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Why do some people on Psychedelics think they can fly?

Tweak Thizz

Tweak Thizz

Bluelighter
Joined
Apr 23, 2010
Messages
269
It seems in some LSD related deaths or other psychadelic related deaths, people have jumped to their death thinking they can fly. What causes people to lose their shit like this? I've thought of some pretty crazy stuff tripping but nothing crazy like that.
 
It has happened before but the reason it's prevalent in your mind is because it was used as a scare tactic for psychedelic prohibition. I wouldn't say it's a commonly recurring thing. I certainly have never thought so. But psychedelics powerfully alter your perceptions and thought patterns. And some people are more prone to severe delusions than others.
 
The "I got high on acid and jumped out a window thinking I could fly" concept is always referred to jokingly by myself and people I've known who actually have knowledge about psychedelics. Right up there with cannabis use making men grow tits or MDMA turning you gay. I don't know, there may have been recorded instances of that actually happening, I do know of cases in which people have become disoriented on psychedelics and wandered out in front of traffic for example, but the notion that someone would get the idea in their head that they can fly, and then take action based on that idea, while under the influence of psychedelics...it just seems really unlikely to me.
 
Just speculation, but I think it possibly comes from an early case back when psychedelics were not as well researched, that due to propaganda someone was convinced they were going to trip forever and the only way out was to kill themself. I do recall hearing of someone on acid jumping off a building once. The result was some condescending idiot going "That person must have been so high thought they could fly" when in reality they were just afraid, brainwashed by propaganda and having a hell of a bad trip.

After all, who could say for certain the last thoughts of the man on LSD who jumped to his death? It's not like he told anyone before he died.
 
Sure it can happen during a psychotic break. People who have "gone insane" ie completely insane and no longer exist in this reality often think they can fly or are Jesus (delusions of grandeur or importance) or they think they are going to die, everyones after them (paranoid delusions) but they all must think something if they are active. It may be hard to think that the person who is experiencing ego death and is clearly not there has thoughts but if they are actively processing information they will have thoughts on who they are or what is going on. They will be clouded and distorted and their brain will piece it together depending on what the "remnents of their ego" thinks of themselves. That is to say those who are paranoid by nature tend to be paranoid during ego loss those who think well of themselves often dont have the same paranoia (at least in my experience) that is not to say a break is at all predictable.

That leads me to believe "thinking they can fly" is interpreted at the scene of the death, by those who did the autopsy and it gets wrapped by the media or through the rumor into them actually thinking they could fly, when really they werent think about what would happen during the fall at all. When you are in ego death or loss you can still be active without memory or the ability to understand what is happening and thus you can fall victim to accident. I can assure you this has happened many times and the "think they can fly" is subbed in by those who report it.

(this is all my 2 cents i am not a professional on thinking you can fly while tripping)
 
CrypticArc said:
Just speculation, but I think it possibly comes from an early case back when psychedelics were not as well researched, that due to propaganda someone was convinced they were going to trip forever and the only way out was to kill themself. I do recall hearing of someone on acid jumping off a building once. The result was some condescending idiot going "That person must have been so high thought they could fly" when in reality they were just afraid, brainwashed by propaganda and having a hell of a bad trip.

After all, who could say for certain the last thoughts of the man on LSD who jumped to his death? It's not like he told anyone before he died.
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I'm not really one for conspiracy theories...but if this is the same case i'm thinking of - that of the mysterious death of Frank Olsen - there is speculation that the guy who "jumped" or "thought he could fly" (or was thrown out of a building) was actually a CIA agent. Allegedly.
"Jumped out of a building thinking he could fly" is a good story though.
The Frank Olson Project website (run by his son) has a few new items.
Frank Olson, for those who don't know, was a CIA biological weapons
expert working under an Army cover. For whatever reason, he was
unwittingly given LSD by the CIA and later thrown out the window of a
tall building in New York. (They used to say he jumped; some still try
to say it is unclear what happened.) The whole story is one sad web
of "official" lies, with the family being deceived for decades at a
time until a new piece of evidence would come along
Click to expand...
 
