what is the right way to use psychedelics that results in progressive insight?

what are the nature of those insights and the general content?

how can such content or use be implemented socially in a productive way, assuming it tends to positive and can result in good social change?

i believe that as individuals we can use psychedelics in constructive ways, and that as you say if we implement changes in our lifestyles that stem from insights gained through such use then we can as individuals make progressive changes

while i do not believe that psychedelics alone can do this, i believe that psychedelics can be used with a doctrine that teaches right mind and right action, like the teachings of Tao, Buddha or Jesus. I believe if you focus on forgiveness while tripping you may end up more capable of forgiving, as an example

however i question the feasibility of a group approach, group dynamics are so different from individual dynamics in the psychological sense, for example an individual might perform an action out of a realization of the benefits of said action, but a group tends to do so out of peer pressure

the aztek had mushroom festivals and ate several forms of psychedelics, but they also engaged in the practice of human sacrifice on a very large scale, how can we avoid this type of thing? our culture has been using psychedelics for almost 50 years now, a significant portion of us, can this be shown to have a positive or negative effect?

I don't overconcern myself with other peoples choices, they are free to choose their lifestyle. It is their responsbility. Some people want to open themselves up to a few "home truths", and others would rather hide indoors watching reality tv and yomping on the latest triple stacked burger patty on toasted rye, covered in triple servings of extra thick mayo.

-It's up to man to decide inwardly if he wants to be a modern day dude, or a modern day fool.

--What is the right way to use psychadelics>>>???.....it is discussed somewhere on this site i'm sure. Appropiate set,dose,setting springs to mind...one must find ones own knowledge from active participation, and not feed off of the experiences of others. Man must be happy with making his own experiences, and should certainly not downplay his own potential by focussing on the experiences of others. Man can be whoever he wishes to be, if he chooses to do so, and it all starts with an inner "yes".

Firstly, I don't think the word "fool" is pejorative. A fool is someone who is not only free from delusions of seriousness, but can often help others to temporarily set down such delusions.

Seriousness is a degenerative disease and a malignant force bar none. Everything bad that you mentioned from war to human sacrifice happens when people take things way too seriously.

A fool is someone who can bring levity to heavy situations. There is a reason that most kings prized their fools over their so-called wisemen.

A fool knows he doesn't understand everything. Everyone else is crazy.

Enlightenment produces a foolish grin. The Buddha describes the path to enlightenment as dropping all attachments to illusions that create suffering. This sounds a lot like what jesters, fools, and harlequins do.

Perhaps there is a reason that so many of the higher beings we meet in hyperspace look like jesters (fools)? Shamans in many cultures are also a form of fool, wild man, unpredictable coyote characters. They often wore masks and made people laugh. Perhaps the early clowns of shamanic cultures peeked into hyperspace enough to copy the fools that were already there. Perhaps our jester and harlequin outfits are directly inspired by those of the jester elves.

I will address your main points in another post after I get myself some maté.

hehehehe

Okay.

To finish the train of thought and get to the intention of the OP... I agree that most people are either asleep or half-asleep at the wheel. Modern man is not the pinnacle of anything in a cosmic sense. Modern man is not even the pinnacle of most things as far as humanity is concerned. There are very few things that we are really good at, actually.

The old adage that people only use 5% of their brains may be false, but, as a species, we are certainly only using a fraction of our potential. Even if a genius here were using a quarter of the potential of their gray matter, they would still be mentally retarded. Thus, we are all handicapped.

Furthermore, these things are cyclical rather than linear. We did not go from neanderthals to modern man in a straight upward line. There have been times of great achievement and forward leaps in the past. Perhaps it is how some thinkers have posited... that when the Earth is in some galactic alignment, consciousness is elevated. Maybe we pass through some kind of cosmic field. Maybe our species is following the procession of the equinoxes after all.

Maybe we did better when we had aliens helping us... either physically or via hyperspace. Who can say for sure?

Any answers we may find in that department will only open up a legion of more profound questions.

As for me, I try and continually strive to be the wisest fool I can be.

Peace.

Hello Hyperspace, i used fool to mean on the wrong path, and not in a nasty way.

--I have also been thinking about thie Egyptian video. Scientists are baffled as to how they managed to build it so quickly. And i have a theory about this:

--At the end of the day, our actions are our saviour, and provide solutions that thinking cannot.

--You see these Scientists and researchers have in my opinion been milking these Egyptian mysteries because it gives them a job. they can spend years writing books and debating this and that. It provides them with an audience and a nice life. Regarding the EGYPTIANS, it's a fact that when people start working on a project that they learn solutions to problems as they occur, the kind of problems that you would only realise if you had a pyramid to build in entirity. I think that the pyramids were built superquick because the people wanted to build them, used wisdom as they encountered it, and just got on with it. They didn't have the luxury of overthinking. The pressure bought the best out of them, and perhaps their positive states of mind allowed their minds to be more open to creative solutions. Perhaps the odd psychadelic consumption "kept the mind open" too??

