<SpaceHead>
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2009
- Messages
- 227
I've taken a several year hiatus from posting on here, but decided to return to share some of my recent experiences with meditation and how it has changed my life and relationship to drugs including psychedelics. First off I'd like to say that I think meditation itself is psychedelic in the true sense of the word (mind manifesting, to make the mind apparent). From my own experience I've found that it has the potential to help integrate psychedelic experiences, help avoid abusing psychedelics and other drugs and also trigger spiritual experiences without drugs. First I'll share a little about my own history with psychedelics, the ways meditation has changed that relationship and also some resources people can use to develop their own meditation practice.
I started using psychedelics in my late teens and these experiences drastically shifted my world view, certainly the most profound thing I had ever experienced. For the next ten years they became the center of my life, I used them for spiritual, recreational, therapeutic and escapist reasons. As I got deeper in I used a wide variety of psychedelic research chemicals and dissociative drugs often in combinations searching for the thrill of novelty. At least every weekend I would dose again and catch a glimpse of that beautiful reality, but by Tuesday it would have evaporated, leaving me planning my next adventure as soon as possible. They have a saying in zen, "don't mistake the finger for the moon". Psychedelics point to a greater reality and give you a glimpse of that reality, but the drugs themselves are only a sign post, not the destination. I made the mistake of confusing the sign with the destination and thought that if I always had psychedelics on hand and took them as often as possible I could stay in that beautiful reality. I tried that for ten years and without means to properly integrate the experiences i was having I was always left unsatisfied.
A friend of mine knew I enjoyed novel mental experiences and got me to sign up for a ten day silent Vipassana meditation retreat. The retreat experience had a lot in common with psychedelics. The retreat caused latent mental and emotional content to come to the surface of consciousness and allowed me to observe the impermanence of all phenomena and the non existence of a solidified "self". After the retreat I felt cleansed and changed in a deep way, similar to how I would feel the day after a solid LSD trip, but the insights and changes felt much more grounding and real. And most importantly I had become established in the technique of meditation, a tool I could use to help maintain that opened and clear way of being in a much more practical and healthy way than using drugs too often in large doses. After this first retreat I went back to my drug use patterns but committed myself to meditating every day. Through practicing daily and doing at least one retreat a year I slowly but steadily moved from an extremely imbalanced relationship with drugs to a much healthier and more spiritual life. I still use psychedelics a few times a year, in contrast to having used them in upwards of fifty times a year in the past. My experiences with them more recently have been more profound and meaningful, and I also experience insight and meaning much more often completely sober.
Whether you're a hard head like me that needed a ten day retreat to get the message or totally new to psychedelics, I think meditation can be a very useful tool in getting more out of psychedelics and preventing the potential for harm. For those new to psychedelics meditation allows one to become more familiar with their inner landscape in a grounded and centered way and helps to build skills in working through difficult experiences. The first few trips that really blow the doors of perception off the hinges can be very challenging for people and I could see these skills being very useful in working through these experiences in a positive way. Meditation can also help provide a context in which to understand the psychedelic experience and translate it into something that can be understood and implemented in daily life. It can be used to cultivate a non attached relationship with experiences, helping to prevent clinging to the psychedelic experience or the experience of any drug for that matter. Meditating helps me to remember that the profound and eternal aspects of life are ALWAYS present regardless of if I am tripping or sober. I personally have used the framework of the Buddhist teachings in my practice as they have been developing and preserving this technique for thousands of years, although I would not call myself a Buddhist. There is absolutely no need for belief in any religion to get the benefits of meditation.
Psychedelics are a beautiful thing and I don't regret any of my experiences with them, but I am so glad that I found meditation and ended up where I am now. For me, meditation was the deciding factor between descending further into serious drug abuse or living the much more clear and aware life that I am living right now. I hope this information may be of some benefit to you fellow trippers!
