Are we actually a bunch of delusional hippies who have just taken way too much of a powerful, hallucinogenic drug? I mean, it would be nice if we were all spiritual seekers on a path to deeper understanding but...maybe we just really like getting high?



In all seriousness though, does the thought ever cross your mind? 99% of the time, I'm pretty enthusiastic about psychedelics and what the are, can do, and represent (hell, I'm working on a degree in neuroscience and plan to shoot for a PhD, all because of finding drugs as a teenager), but occasionally I lie awake at night and wonder if maybe it's all BS and I should have gone into finance or something and just made an obscene amount of money.

Blessings
~ND

Perhaps...I know that that thought has crossed my mind for a fleeting second, here & there in the last 35 years...

The thing is, is that I've pretty much arranged my entire adult life specifically around the psychedelic experience & I really wouldn't want it any other way...

However, whenever someone is discussing the subject of "getting high" I usually point out to them that many animals love to get high & that homo sapiens, as a species, could have easily been called "homo medicans" due to our innate, nearly unquenchable penchant for altered states of consciousness.

From someone's morning cup of coffee to change their perception of grogginess to painkillers & NSAIDs to change perception of pains & aches to the highest you've ever been on psychedelics, it's all about that never-ending quest of humans to change their state of mind/body. And I personally don't find anything inherently wrong in just that, if that's all it is anyway. It seems to be in our DNA.



I have to say, ND, that you definitely come up with some really interesting topics to discuss & I, for one, totally appreciate it!

To squirrel away everything, or join the nuts?

I do not wonder at all! I am convinced every day

We should do what we want in this life and not be afraid to alter course when needed. There are many paths up the mountain and the way I see it-no one has it figured out yet. There are lots of "financial" people living unhappy lives with big bank accounts....

"Nothing lasts but nothing is lost" To me, there is no wasted effort when trying to expand the mind/awareness/experience.

Well... So what if we do just really like getting high? As long as we take care of ourselves, communities, responsibilities and do no harm, so what?

I have considered this many times, and, of course we are a bit bonkers, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing! We are courageous and curious. Boundary pushers.

Maybe finance is the really bonkers path? Money is nice, but it doesn't equate to wealth. The real treasure is deep within.

I agree, although not exactly in the same way. I think humans are literally suffering from a neuro-degenerative disease of sorts.

Yes. I wonder this often. More than once I have opened my eyes and turned on the lights after a DMT trip and looked bewilderingly at my bong and think that I'm just a weird monkey guy who likes to smoke neurotransmitters with overpriced pieces of glass so I can get off and try to force my way to spiritual revelations.

So what? Even if we are utterly wrong and philosophically unjust in all of our theories, isn't it more fun? I'd rather be a crazy, interesting person than a sane, uninteresting one. I have mostly stopped caring if hyperspace if real, or not real, or something in between, because really, what is real? The reality (as perceived by society) of hyperspace and the DMT realms has no effect on my personal revelations. I am happier and probably a better person with my ego tamed by psychedelics, so I do them. If it's all in my head, well too bad, humans have relatively powerful minds.

Also I'm going into finance and want to make an obscene amount of money. It's my niche, and I know I can make a direct difference in people's lives with philanthropy. Sometimes you have to ask, who makes a better investment banker, the egotistical cocaine snorting monkey man or the monkey man who frequently takes a step back from the existence of himself and his "I" to evaluate society?

Well said! It is almost like you took the thoughts right out of my head...but that would be crazy!

This^

I also enjoy learning, exercising, learning how to cook tasty, nutritious food, understanding others better and having an alternative outlook available to my views of all the above.

I'm 100% confident I'm no more insane than the average non-psychedelic user. Possibly a little more sane as my feelings and emotions of myself are a little less hidden away.

Oh man, I've been there countless times

When I was a child I used to think people who did drugs were insane. I grew up through all that "Just Say No" campaign. Why would anyone knowingly take such a risk? I thought they were all bad guys who might have already been crazy before the drugs.

Then I mature and realize, hey, all the stuff I've been taught was a lie. Then I begin to see how I'm surrounded by insanity, and no one seems to notice. It's life as usual, just another day on the calendar. It's as if these drug experiences increased my sanity rather than detracting from it.

As a species, hell yes, we're absolutely nuts. Psychedelic users in particular? Probably at least a notch or two above most of the average psychopaths you meet all over the place.

I think that's the sign of a real powerful experience. If it can make you question your sanity, you're on the right track

To me it makes no difference if I think I am nuts or not. Being nuts is a thought, a human concept, an image of something, with which I can identify myself. (A part of truth is always unfolding, like in this example, I identify myself with something. I can never be something with which I identify myself, I am the I, the space providing essence.) The opposite might be the idea of being enlighted, still it is just an image, with which I can identify. It can be true but never be truth on its own.

Life is unexpected to me and I experience, that the only limit in life there is, is set by myself, by own limit of imagination or distrust in my own being. Thus, why should I live a limited life, when I can live my life to the fullest. I guess you experience(d), that right and wrong just exists in the crystalized state of myself, so, shooting for the stars and expanding knowledge or working in finance and stack loads of metal coins and printed paper is equal in its value but might has a different effect on the world you live in. To me, everything is important in the whole picute of the now, the guy you cleans the floor, the guy who does research on blaa, and so on. It took all of us to come to this point of evolution where we are now.

