Hello fellow travelers,

i am currently on a 4th day of water only fast ( plan to make it 8 days in total ), i don't feel hungry anymore but my energy level is very low ( i sit most of the time )
Today i have the "itch" to visit the tryptamine space... haven't been there for a while and i am considering taking some shrooms tonight or smoke changa.
However i am not sure if it is a good idea with the fasting and all.

Can anyone with relevant experience/knowledge provide some advice ?

Cheers

IME, I've found that fasting helps create a more 'clean' experience - like your body is a clean vessel for a visionary journey. I have had some of my most memorable experiences after fasting and using mushrooms or changa (or both). I think it both intensifies the experience and gives me more of a feeling of commitment towards the trip. I usually will only use entheogens after I've fasted for at least 24 hours.

4 days huh? That's pretty good!! I have never done one past 3 days but I've read a lot about extended fasts and their health benefits, which are greater than most people think!

Peace,
-SM

Could you please state the reason why you are doing this?

Sure you won't die but it isn't healthy for sure. I happened to know for a fact that people a long time ago would do crazy stuff like going to the desert with no food, no water, possibly even no sleep for a few days to experience changes in their consciousness/visions for religious reasons.

Also not everyone had access to psychedelics, just some tribes that had them native to their region. There still are healthier alternatives to accessing psychedelic headspace without the actual use of psychedelic drugs like meditation and certain types of yoga if this is what you are trying to accomplish.

IMHO I think you are hurting yourself and shouldn't be doing this, especially if you have psychedelics close by. Granted some fasting can be beneficial before shrooms or ayahuasca but you don't need to fast much more than 24 hours before taking it up to the morning after the trip where you can have a light but healthy breakfast.

As for changa, people have smoked it while high on MDMA and we all know that harmalas and M are a very dangerous combo which most likely would kill you. The percentage of harmalas in changa is to low to make any dietary restrictions what so ever. You could eat at mcdonalds and wash it down with a beer and still smoke it 5 minutes later and be perfectly fine, but don't... this isn't healthy either, just trying to prove a point here.

Be safe, man. Make sure to know what you are doing. I'm no expert either but looking at it scientifically it does more harm than good. You're way better of eating the right foods than not eating at all. Even shamans suggest cleansing the body with fruits and vegetables.

I know some people who prefer it but personally i like to keep my fruit intake going when tripping (or living off of plant/herbal/fruit juices for a few days). If you do decide to dose, please start low because it may very well intensify it quite a bit - it has for me while juice fasting

4 days really isn't that extreme for a water fast, so i dont think they're in any danger due to the fasting alone...unless they've developed a sort of addiction to it like some people seem to.

People fast for many different reasons but there is some research surfacing on the usefulness of it within the past few years. Not to mention the ancient praise of it and heaps of anecdotal reports.

Physiologically speaking, you'll be fine - like UC said, plenty of people engage in much more extreme fasts than that and come back fine.

You could be in for a rough time though, psychologically speaking. Your defenses are likely to be lower as your body goes into extreme hunger mode, so you're probably going to have a more intense, less controllable trip. Maybe that's what you want, in which case, go ham, just be cognizent going into it.

Blessings
~ND

Thanks everyone for the input. For those who asked why am i doing it then for few reasons, not in particular order:
1) Exercise in self-discipline.
2) Cleanse the body ( No scientific evidence for it... but ime it does do something )
3) Induce a more sensitive state of mind and increased clarity ( that's why i quoted n.dread... ) this definitely works, i am at end of day 5 now and feel very good, sharp and clear minded. body is weak tough and 2 previous days were quite rough.

i suspect my craving for tryptamines is related to my no.3 above.
So going to give it a go i think

Also be sure to reintroduce food slowly. I'd recommend vegetable/green/fruit juices first and slowly moving up to more solid foods. Let us know how it goes!

Not trying to stop you here, but since this is a health and safety forum I'm inclined to share this info I happened to find on what actually goes on with your body when you stop eating.

6-72 hours after your last meal you get in a state known as "ketosis" where the brain no longer has nutrients in your body to feed it and uses your fat cells as a reserve. This works for a while but your cognitive effects might not be as sharp as when you're full-fed.

You don't have to be starving to reach this state, take athletes for example. They have special diets and because of them being constantly in motion they reach this state much faster and don't necessarily feel hungry but they do lose fat.

