Introducing someone to LSD

[diaphon]

Being the leader, mentor, or teacher in this department kind of makes me nervous.

I'm not a frequent poster on Bluelight, because so many on here have so much more experience and wisdom than me! And in fact, you in particular have lots more experience with LSD than I do. But this sentence in your post made me want to issue a note of caution here.

If being a mentor / teacher in this setting makes you nervous, you shouldn't feel it is your job to do it. There are many people who enjoy introducing people to psychedelics, and there are even people who have experience with psychedelics and therapy (I say that because you mentioned a "personal block" that your partner is hoping to overcome). I'm not one of those people, and it doesn't sound like you are either. Although I do a lot of teaching and mentoring in my professional life, I think of psychedelics as a very personal internal experience. I wouldn't want to guide someone else at this point in my journey - but I am very grateful to the person who guided me!

You mentioned so many things that concern you, from the art on the walls to the music, the lighting, and the spiritual focus. These are important features of the experience for you, and that's wonderful. I also understand where your partner is coming from, feeling uncomfortable with overt religious iconography and what probably seems too stereotypically "hippy" for his tastes. So you have different preferences, and maybe these differences should be respected instead of one or both of you forcing yourself to match the other's preferences.

It seems like the ideal scenario would be to find someone else who could be a first-time guide for your partner. You could go along for the ride, at a low dose, or you could just let him have a full and personal experience with a mentor. Then, once he's had a session or two to figure out what to expect, you can begin journeying together.

 

[Jabberwocky]

My partner and I have been together for over a year now and living together for 8+ months. We get along for the most part. I've told him a lot about my past LSD exploits, especially heavy dosing in a safe and setup home environment. He is very curious, mostly because he has a personal block he can't seem to overcome in his life and it's been about 10 years of him trying through therapy and whatever else. He really needs a creative explosion in his consciousness and after talking to him about it for a long time I honestly think psychedelics may be the best way, if not the only way, to help him out of this.

Anyway, he wants to do a deep dive with LSD. I do have some experience with this. I've taken very heavy doses before, but in the company of a person or people who have much more experience than I do. I've tripped heavily maybe 25-30 times in my life. I've never been in a position of introducing a raw newbie to it, especially someone I'm this close to. Being the leader, mentor, or teacher in this department kind of makes me nervous.

So I'd like some advice?

Normally what I do is setup a comfortable home environment with food already made, music that's agreeable, and candle light (or just low light), and preferably lots of art things around. Visual art, colourful lights, crystals, entertaining objects, whatever. I also prefer the winter time (in the northern hemisphere) because it gives us lots of night time to do it + no disturbances from random friends dropping by, the mailman, or whatever.

So this time would be different because I'm living in his home and he's very different than I am. I'm afraid that my musical choices, decor choices, and basically everything I have in mind for a good trip would not be something he's into. We have very opposite tastes in some ways. For example, I like "spiritual" kind of environments... religious iconography, symbolism, and organic looking materials and colours. He isn't spiritual at all, he doesn't like religion, etc. I like being on LSD and getting lost in art. There's not much art on the walls in his home so I'd have to get creative. Musically, I like electronica with international fusion, maybe even some spiritual overtones. Him? I don't think he'd go for that. He likes a lot of pop music, bands and singers that... honestly... are not really LSD material in my opinion.

For me, I kind of need these things to feel stable in a heavy trip, so I'm afraid we will be tripping and he'll hate the music and then we'll have to change it, and I might have a bad trip myself. I have to explain to him that, for example, turning off the music and having none at all is not an option for me during a heavy trip. The silence would make me crazy. Going outside and going for a walk is also not okay, unless it's the very tail end of the trip. Heavy LSD dosing makes the world chaotic and I would not want to wander the city in that state.

He's basically looking to me to guide him through this trip, and I'm open to that but I'm not sure anymore how to make the best environment. I have very limited LSD and for me a heavier trip is more worth it than light dosing. I too could benefit from some deeper diving. I'm also willing to toss out my old rule book for how this should be done and let things unfold organically, but I'll need some parameters in place still.

I wish I could describe more what I'm talking about but I hope the above would suffice. I think this could be very good for both of us but I want to do it right.