I am here and make the unimagineable possible.

Ad Neuroscience) I worked some years in a neuroscience lab in university on topics of attention, consciousness, learning, sleep and working memory. I really appreicate the work even the influence of money and fame with which I was confronted botherd me. More I had the impression, that a lot of science in public fields is like dumb verifying hyptheses (with the goal to publish a new paper to get more money) instead of Sir Carl Poppers postulated falsifiabilty.

Haha, nothing to worry about because I am the light myself and like I said before, to me it is all equal in it's importance as a whole. The panorama in my life changed but I am still here.

I keep on learning, sharing, expanding in every way life offers to me.

tseuq

I think so too. I believe in the adaptability of the human brain to new situations and circumstances - but we simply stopped adapting much. Perhaps one of the reasons is that we do not take neuro-enhancing drugs such as mushrooms and do everything to not take advantage of neuro plasticity fostering substances and habits.

As for the main question I would go with tseuq:



...or not. As long as i'm not suffering from my deviant behaviourS, i can be as nuts as anyone wants me to be.

.. and I am nuts as hell. I really enjoy myself.

love tseuq

Thought has crossed my mind but I've long since gotten rid of it through yoga meditation more trips and lots of critical thinking

I'm not nuts at all . I'm the most stable person I know and I think friends and family could attest to that.
I've only been doing Psychedelics for about 2 years now and they have made me even more relaxed and confident in myself.
You yourself could be a total nutter though?

I experience a very thin line between genius and insanity and I am riding this line as hard as possible. I am pushing my comfort zone, I am expanding my consciousness, I am fully on, while I am peace itself.

tseuq

I feel it can be both, i don't think theres anything wrong with getting high off entheogens, they're safer for the body than other substances and they can certainly get you much higher! Low/moderate doses can be fun as they're more integrable with usual activities but i find with higher doses that it can go beyond any intended recreational use and leave no doubt as to it's higher purpose/s.

Many of us sense divinity or great beauty when we're 'high' but then soon forget it or doubt it afterwards, i think the key is sober realization of the same truths that entheogens can help us to be aware of, maybe the best way to know if you're kidding yourself by thinking these substances are spiritual is to get there without psychedelics so you know it's the real deal, then take a psychedelic again and see...

Also for some people certain substances feel spiritual whereas others seem to lack depth, with vaped DMT i've had a few deep experiences but more bewildering/interesting trips which weren't that spiritually isgnificant, whereas with Psilocin or LSD it's quite reliably a deep experience for me, i'd expect the same to be true of Aya/Pharma.

Entheogens are the most interesting things to me, even to have encountered these substances in my lifetime i feel is priceless, i honestly wouldn't trade it for anything.

I think there is no way coming around it, with or without entheogens.
We can't be else than wrong, how about that for a consolation.
I dare you: try to avoid it, just try

Then it leaves to choose what kind of nut-path seems most fitting, with evaluation of how-was-I compared to what-did-I-become.

For some the entheogens are not the best choice, for others it is.
For some it was best choice but isn't anymore.
For others it wasn't but is becoming best choice.
For some, some etheogens do bad score but other entheogens work better.

Anyhow the tripy part is part of it whatever it does for the rest, like you get wet taking a shower. I think we should stop asking nut questions as things are already way nut enough <-- joking

I wonder this all of the time. I've oriented so much of my life around psychedelics however that I certainly hope there's more to it than the simple pleasures of being in an altered state of consciousness.

I think the fact that many (maybe most) of us experience intense anxiety before taking a high dose of a psychedelic speaks for itself. While I do "enjoy" getting high with low-to-medium doses, a breakthrough psychedelic experience is in some ways quite the opposite of enjoyable (although it certainly has moments of bliss). Committing to a breakthrough dose of anything, in my opinion, presupposes a certain level of interest in these drugs that extends beyond the realm of enjoyment or recreation. We acknowledge the likelihood of facing extreme discomfort but we follow through anyways because we have a strong interest in the experience and we find value in it. If smoking cannabis made me feel the way that psilocybin or DMT does, without the apparent benefits/implications that they offer, I would not smoke it because I don't find psychedelia all that fun or interesting on it's own. I smoke weed because I like to get high, I smoalk DMT because I'm curious about my mind and I think it helps me to be a better person.

Even if it turns out that there is nothing innately spiritual about psychedelics, and we are one day able to explain psychedelic phenomena within a reductionist, materialist framework...I don't think that makes psychedelics any less interesting. The implications of the experience certainly give us a lot to think about just within the realms of mental health, brain/cognitive function, medicine, neuroscience, therapy, etc....I think any critical thinker can find something of value in the depths of psychedelia even if it might not be inherently "spiritual", whatever that means.

So nah, I don't think we're nuts. I personally don't really enjoy losing my mind, at least not as it's happening, but I recognize that these experiences facilitate a positive change in my growth and development as a person...for whatever reasons that might be. So based on this criteria alone I think that prolonged use of psychedelic drugs requires a certain level of genuine interest.

Most people who are just in it for kicks usually call it quits after things start to get weird, at least in my experience.

All of these!!! ^^^^^^^

I love all of you folks so much!!!!