To my fellow Nexians,
I am here to ask for some honest advice after having suffered a pretty rough weekend including: what felt like ego death possession; the removal of my concept of free will; and then earth-shattering synchronicity watching a film which perfectly summarised all my artistic interests and my life up until this point whilst sober.
Basically, I ask that if you have any advice for re-integration after a tough trip I would really appreciate you reading through this. I have found this forum of amazing place to discuss and advice and now I ask for some honest help and hope some you awesome people could oblige.
So a little background, I am a freelance script writer and love cinema and mental exploration. So on Saturday, I tried what I thought was a minor dose of 2C-B but ramped it up considerably with marijuana (I had two pills tried one and it was barely threshold so thought I would try to ramp it up a bit). Now I have quite a lot of previous psychedelic experience: 3x shrooms (max. 5g), 5x Acid (max. 300ug) & 4x DMT (max. 40mg) and have always been able to handle myself relatively well.
Part One: The Day of the Trip 02/02.This time I was not prepared to go so deep into ego death and be completely pinned. The clarity (more specifically the lack of visuals and patterns) of the 2C-B headspace made the feeling of being pinned down and overwhelmed by energies out of my control quite scary. I felt as if I were truly slipping out of existence into nothingness only energy. At the time I was listening to Burial’s Untrue and the album took over my trip: I felt as if I had dropped into the echoey chasms of sonic texture – the decays and reverbs of past tracks. I truly felt Mark Fisher’s concept of Hauntology.
So being trapped in this moment, I realised or rather was confronted by the idea that I was not intrinsically special, but was part of a collective intellect: that all things created were from me, but indirectly if that makes sense. I am part of all creation, but not the actual node that made it. In retrospect, this was the most intense attack on my ego I have ever faced. I pride myself on being a thinker and a creative. What I create may be influenced by others, but all the time I am struggling to be unique and try to create something powerful and meaningful. I have always been wrestling with the idea of whether I wanted to create to satisfy by egoistic desires or whether it was from a place of selflessness (i.e. wanting to ensure that something quality exists on Earth). My problem is that my theory of deciding what is good is using my personal convictions as a basis and hope that if it satisfies me it must inevitably interest someone else. I was extrapolating from my interests and is that right?
Anyway, I felt like what I created was in jeopardy; the trip reduced me to feel like I was possessed by only my basic drives. I couldn’t distinguish my intellectual involvement from my uncontrollable urges. Maybe all my many scripts were only products of inevitable determinations and that it isn’t really that impressive. It was a tough pill to swallow to say the least.
Part Two: The Day After - Re-Integration and some strange symptomsSo the day after I am trying to integrate, and I decide to meet up with my friend and a go see a film I had been dying to see called Burning. I sat in the cinema and it rocked me to my very core. It first hypnotised me and then felt as if it spoke to all my most basic artistic convictions and emotionally drained me to my very core.
VAGUE DISCUSSION OF THE FILM’S ARCHETYPAL IDEAS I will not spoil any plot details just discuss ideas, but will nonetheless put spoilers so you want to go completely blind into the film, but I must state that this is only thematic ideas and not details.
The film deals with idea of [Spoiler 1] being a passive protagonist in a world that is leaving you behind and getting an emotional outreach or saviour that your passivity causes you to let slip out your hands. [End of Spoiler 1]
Now, ever since doing psychedelics I have been trying to find the best ways to actualise myself and become more active. I have done exactly this former premise – been too passive and missed out on a relationship. Now I’m trying to rectify this issue in myself. I had to go back through reliving this personal grief with the protagonist, [spoiler 2] to the point of a symbolic ego death [spoiler 3]. The ego death that I had just struggled with. [spoiler 4]The protagonist was also a writer who was wasting his time away, trying to find something worthwhile to write about. [spoiler 4]
Basically, this film is exactly the film I dream of making. It covers all my personal struggles and arranges them into an allegorical tale about actualisation through becoming more active and choosing love. But, I didn’t make it and I have been trying to write something like this for a while. It concerns all the same themes that I am using to write and conceptualise all my stories from.
Again, suffice to say it was not only reality-shattering as it felt as if it were speaking to me, but also nuked my ego that I was not the only person who might be able to make a work of this sort. I had to confront whether I wanted to have the egoistic success or make a good work of art. I fear that my reaction pointed to my egotistical nature and I have been struggling with this realisation.
Another strange aspect, during my 2C-B trip it felt like I got possessed by an erotic spirit that took over my body and forced me to climax; and in this movie [spoiler 5] a ghost of a loved one gives a handjob. [spoiler 5] Basically this detail’s synchronicity really freaked me out.
Now, if you hadn’t gathered already all these events pushed me to the very edge of a psychotic break that I am still navigating now. I became paranoid and thought I would die any second, I kept bursting into tears and really weighed up suicide for the first time.
I have gone through bad trips before, but this one has really rocked me. In the worst way I feel as if I can’t truly tell where I begin and where the infinite energies start. I still look at my body and don’t truly feel like I’m in control. I mean when I first noticed this, I had to fight my hands to write the words to make this bizarre sensation real.
So I am in a bit of a tough headspace, and as much as I love the idea of interconnectivity and find it beautiful, feeling or rather experiencing it as my reality is making life as an incarnated being a tough mental strain. I know I may sound crazy (but I feel like I’m preaching to the choir here as best as possible haha), but I was wondering what you guys do to reintegrate after a knock like this. I’m doing exercise, talking to people and going through the motions, it feels okay, but man I feel like there’s this dormant insanity that I’m trying to keep in check and it's tough. It makes me think of a quote from Ken Kesey: “I believe there’s a whole new generation of kids. They walk different… I can her it in the music… It used to go… life - death, life - death… but now it’s… death – life… death – life…”
Writing this down is making me shake, but I feel I need to move onto life from my death. It is hard!
I hope this wasn’t too long and rambling, but yeah would love some honest advice.
Day 3It is now 04/02/19 and my whole perception of the world has taken in the strange visual acuity of an acid trip - bright colourful slight distortions and hyperreal. I feel none of the subjective effects, but the whole timbre of my experience (that psychedelic type of vision if you know what I mean) it's freaking me out.
Best wishes to you all, and be careful with mixing weed and psychs if you aren’t ready to get blasted off – and respect 2C-B!!! It can rock you!!!!
Peace and love.
Nature is not mute; it is man who is deaf. - Big T