Resources for building a practice:
Teacher Tara Brach's introduction / FAQ for meditation:
https://www.tarabrach.com/faq-for-meditation2/
Dharma Seed, recordings of talks on meditation and Buddhism
http://dharmaseed.org/talks/
Vipassana meditation retreats, (they are donation based)
https://www.dhamma.org/en-US/index
Also there may be a meditation center near you where you could go learn to meditate for free or for a small donation, check it out and go see a talk and show up for a sitting!
I started using psychedelics in my late teens and these experiences drastically shifted my world view, certainly the most profound thing I had ever experienced. For the next ten years they became the center of my life, I used them for spiritual, recreational, therapeutic and escapist reasons. As I got deeper in I used a wide variety of psychedelic research chemicals and dissociative drugs often in combinations searching for the thrill of novelty. At least every weekend I would dose again and catch a glimpse of that beautiful reality, but by Tuesday it would have evaporated, leaving me planning my next adventure as soon as possible. They have a saying in zen, "don't mistake the finger for the moon". Psychedelics point to a greater reality and give you a glimpse of that reality, but the drugs themselves are only a sign post, not the destination. I made the mistake of confusing the sign with the destination and thought that if I always had psychedelics on hand and took them as often as possible I could stay in that beautiful reality. I tried that for ten years and without means to properly integrate the experiences i was having I was always left unsatisfied.
A friend of mine knew I enjoyed novel mental experiences and got me to sign up for a ten day silent Vipassana meditation retreat. The retreat experience had a lot in common with psychedelics. The retreat caused latent mental and emotional content to come to the surface of consciousness and allowed me to observe the impermanence of all phenomena and the non existence of a solidified "self". After the retreat I felt cleansed and changed in a deep way, similar to how I would feel the day after a solid LSD trip, but the insights and changes felt much more grounding and real. And most importantly I had become established in the technique of meditation, a tool I could use to help maintain that opened and clear way of being in a much more practical and healthy way than using drugs too often in large doses. After this first retreat I went back to my drug use patterns but committed myself to meditating every day. Through practicing daily and doing at least one retreat a year I slowly but steadily moved from an extremely imbalanced relationship with drugs to a much healthier and more spiritual life. I still use psychedelics a few times a year, in contrast to having used them in upwards of fifty times a year in the past. My experiences with them more recently have been more profound and meaningful, and I also experience insight and meaning much more often completely sober.
Whether you're a hard head like me that needed a ten day retreat to get the message or totally new to psychedelics, I think meditation can be a very useful tool in getting more out of psychedelics and preventing the potential for harm. For those new to psychedelics meditation allows one to become more familiar with their inner landscape in a grounded and centered way and helps to build skills in working through difficult experiences. The first few trips that really blow the doors of perception off the hinges can be very challenging for people and I could see these skills being very useful in working through these experiences in a positive way. Meditation can also help provide a context in which to understand the psychedelic experience and translate it into something that can be understood and implemented in daily life. It can be used to cultivate a non attached relationship with experiences, helping to prevent clinging to the psychedelic experience or the experience of any drug for that matter. Meditating helps me to remember that the profound and eternal aspects of life are ALWAYS present regardless of if I am tripping or sober. I personally have used the framework of the Buddhist teachings in my practice as they have been developing and preserving this technique for thousands of years, although I would not call myself a Buddhist. There is absolutely no need for belief in any religion to get the benefits of meditation.
Psychedelics are a beautiful thing and I don't regret any of my experiences with them, but I am so glad that I found meditation and ended up where I am now. For me, meditation was the deciding factor between descending further into serious drug abuse or living the much more clear and aware life that I am living right now. I hope this information may be of some benefit to you fellow trippers!
Resources for building a practice:
Teacher Tara Brach's introduction / FAQ for meditation:
https://www.tarabrach.com/faq-for-meditation2/
Dharma Seed, recordings of talks on meditation and Buddhism
http://dharmaseed.org/talks/
Vipassana meditation retreats, (they are donation based)
https://www.dhamma.org/en-US/index
Also there may be a meditation center near you where you could go learn to meditate for free or for a small donation, check it out and go see a talk and show up for a sitting!
