In regards to Ram Dass and the story of the guru that ate 900 mics of LSD. Sometimes we want to believe something so much, that it becomes the truth. Often things we remember, aren't remembered or retold as they really happened. It's not lying per se, because people will often actually believe the story they are telling, sometimes it's because they so much want it to be true, that it becomes the truth. (and sometimes they'll just outright lie too, off cause) Sometimes what we mean and think and remember, is twisted by how we want it to be.
It's called confirmation bias (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias)
And it's how myths are made.
Eye witness is a worthless term when it comes to humans, because humans are mythicists by nature. It's why science was such a huge break through for the
human perception, since it's an objective method of assessing what is true, and what is not. Something that the human mind in itself is uncapable off. (objective in the sense of meaning
detached from human objective perception)
It's a well known scientific fact in psychology, that two persons will often remember the very same incident very differently. What color was the car that hit you? blue, black or dark green? Did the assailant have a foreign accent or not? Police know very well to not put too much trust in eye witness accounts.
For Ram dass story to have any credibility, it would have to be verifiable and repeatable. If it can't, it's just another myth retold, like 1000 times before in the story of humanity. You know:
"jesus walked could on the water. It's true because he said so" or "
L.Ron Hubbard says God will come in a spaceship and save us, it's true because he said so" or
"There's a guru who took 1200 ug of LSD and didn't even feel it, it's true because Ram dass says so".
I never said I knew what I experienced was the truth, I said that whether I like it or not, whether I call it "spiritual" or not, whether I want it or not, my experiences tend to permanently transform my perception of the world and the self.
I have explored the notion that there is nothing spiritual or spiritually useful about psychedelics, but eventually realized they change me in ways I can't understand even if I am most resistant to that happening.
Nice post
but it doesn’t fully harmonize with your first post imo. I’ll break it down for you:
As a result of my experiences, I have had many revelations about the nature of reality and the way I experience myself has completely changed.
How do you know these revelations about the nature of reality, aren’t illusions about the nature of reality? No matter how real they might seem to you, they could still be illusions.
It seems to be the case that many famous psychedelic researchers like Leary, Alpert, Grof, etc also went down spiritual paths as a result of their psychedelic experiences and developed transpersonal (beyond ego) understandings of the human psyche.
<--- These guys are the good guys, on the true righteous spiritual path of eastern wisdom of abandoning the bad, bad ego. (is what you're indirectly saying)
However, it seems this is not the case for everyone. For instance a friend of mine at work told me he has been using shrooms and LSD for over thirty years, had hundreds of trips, and he just considers it good fun. Its not a spiritual or transformation experience for him. I also see people on these forums who have done a lot of pyschedelics but still seem to live entirely within the egoic frame of reference. Shulgin in another guy who comes to mind, although psychedelics certainly were spiritual and transformative for him he seemed more interested in testing and making new psychedelics than in the actual revelations he received.
<--- These guys are base. They aren’t getting the message of letting go of their bad ego’s. (is what you're indirectly saying)
Could it be, that people like me who can't seem to take psychedelics without having a spiritual experience are simply born more aware of the spiritual nature of reality?
Or maybe there is no spiritual nature of reality, and some people are just born more sceptic? I’m not trying to make a case for the opposite. But I’m just telling you were your bias and worldview is apparent. Nothing wrong with your opinion, but that is the “truth” I was commenting on in my first post.
But yeah, thats my question, because I am surprised when I see long term psychedelic users talk about it as though it were some kind of recreation.
You seem to expect everyone who takes psychedelics to turn into Barefoot crystal-wielding new age hippies, and when you find out that is not the case, you come in here perplexed asking how this can be. IMO it’s a naïve question, as I’ve already said, psychedelics affects everyone differently.
You know, personally I’d much rather have spent an afternoon in philosophical discussion with Shulgin, than any of those phony fake pseudo-guru’s you mention. I’m sure he would have had some much more interesting and deep thoughts and ideas, even though he isn’t supposed to be on that righteous path of eternal eastern wisdom of fighting that bad ego. But that’s just my opinion, off cause.
The reason I don’t like the term Spiritual is, because if you call yourself spiritual, you are implicitly stating, that other people are unspiritual. Which again implicitly leads to, that you as a spiritual person, must be privy to some kind of secret esoteric knowledge, that the rest of us aren't.
The difference between
spiritual and
religious is that as religious you follow a doctrine dictated by others, this is dumb imo, but it’s not arrogant. I don’t know, maybe I’m being unfair, I just always think there’s something snobbish and haughty about the opinions of people that call themselves spiritual, maybe because they are often very absolutist about stuff, that so obviously might just be mind tricks and illusions. But nothing beats subjective experience as proof of reincarnationa and what not, right?
I think there’s some good posts by Solipsis and Xorkoth in this thread (not to suck up to the mods or anything, lol
) But I myself, wouldn’t be who I am today if I hadn’t taken psychedelics, but I think it’s a fallacy to think that psychedelics makes people better persons. Yes, it can change you, sometimes give you revelations/illusions, and you can still be as narrow minded as the rest of us, just in your own way.
I actually think this thread is a prime example of this.
