to ponder on the imponderables of it all. The hunt and the chase of it takes me into some pretty interesting terrains, and all without psychedelics.

There are volumes of literature to read on the stuff.

Just as long as it sits well with your constitution, in the truest sense, yes, literature does aid in our process of understanding.