3-7 days after your last meal the body starts to break down it's own protein so you will lose some muscle tissue. This explains why you feel weaker.

A week and more will make your bone density weaken significantly and you could become sick because the immune system is practically down now. This is a state of really poor health, where you could potentially seek medical attention in case you start feeling really bad. I wouldn't recommend going that long without food for anyone.

3 weeks to 70 days - Death.

This is a rough estimate done by a research performed while the hunger strikes were happening. The time you reach certain states depends hugely on your previous eating habits, how much fat cells your body has to use as a reserve, your general health, etc.

I hope you find this info to be as some sort of help. It is always better to know than doing test a trials on yourself, which could potentially have serious consequences regardless of what kind of experiment you're doing.

I think a good diet like aya-diet, change a lot your condition to trip.

I dont remember where i read that the amazonian diet (fish, banana, etc) have a lot of triptofane, so i think you are loaded your body with a similar molecule.

Yep. Exactly what i did. First 2 days just veg/fruit juices and then full water fast for another 8 days. by now i emerged on the other side feeling great, head clear and sensual sensitivity is amplified immensely. Libido did not come back yet fully ( yep, it was gone with the food i guess) though mind-wise i am highly energetic. i re-feed slowly... taking it up to full calorie intake in the course of 5 days.
I ended up not consuming any psycho active materials (besides some hash, but i dont really count it ) just felt too vulnerable for a wild ride... but if all goes well will get there in few days

peace

I'm also thinking of fasting and using magic mushrooms. Motivation being that, as I currently understand the subject, fasting has been used traditionally to achieve deeper states of concioussness and precipitate personal religious experiences.

Anyone have any mew experiences or insights into this since this thread was last updated? Thank you.

I spent the vast majority of my twenties fasting, meditating, praying, doing yoga & pranayama and consuming large quantities of LSD, Psilocybin mushrooms and Cannabis.

I have no regrets, however I would have kept much more hydrated than I was back then had I known then what I know now. It certainly would have kept me from passing out in some inconvenient places.

Just for your edification Loveall, I will tell you that most people only associate water, or a lack of it, with dehydration. That is only one fraction of the picture.

Without enough salt and fats/oils, we humans cannot get enough water into our cells, even when drinking copious amounts of it.

I don't have much more time right now to go into depth with it, but suffice to say that that is one of the biggest things I have learned on my never ending journey.

I will check back later and in the meantime, feel free to PM me if you wish.

Peace be with you

Doc Buxin, thanks. I'm starting the fast tomorrow. I've looked into this and some say too much salt can also be bad. Some say to simply use quality mineral water (natural and containing various electrolytes). What do you think? Any other tips. It's the first time I fast.

No serious need to use salt while on the fast, unless for some crazy reason you decide to exercise heavily and it happens to be very hot where you are. Two factors that no fast should really include anyway.

Thanks. Don't plan do excersice, only stretching and meditation. Fast has started, breakfast (or should I call it startfast ) was a green tea.

Its inadvisable to go into a fast with a fixed length as a target, but are you tentatively aiming at a specific duration, or just deciding on the fly?

I've read over a dozen medical books on fasting published from 1880 to around 2010, some good, some dangerously bad. The most instructive, and all around best, one I ever found was one of Herbert Sheltons. Its off copyright and free for download Here. The guy rambles like a grandfather and some of his notions are anachronistic today [like the idea that all medications are poisons, which was mostly correct in the 1920's when he formed that view] but its a great read before or in the first days of a fast. If nothing else his love of the alaskan fur seal bull is humorous.
I fasted to completion [the border between fasting and starvation] twice and that was the one book I would not have wanted to miss before those fasts.

I didnt use any entheogens on my complete fasts, or on any fast over 24 hours. Let us know how it goes
...you might want to start with low doses tho

Elrik, I plan to fast for 3 days. I'm in my third and last day, looking forward to tomorrow's BREAKfast . I will take a some tea with salvia at the at the end of the day and report back. How many days did you fast for?

Thanks for the link to the book.

Actually, that particular notion can still be considered validly applicable today if one considers the vast majority of modern pharmaceuticals as "medications".

My complete fasts were for 10 days, and then again 11 months later for 12 days.
It surprised me that they were that short, but thats what my body decided.
Perhaps because I have a very low body fat percentage. Doing it in winter probably helped burn through my meager fat stores faster.

The hunger was nowhere near as bad as most people would assume, feeling cold for nearly 2 weeks was annoying though