Man, I bet the CIA had the best drugs...they did some really shady drug related shit back in the day, like literally going into NYC bars and slipping hallucinogens in people's drinks to see how they'd react lol
 
People think they can fly for the same reason that I thought my body was nothing other than a decentralized flux of electron orbitals; your background, history, what you're interested in and the like. I've got a chemistry background - on one of my largish mushroom trips I watched my hand started to dissolve and transform into a wildly varying cloud of electrons. As I moved my hand back and forth, it would leave trails of electrons that would spontaneously orbit around my consciousness. These 'satellite' Tom's would eventually reform into the mother mass of me.

Now, is that self delusion or realization of the truth? At what point does it become losing my shit? To date I have not yet walked into traffic thinking that although I am a self associating set of molecules I can pass through an oncoming car without damage (because I can choose that exact moment of impact to temporarily dissociate).

I've done some pretty stupid things when tripping, but it's all been within the safety of my house.

I honestly don't know what losing my shit would be like.

Tom
 
I don't believe in conspiracy theories either but some of the shady shit Allen Dulles (same name as D.C. airport) did as CIA director is more fact when it came to L.S.D experiments. I totally believe there is more to Frank Olsens death then what was reported. It is a fact they would do shit like have prostitutes spike johns drinks and observe there behavior. Also they would randomly spike other C.I.A. operatives drinks and observe their reactions.They wanted to see if the drug could be used to flip agents or be used to make other world leaders into puppets.I'm sure the research probably told them it was highly unlikely(can't remember the name of the declassified tests but if you google it you'll find it). Also we were in a hyper sensitive time(height of the cold war) because we feared our Russian counter parts were doing the same kind of experiments.
But anyway people thinking they can fly and end up jumping off buildings probably happened a time or 2(law of averages) but is widely overblown.Complete bullshit that this is the norm!
 
As I understand it, the myth of someone thinking that they could fly started when Art Linkletter's daughter killed herself. She had admitted to taking LSD some months before, and Art decided to blame her suicide entirely on the drug. He owned a large newspaper company, and began to print slanderous rumors about LSD.

I did see an article about someone thinking they could fly in Australia on 25i, but I attribute this kind of thing to them being heavilty intoxicated and remembering this rumor and deciding to make it a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Don't forget what Bill Hicks said about this: "good! Another moron is dead! If you thought you could fly, why didn't you take off from the ground? You don't see ducks lining up for the elevator!"
 
Rasasvada said:
As I understand it, the myth of someone thinking that they could fly started when Art Linkletter's daughter killed herself. She had admitted to taking LSD some months before, and Art decided to blame her suicide entirely on the drug. He owned a large newspaper company, and began to print slanderous rumors about LSD.
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Actually i think you're right - i stand corrected :)
 
It doesn't make any sense to me why a person that thinks they can fly would jump off a building rather than try to take off on the ground. Flying without wings is different from parachuting without a parachute.

It's too crazy to take seriously, in my opinion. Planes don't take off above the ground, and birds don't need elevators to fly. Why would anybody think having the ability to fly requires a rooftop to work? After all, what's so special about the elevation of the platform one attempts to fly from? And why jump in the first place if the idea is to fly? I mean, flapping your arms like a bird would seem much more rational than using your legs to hop.

It seems to me that hallucinogens produce not a delusional ability to fly, but either a delusional ability to turn off gravity or simply an increased probability of accidentally falling from high elevations. The latter seems most likely.
 
Tweak Thizz said:
It seems in some LSD related deaths or other psychadelic related deaths, people have jumped to their death thinking they can fly. What causes people to lose their shit like this? I've thought of some pretty crazy stuff tripping but nothing crazy like that.
Click to expand...

I can't believe no one brought up the most famous LSD trip story. When the Beatles were recording Abbey Road, John Lennon accidently drank a glass of water with LSD in it that he was planning on saving for later. He told George Martin what he did and that he was going up to the roof of the studio building to get some fresh air. When Paul and George asked where John was Martin told them the story and they immediatly ran up to the roof to bring Lennon back as they were afraid he 'might try to fly'.
 