If your doing a deep dive, avoid any other substances other the LSD it can be tempting to smoke weed, or in my case klonopin (nervousness in general) but you have to remain strong, you should also find out if any of his IMMEDIATE family members (mother, father, bro, sis) have any mental issues. Or if he may, for some especially with LSD cause of its dopamine effects it can cause manic effects in some individuals. But overall, 1 hit maybe 2 once’s he’s used it a couple times, and just be there for each other. I approve of this

 

[finitelifeform]

I guess the only way to find out is to see what happens. You sound like you've got plenty of experience with psychedelics to understand what needs to be done leading up to the trip, the variables for during, and then after. Respecting the sacraments and proceeding with knowledge is the first part of the journey. If there's a lot of material there for this guy to experience for the first time in his life with the filter off, this might be a challenge to him. I'd be aware of this because during the trip all illusions fade away and the raw presence of this person comes out. You will no doubt see more to this person than you did before and this might be uncomfortable for your partner if he feels embarrassed or ashamed or vulnerable. After the experiences I've had where content has been freed when I've been with other people, and knowing how difficult it was for me personally to be with that stuff I can say in my experience it can pose both a challenge for the person experiencing it and the people with you during that time.
Someone else seeing me in such a vulnerable state needs lots of trust, understanding, patience, empathy, open-mindedness, authenticity etc.

It really depends on what the content is about and how deep it goes and how it's affected this person.
There's going to be no convenient conversation changing environment if how he reacts, how you react to him reacting etc if you're both deep into a heavy trip. If you get thrown off by what's happening, who guides you? Plus, bad trips will resurface in some way or another, especially if they have imprinted onto this person enough. From my experience you have to recondition yourself after a bad trip in order to wipe the slate clean again and write over the bad trip with something that reinforces change and potential for things to be better.

You could be sober when he has his trip.
That way you can lead with all the experience you have.
If I'm right in saying all therapeutic sessions with psychedelics involve the person seeking the experience taking psychedelics but the guide not.

 

[Foreigner]

I think, all things considered, I am going to step out of my mentorship role in this trip. I have more experience than him, but I want to go into it as equals who are just looking to have a good, interesting time. I don't want to frame it as me being his guide, or therapeutic crutch, or whatever. I'll make suggestions about how to setup a good environment, I'll recommend a light dose, and if I'm personally comfortable with the setup, then I'm cool doing it with him. Then we can just take it as it comes. If things happen during the trip that require navigating, I will naturally be in a more experienced position to maybe help, but I have also been in a position in the past where the less experienced person has had creative ideas or added their uniqueness to the situation in a way I didn't expect, and it helped immensely. There are no rules.

To my recollection, it's also not good a thing to be too controlling of the experience because that control can backfire into a negative trip. You also have to be willing to let go and let god, so to speak. There's only so much I can do to ensure a good experience and I could totally see myself getting neurotic into the lead up of the trip, which violates my #1 rule which is: don't trip if you've had a lousy day. If I drive myself crazy preparing for the perfect trip then that will make a nightmare trip happen.

It's balance between "let's make sure all our ducks are in a row" and "fuck it, let's just drop acid and see what happens". You know?

Thanks for all the feedback, it has been formative of my strategy. My motivation is to just have a good time. I miss the magic of LSD. It could help me a lot, and him too.

 

[Ismene2]

Definately wouldn't start with a heavy dose foreigner. I'd been taking 15 dried grams of mushrooms for many years when I first tried LSD and took way too much the first time - it wasn't horrible but it wasn't fun either. I'd start with a really low dose and go for a walk at a nature spot - if he's comfortable to go out in public on it. LSD is fun in direct proportion to how confident you are in handling it. It took me maybe a dozen trips to explore it and become fully confident with it - and even now I stay away from heavy doses (obviously a heavy dose depends on your tolerance - now I could probably take 500mics and be fine, if my tolerance was zero it would be an unpleasant bodyload and too intense mentally)

One other thing to consider is "Ismenes Wormhole" (patent pending) this is where you take half the dose and then the other half 20-30 minutes later. If you get the timing right it turns LSD into a completely different drug - much more like a magical, ultra clean version of Ecstasy - I've been rolling round in the duvet in absolute bliss using it that way.

Ismenes wormhole - like Ismenes arsehole but better

 

[27clubLi]

My two close friends who I introduced to both MDMA and LSD have thanked me profusely to this very day. They're both upset with themselves for being so against the idea for so many years before finally listening to me.

 

[Xorkoth]

So8unds like a good conclusion, Foreigner. Just let it flow. Good luck!

 

[pupnik]

@Foreigner I think there is too much overthinking about this going forward. yes, set and setting (include some prep of fluid and snacks too) are important and then do not obsess. music, whatever, do not obsess.

getting to this point as well I see that there has been too much emphasis on the psychological "problem" or on the person with the problem - go into this without blame or without an investigation into what went wrong - go together IMO.

for this to work well, get the setup right, get the intent simple, get stoned and begin to observe totality as it is, sharing if you can.

Later on you can return to your problems if they are still there.