Ok, I've never really made a theory about something so to say. Not one that I wrote out anyway. So excuse any crudeness in my technical approach.

By mental loop, I mean that bizarre feeling sometimes induced by plants, that what you are thinking, seeing, feeling, will go on and on forever, uncontrolled.

Last night while dazing on and off at my screen, I felt like my vision was just looping, this influenced my mentality a bit also. Here's what I wrote.

When I hallucinate or get hypnotic looking at the words onscreen, they fold, blend and layer, until I, even barely notice, then the image comes back into focus, but not completely, and it continues to go through a nearly identical hallucination again, the notion of my self again bringing it back. When repeated 8 or 10x it feels 'loop' like. Or stuck in a web.

It’s a simple idea. Of course the 'self' is pulling the attention back from it's strange wanderings, but is this what is responsible for ‘loop’ thoughts on psychedelics. The brain stuck cycling between trance/delirium and awareness of present reality?

This might be nothing new. But was my last nights revelation.

Try it. Stare at a half filled word pad. Let your eyes relax and cross, and the image split and layer how it will for a moment. Then lightly, barely, bring it back into focus, only to let it roll away again, and again, and again.

It almost even feels like a ‘loop’ mentality pushing against me. I can imagine the fragile consciousness trying it’s best to grab hold of some bit of reality or memory or ego, and the drug trying to keep the show going.

Loops are fights anyway I see it. But does that necessarily mean we shouldn’t have them? I wonder if it is good mental therapy?

a friend of mine and myself have both experienced the loops... from what i understand, when you notice a loop it's because your being shown that you are in a loop within life.. ..maybe something you keep circling around

While this could be so, (loops happening only to those who are in a loop in life), I've been led to believe that they happen more spontaneously. I can agree that someone who is 'looping' through life, too lazy or fearful to face what they need to, is more likely to experience a mental loop on psychedelics. It seems the loop is a mode of fear and attachment. A feeling of going crazy because you can't remember who you are or what you were thinking.



Sounds like the real deal bad trip man. Care to expound some on the emboldened? I overdrive my ego a lot too. Products of insecurity or anxiety (overthinking/over analyzing). The mental loop takes root there it seems. Pushing the ego out of the way, the ego keeps rolling back in begging for sanity.

I gotta dive back into salvia, break past my own stuck loops. Embrace trance. Travel.

The worst "loop" I have experienced was on 8g of mushrooms.

It hit me so quick I didn't know how I got there, why I got there, when, etc, etc,
I kept seeing, was stuck, in the same 3 scenes for what seemed like an eternity.

In the midst of a total mind fuck, I didn't even feel human anymore, just some kind of screwed up hellish purgatory, First I would see the top corner of the room I was in, then I saw the door, Then I would look at my zipper, and I would forget everything, and the loop would continue, starting at the corner of the room again.


This was a extremely unpleasant experience, and according to my friends, at this point I was seen stumbling around in the snow screaming nonsense and injuring myself.

I did not know what to make of this experience, and I had fairly unpleasant "Loop" flashbacks just from smoking weed.

A few months later, I drank 4g of mushroom tea.
A few hours in, it hit me again, the very same loop was back.
This time I was more experienced, I knew not to fight it, and I managed to actually use the momentum from the loop, per say, and propel myself into the ultimate blissful state of mushroom hyperspace.

That was definitely one of my most enjoyable mushroom experiences.

Now almost every time I am visited by loop, especially on tryptamines, it never lasts, I am able to realize it, and it only helps me on my journey.


Now this doesn't work all the time, I recently had a very miserable experience involving some kind of alien loop flashback. **COUGH COUGH* 2c e **COUGH COUGH**

Worst loop I ever had ..... no, don't mean it to sound like the old yorkshiremen sketch from monty python ..!!!!....
was from a very bad acid trip - my last one, way back must have been summer 1982. Blimey - where did the years go? But ok, I'm much better for the experiences of the years, so mustn't complain.

Right. I'm sure i was very naive at the time. I had this ideal even then to use psychedelics for inner exploration. Unfortunately, the bloke who came round and visited wasn't of the same ilk, more of a recreational/have a laugh type mood. nothing wrong in principle, but set and setting etc. weren't quite compatible, to say the least!

now to the loop. he brought around a tape of music and not long after i told him i was tripping, i suddenly found myself in a loop of deja vu time and time again and didn't know what where why or who until i realised the silly bugger had been playing and rewinding steve miller's 'abracadabra' - the bit that goes - "the situation goes round and round and ...." well, you know the rest. there was a hell of a lot more to it - i split in two and was seeing him from where i was and from above and behind him. maybe a reflection of the duality i felt - one part of me 'knew' he was doing it, the other part of me didn't want to believe it. he was also doing a bit of 'space invading' and pulling a few other stunts.

from the outside it may seem like like a bit of a laugh, but that took me over 20 years to recover, and at the 20 year point i nearly didn't make it. it was very close.

Fortunately i did, and in all the processes involved had a huge mental, emotional and spiritual clearout.

since then i've always been careful about saying the right thing in front of those on journeys, if i can't think of anything positive to say i just stay quiet and focus on wishing them well.

If anything, i've learned that that i can't change what is or was, but i can sure as hell change how i feel or felt about it!

funny how we have gotten into loops by different ways, but i suppose each difference is a resource for someone.

thanks to all you brother/sister sharers, it's great food for thought and has given added sense and meaning to my own
experiences.

peace love happiness and everything positive (seems more meaningful to say that now) to all

Me, Me, Me, Me too ~Agent Smith