Nom de Plume said:
It doesn't make any sense to me why a person that thinks they can fly would jump off a building rather than try to take off on the ground. Flying without wings is different from parachuting without a parachute.

It's too crazy to take seriously, in my opinion. Planes don't take off above the ground, and birds don't need elevators to fly. Why would anybody think having the ability to fly requires a rooftop to work? After all, what's so special about the elevation of the platform one attempts to fly from? And why jump in the first place if the idea is to fly? I mean, flapping your arms like a bird would seem much more rational than using your legs to hop.

It seems to me that hallucinogens produce not a delusional ability to fly, but either a delusional ability to turn off gravity or simply an increased probability of accidentally falling from high elevations. The latter seems most likely.
Click to expand...

^^^ Agree totally. I had that same thought once in my life when I was very high and felt I could fly.
I must say that I had a mild bike accident as I was quite impressed by the street lights.
For a moment I though I was too light but -- as you explain it quite well,
I didn't feel like jumping out of the window.
That didn't even cross my mind. And I really believe it does not seem logic, neither plausible.
 
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It's an urban myth. No truth to it whatsoever. It's like the guy who went blind staring at the sun on LSD or the one who thinks he's a glass of orange juice.

Obviously we all have silly thoughts that cross our mind even when sober - have you ever thought what it would be like to drive the car off a cliff when you're driving at height? It's just silly ideas that cross your mind every now and again.
 
Tanner Blaze said:
I can't believe no one brought up the most famous LSD trip story. When the Beatles were recording Abbey Road, John Lennon accidently drank a glass of water with LSD in it that he was planning on saving for later. He told George Martin what he did and that he was going up to the roof of the studio building to get some fresh air. When Paul and George asked where John was Martin told them the story and they immediatly ran up to the roof to bring Lennon back as they were afraid he 'might try to fly'.
Click to expand...

I think the story is George Martin took him up the roof to get some fresh air and John stood there saying "Arn't those stars fantastic". I don't think Paul and George H would've dashed upstairs because they thought he would try to fly - I don't think the urban myth existed at that time. George Martin was telling the story 30 years later and combined the "LSD makes you fly" myth he heard after the Ark Linkletter publicity with taking John to the roof - I'm sure at the time it never crossed anyones mind.
 
Im with pen name on this one. I have had some seriously bad trips, but I never believed I could do anything but transfer minds with people.

I think it is all people being in horrible places to trip and having their balance so distorted that they cannot help but fall. I have fallen just walking due to my balance being thrown off on mushrooms.
 
I lol'ed at the many posts in here. You can certainly try to fly by jumping off a chair, or a situation that is much safer. No need to try it by going to the rooftop, lol, what in the...
 
I must be a magnet for unstable people. I kind of think of this as a potential very real risk every time I'm ever around anyone on a psychedelic period, based on my prior experiences. I have had to stop a friend from jumping off of a balcony while tripping to prove that it couldn't hurt him. I've also seen people exclaim "I'm in a lucid dream!" while out of their minds, and I can guarantee you that if I thought that one of the very first things I would do is try to fly. Luckily, these people were content just wandering around talking nonsense.

This may not be common, but it's certainly an entirely realistic scenario. A good reason to never forget that psychedelics demand respect.
 
Kaleida said:
I must be a magnet for unstable people. I kind of think of this as a potential very real risk every time I'm ever around anyone on a psychedelic period, based on my prior experiences. I have had to stop a friend from jumping off of a balcony while tripping to prove that it couldn't hurt him. I've also seen people exclaim "I'm in a lucid dream!" while out of their minds, and I can guarantee you that if I thought that one of the very first things I would do is try to fly. Luckily, these people were content just wandering around talking nonsense.

This may not be common, but it's certainly an entirely realistic scenario. A good reason to never forget that psychedelics demand respect.
Click to expand...
If you are going to continue to trip you might want to find new people to do it with!
 
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