--Who knows, we will never know

--So maybe it was a case of Open mind, action, action, action???

^ I think most of the really megalithic and cyclopean ruins around the world were built with help... or by nonhumans without any human involvement.

That is what the people who built them said. That is what they wrote in their records, painted on the walls, carved into the stone etc. etc.

It is sheer arrogance for us to completely disregard what the actual builders themselves had to say about these monuments in favor of listening to some stuffed shirts and their contradictory theories based on little or no evidence whatsoever.

Good point, Hyperspace fool.

-But what do you think about this idea:

--Perhaps if the whole country thought that the building of the Pyramids was for their greater good, then they TRULY would have felt the NEED to accomplish building them (with the help of Aliens )...Perhaps because of the fact that the whole population was at this project, and it was a focussed effort in PERFECT alignment with their needs and greater want, it bought out extra special abilities. For example there are many men that have done extraordinary feats simply because they have put their life and soul and dedication into doing them, because they fully/truly believed in doing them..such as running 1 marathon every few days for decades, etc. Focussed efforts lead to extraordinary results.

--Where as today our life lacks such dedication and wanting, and we mostly grudgingly force ourselves to goto work, and find excuses to not go,etc. We have a certain amount of working hours per week to fill and find ways of taking our time, comfort and the "system" have robbed man of his potent edge that he encounters under pressure,etc. Most of us don't have the opportunity to do the job of our dreams for a variety of reasons. In all this confusion we are mainly simply existing rather than thriving. We don't have goals that align to some mighty good because governments decide something one time, and change it the next. We feel we are being toyed about with, Our energy is being messed about, and we are unable to create a dream society because we are losing faith...

Psychedelics by themselves won't generate insight, I don't think. Instead, I believe it has more to do with the temporary changes in perception/thought processes, which (possibly) allow one to look at things in a different way, and generate insight from it. Any deviation from baseline (as long as you're still conscious of it, I guess. there's probably not a lot to learn from a blackout state) has possibility to generate insight, I believe? It's just that psychedelics are *very powerful* catalysts and they facilitate the process.. the more extreme the deviation, the more possibility for novel stuff to happen.

These doctrines you talk about appear to be good frameworks, and perhaps one's ability to derive meaning from them can also be catalyzed by psychedelic usage. This is not to say that is the only way to live by them, naturally.


I don't think we're all deluded here, most of the people in the forum seem to think that psychedelics are incredibly powerful and positive tools. That is not to say there is not a negative/dangerous side, of course there is. I guess what you're trying to point out is that taking acid (dmt, shrooms, ..) is not guaranteed to make you into a "better" or more balanced person, or have life-changing insights that you're bound to apply to daily life. But if you're someone with the "right" mindset and already have such ideas pregnant in your mind, then surely these are powerful tools that may allow you to make progress faster, see things clearer, have experiences that come to define who you are and what you think about existance (to try and cover all angles, this is not to say that they are the ONLY way).

I don't know what i could add to this but thought this was well said ^ and lately have been having a lot of thoughts revolving the ancient Egyptian times.

As For the psychoactive plants having a role in our ability to receive this higher knowledge, i could Concur completely,

My idea towards them is they are basically the collective brain that holds our history together. When i go under the influences of these plant i can't help but to think all these images and symbols and designs are a huge inventory of previous trip and all the ideas that have been made in that psychedelic state from people all the way back in the past.

Thanks you, Mantus.

-I like your collective brain philosophy. I guess all these psychoactives were planted for us to discover and use. Such has been how mankind developed throughout history, by trial and error. We can look to governments and religions as to why mankind was encouraged to avoid such things. We wonder why that could be so...?????

well, i do think we have developed enormously as a specie in the past 50 years.

i tend to weight the advancement of the society by the amount of freedom it provide to its individuals,specially the 50% of society that was brutally ignored and abuse for so many centuries.

as a woman i can say, i wouldn't want to get born in any other ancient time,where a person like me would probably get herself burned on the town square...

as i see it, yes, we are living in a better society these days,i know it doesn't look like it when we read the news,but this is only due to the fact that we actually get all these bad news, that we had so little chances to even hear of 100 years ago.
when we hear about these bad news, we actually get the chance to protest against them, and try to improve the world.

i know its hard to conceive, but when i look at the human history in a wide perspective,
i have to admit its getting better...better and better all the time

surly the use of psychedelics (specially in the 60) had something to do with that small leap forward.