Ayahuasca, LSD, meditation etc - to ask if you or anyone you know tried and what’s it like

Ooh those viking drums are great, it just made my hands tingle!

Eastern is just what I'm more familiar with (mantras, kriyas, yoga, breathwork etc). It seems sensible to me plus my body (and mind!) enjoy the practices. I had Catholicism drummed into me as a child so that probably put me off more western style beliefs.

I've ordered the Shamanism book, thank you! Your second link didnt work but if you let me know the title I will look it up myself.

The Spiritualism section of mumsnet is not very active, which is a real shame because this thread has been fantastic with a lot of knowledgeable posters and kindness. I really thought the usual naysayers would be on to tell us we were all addicts and should be in jail!

The Viking war drums I use are just in you tube but search round to find something that resonates (no pun intended).

Personally I’ve never clicked with Eastern philosophy and in my experience westerners often come un stuck beyond a certain superficial level, but I noticed someone upthread said they were a practicing Buddhist @WongandLynch would you be able to recommend anything.

Re Shamanism. I would recommend finding someone/a group to try guided shamanic journeying first. This book is a good introduction https://amzn.eu/d/05ztASkd

This is a good book re self hypnosis techniques as it gives good background and some very simple techniques https://amzn.eu/d/02qEtWhb.

What is drawing you to Eastern systems as a matter of interest?

This is so helpful, thank you. 💜

I'm definitely an auditory person and have had some almost out-of-body experiences with sound healing before. Do your viking war drums have to be 'live and in person' or can you listen via headphones? There is something very primal about a drum beat.

I'm mostly drawn to eastern mysticism and shamanism interests me too. If you have any recommendations that may help me dive deeper I'd love to try them.

I think there’s many paths into self hypnosis and it can be achieved at various levels. The most important thing is to really strengthen the imagination to such an extent that it becomes a very strong muscle.

The second thing to do is find something which cuts out the critical function in your brain. Some people it’s visual like staring at a mandala, others it might be hearing certain drum patens (Viking war drums work well on me), others it might be a progressive relaxation through the body, lying down and tensing and relaxing each muscle in your body working from your feet upwards. If you have a good imagination you can imagine light moving through your body. If you search up “middle pillar” practice this is very good. Somethings work better for some than others. Are you an auditory, visual or feeling person.

The rest is just story telling. Your mind will construct stories which allow it to make sense of important stuff. It will automatically frame it in a story that makes sense to you, which is why people who think they are shamanic will suddenly have stories about native Americans (even though it logically makes no sense) it’s just the language our subconscious (and what that is is going to depend on perspectives) uses to communicate to us.

Re books, it depends on your perspective. Most spiritual frameworks will approach this in a slightly different way, what I’ve found most important is to stay within a system, are you drawn to Eastern Mysticism, western mysticism, shamanism magical systems like the Golden Dawn, Thelema or more a scientific/therapeutic perspective? It’s important to find something with the language and stories that you connect with. This is the “mistake” people make. Not finding what they connect with so they don’t maximise the experience.

edit, forgot certain breathing techniques will also get you into an altered state of consciousness- I’ve had some incredible trips that way

I think this is a really good question.

I've absolutely achieved blissful, realisation-of-the-oneness-of-the-universe-and-all-of-life states in both acid trips and meditation.

I found it first on acid, but once I found it, it's much easier to get there with meditation these days. And with meditation you can get in and out of that state more easily, and don't have to put aside so much time for the trip and the return to reality.

Mushrooms are pleasant and beauty-of-life-and-the-universe, but not in the same league, IMHO. It feels much more connected to nature and our earthly existence, whereas acid is more a state of oneness with the totality of the whole universe.

Ketamine has some similar aspects for depth of meaning, but a totally different experience, which I experience more as losing the edges between me and the rest of the universe, all of us blurring into one. Much less euphoric though.

Haven't tried Ayahuasca but would like to.
DMT (the active ingredient) only lasts about 7 mins when smoked and without the inhibitory effects of the rest of the Ayahuasca tea blend, so it gives very pretty visuals but not much in the way of esoteric or spiritual insights. And it's disgustingly harsh to smoke.

On the whole, meditation is good for everyday, whereas the drugs are a max couple of times a year kind of thing. But also, there is so much research currently into benefits of psychedelic therapies for many sorts of trauma, end of life issues, to get people out of depression and anxiety by using the neuroplasticity effects, etc, that I expect to see much greater knowledge and less scare mongering about them in future.

I meditate regularly and sometimes have weird experiences (maybe 4 or 5 times a year). I also teach it.

I’ve micro dosed magic mushrooms and found them to be great for depression and anxiety. Since regularly meditating I don’t need antidepressants or shrooms any more!

Regular meditation does the same thing but it’s a slower paced process. I’ve heard people say taking a larger dose of mushrooms is like taking a sledge hammer to open your mind, meditation opens it brick by brick.

I used to take LSD when i was younger, i loved it! Great fun.

I once got high and more than a bit euphoric by listening to Krishna Das sing Hare Krishna while spinning around. It’s totally possible without drugs!

I've also been very put off ayahusca by the stories of people spending days shitting themselves! Surely it ruins their south American holiday? Are there any books or sites you recommend to start looking into self hypnosis?

I posted earlier about microdosing, but I also once got 'high' from eating an ayurvedic meal after a few weeks of regular yoga, so I really do believe we can alter our own mental states without drugs.

I’ve tried all three and, as a Buddhist, I’m a regular meditator. Had some weird and interesting experiences, I suppose many of which could be considered spiritual.

Drugs are a shortcut but you can have frightening experiences as well as life-affirming ones.

With mediation you have to practice consistently and intensely to get anything more than a basic “head-clearing” experience.

But that’s just my experience and everyone is different.

Ive known several people who have tried ayahausca there just seems a lot of puking and shitting involved, I think anything experienced is just a result of being severely dehydrated. Tbh I think it’s best left to the relevant SA tribes.Mushrooms seem to have a much higher rate of some spiritual experience.

But nothing can really replace the careful training of the mind, learning to expand the imagination and shutting down the prefrontal cortex through self hypnosis - I would recommend looking into western esotericism (assuming you’re in the West). Self initiatory texts are good at training the mind.

Psychadelics may cleanse the doors of perception but proper training can through them wide open, and soon you’ll realise those doors never existed

Have taken mushrooms are few times and the effects have always been interesting and usually positive. I have never taken them in high doses and never would do so.

I experienced strong feelings of euphoria and colour always becomes much more vivid as though your are seeing things as they would appear in an early techni-colour film. It also enhances your appreciation of music. A good base hook will take you into an incredible musical groove. I can also play better (or at least I think I can) The mild visual hallucinations I have experinced have been pretty fantastic and sometimes hillarious. I can remember looking at a herd of cows grazing near to my house on a summers evening. I put on some music and when I looked up againthe cows were line dancing.

I would never take hallucinogens that had been given to me by a third party (I collect them or grow them) and always measure the dose.

DMT was a fascinating and very weird experience! Mushrooms was horrific, never again.

Because it's relatively safe in overdose compared to alternative anaesthetics if you're already in hospital being monitored by an anaesthetist- it doesn't drastically plummet your blood pressure like the alternative IV anaesthetic drugs so doctors find it safer (ie easier to reverse) compared to opioid drugs, which make your blood pressure much more unstable so if the patient starts to crash on the operating table with opioids it can be harder for the anaesthetist to bring their blood pressure back up.

But that's a completely different situation.

Using ketamine outside of the hospital nobody is monitoring your vital observations, so that's when it gets risky. And remember ketamine is only relatively safer than the alternative anaesthetic drugs like really strong opiates (which are also incredibly dangerous if used recreationally- that's how Michael Jackson died for example, and many other people have died in the opioid crisis).

Also k-holes are a real psychological risk, and long term use of K can cause a very horrible untreatable condition called ketamine bladder, which causes severe pain of your bladder that's so bad that the bladder needs to be surgically removed, and still the pain doesn't go away. So I really wouldn't mess around with ketamine!

Anaesthesia is intrinsically unsafe; ketamine is only safer in the relative sense. There will always be people in the long tail of psychonauts who try to push things too far.

That is really well explained, thank you.

But...how come there are ketamine deaths, if it is given to children due to its relative safety if overdosing?

I've done shamanic journeys. They are really easy and pleasant. You just relax very deeply and then follow guided meditation until you 'meet' your spirit guide. To me, it's not dissimilar to daydreaming/ fantasy world-building, except that it is targetted - you ask for help or you listen to their advice or you just watch what is going on. These have all been very pleasant experiences, but not life changing.

I'll give it a go!

Ketamine is a dissociative anaesthetic, often painted by the press as a "horse tranquilliser" but in fact used in small children and on battlefields because it's much safer than many other anaesthetics to get the dosage wrong. But the side effects are pretty mind-blowing for a human adult.

A recreational "line dose", also known as "the K-hole", basically knocks you unconscious and then "lets you watch" as your consciousness returns. I scare-quote "lets you watch" because each word in that phrase is also a concept that you need to work out from first principles as you rediscover:

• Something exists (pure being / presence)
• There is a point of view (a "me" or a witness)
• Space appears (here / there)
• Time appears (before / after, continuity)
• Agency appears (I can do / something can do)
• Other minds appear (not alone; others exist)
• Objects appear (room, body, people, language)
• Narrative identity returns ("Oh right, I'm me, I took ketamine, I'm safe")

...which is why it's crucial to be in a good "set and setting" when you take it.

The experience is an extremely spiritual one because the concepts arrive in an order to which they are literally foundational to your normal experience. As your emerging consciousness tries to reintegrate its sensory input (or as subsystems come back online into the maximally integrated causal structure or "dominant complex" of Integrated Information Theory) you are still trying to make sense of space (which appears geometric because your cognitive systems are trying to collapse it into a comprehensible structure despite being partially offline) and time (which loops because your brain's normal mechanisms for sequential prediction and memory are disrupted) while you rediscover other minds which are foundational to meaning, morality, love and the human condition.

It can be quite addictive and harmful to your bladder if over-used, so I've only ever taken it a few times. I intend to take it again, but only very sparingly as I've encountered people who have definitely overdone it.

I intend also to try DMT, which is the most psychoactive ingredient in Ayahuasca (but without all the emetic stuff) and related to shrooms (psilocybin is 4-PO-DMT, psilocin is 4-HO-DMT). It's apparently now possible to get it in freebased form for vapourising, but I haven't sourced this yet.

The type of meditation that is best for you also depends a bit on your personality. If you feel emotions quite strongly like I do, then loving kindness guided meditations can be the best - there are lots of great ones on YouTube!

Wow. That is a good warning against it.