Are Psychedelic States Truly Possible Through Alternative Methods?

[Morninggloryseed]

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Bingo!

 

[xx001]

That could be true for some...it hasn't been the case for me; and if you look at cultures outside of the 'civilized, enlightened' West that use psychedelics and integrate them into life in a very tangible, meaningful, and practical way...it does not seem to be true of them either. I also want to remind us all that the psychedelic experience IS completely natural and the proof is there because DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, 5-HO-DMT, and perhaps other 'psychedelics' are already in the brain. Even further, read about the Near Death Experience and read about 'The 5-MeO-DMT Void' and absorb that they are on in the same....and I think the case is well stated that psychedelics are as natural as a kiss. Finally, in the case of LSD...and I would be the case for all the psychedelics.....whatever LSD does...it is in and out of the brain in less than an hour and there are no meaningful or 'detectable' amounts of LSD in the body within a few hours....one trips off LSD long after the body eliminates it.

Fast track or not, the carefully well intentioned psychedelic experience is natural, is valid, and is every bit as much of a tool as all other forms of higher consciousness.

The half-life of lsd is about 5 hours actually.

http://www.erowid.org/references/refs_view.php?A=ShowDocPartFrame&C=ref&ID=6265&DocPartID=6624

 

[EarthBounded]

The term Psychedelic defined by dictionary.com "of or noting a mental state characterized by a profound sense of intensified sensory perception, sometimes accompanied by severe perceptual distortion and hallucinations and by extreme feelings of either euphoria or despair" Adj.

The term Psychedelic does not just mean drug/drugs this is a common misconception.

I have read some theories lately how mass power like government involvement can even induce a psychedelic experience. I don't believe this is proven but a radical example.

Personally I use Kundalini and Chakra meditation to achieve altered states of mind and anyday I would argue these states of mind are more powerful then drugs plus when done with extreme knowledge and care chemicals can be released in the brain I would relate similar to feelings of MDMA, this is simpily spiritual ecstasy.

You can only expand your mind so much with drugs, meditation is my salvation thats for sure.

 

[weadazoid]

A sensory deprivation tank where you float in water in the dark will eventually alter ones mind state. Lucid dreaming is a valid point, really in trully any REM state generally mimicks the brainwaves recorded when one is in a full on psychadelic state.


I think most kids between the ages of 4 and 8 are constantly in a psychadelic state of mind. It is the age of magical thought were anything is possible.

 

[xx001]

Lucid dreaming is a valid point, really in trully any REM state generally mimicks the brainwaves recorded when one is in a full on psychadelic state.

Do you have any sources for this about brain waves?

 

[psood0nym]

Foreigner I usually respect your posts but you are dead wrong. The experience of samadhi from meditation is above and beyond any dose of any psychedelic.

There's a very interesting account of a DMT session written about the psychedelic experience of a decades-long Indian meditator that is related to this topic. From the article:

Immediately after my first DMT voyage the drug was administered to the Hindu monk. This dedicated man had spent fourteen years in meditation and renunciation. He was a sannyasin, entitled to wear the sacred saffron robe. He has participated in several psychedelic drug sessions with extremely positive results and was convinced that the biochemical road to samadhi was not only valid but perhaps the most natural method for people living in a technological civilization.

His reaction to DMT was, however, confusing and unpleasant. Catapulted into a sudden ego-loss, he struggled to rationalize his experience in terms of classic Hindu techniques. He kept looking up at the group in puzzled helplessness. Promptly at twenty-five minutes he sat up, laughed, and said, "What a trip that was. I really got trapped in karmic hallucinations!"

The lesson was clear. DMT, like the other psychedelic keys, could open an infinity of possibilities. Set, setting, suggestibility, temperamental background were always there as filters through which the ecstatic experience could be distorted.

I think psychedelics are psychological tools. Similarly to constructing an architectural work, it is possible to build a greater ecstatic or insightful experience using tools than it is without them. Potentially (and plausibly), the most beneficial method is to use every tool at one's disposal together. Moderated, contemplative, and foremost, critical use of psychedelics is the most expedient path. I will concede, however, that walking such a path is difficult to do without stumbling and falling. It's far more inherently risky than alternative methods, but it also holds greater potential.

I have always loved this question. For me, although I do meditate and do some breathing exercises, I don't think the psychedelic states can be reached without a psychedelic. Now I am not saying insight, even all strung together, can happen without psychedelics. But I remember my first trips thinking "why have I not seen this before". Now life is a trip, so it is easy to see how some states can happen with or without the sacraments.

I always laugh when I think of the part of the book The "Electric Kool-aid Acid Test" where there was suppose to be an acid graduation. Kesey was telling Owsley that they were going to move on from psychedelics and get the same states without. I don't think Kesey was serious but he stated to Owsley the states were available without acid. To which Owsley says "bullshit, it's the drugs that do it".

I also find it interesting that T McKenna claims on his trip to India that he never found anything close to psychedelic states when he met with gurus and sadhus. He said it was a lot of old man wisdom but not psychedelic. And he stated most of the gurus and sadhus of India he met were fascinated by psychedelics.

For me, studying consciousness without psychedelics is like studying astronomy without a telescope. It can be done but it is richer with the correct tools.

Now saying all that I love meditation and strolling through nature sober. They are valuable tools. But so are psychedelics and I never bought the notion that they can be given up and meditation could work just as well. Trust me, I know too many people my age who claim they haven't tripped in 30 years and don't need to anymore. What I get from that is they are scared to trip, plain and simple. At least the people I am talking about. We all know the people that may have taken acid once and claimed they use to take it all the time and don't need it to get there anymore. Yeah right.

I agree. I subscribe to the supposition that psychedelic states cannot be reached by other methods. This conclusion is based on the simple recognition that, mostly, psychedelics represent a biomolecular means of generating brain states that are highly unlikely to be possible without them. That is, psychedelics function as unnatural "neurotransmitters," which despite this have powerful and consequential psychological effects. One can generalize to some psychedelic states from alternative methods, but a generalization is likely all it is. Solipsis brought up the relevant point that in our overwhelmed state we mistake distortions for actual insights that will pan out in the real world. Such distortions are certainly a threat to the productive use of psychedelics. However, actual insights can also occur during a trip, and I don't see any reason to think all of these sorts of psychedelic insights are ONLY distortions. This is to say that the unique experiences afforded by psychedelics may be both valuable and unachievable by any other means.

It's the disciplined work of sober reflection that determines that what we think we've learned from a trip is sense or nonsense. I, for instance, after meditating on numerous salvia experiences, came to reason that panexperientialism may be true prior to reading any philosophical text that describes panexperientialism (I found those texts by searching for them using statistically improbable phrases that I felt might have already been written in preexisting publications). The salivia experience is one of the most bizarre and ostensibly "distorted" drug experiences that exists, yet I've had some of my life's greatest thoughts only because I've experienced it. The findings of positive psychology indicate that we find novelty pleasurable in itself. It strikes me that this is natural because finding and exploring novelty is part of what humans live to do. Psychedelics are tools that are historically unprecedented in their capacity to invoke meaningfully novel experiences, which for me means that using them now is almost necessarily obliged by my simple recognition of myself as a human with the opportunity to use them.

 

[Foreigner]

Foreigner I usually respect your posts but you are dead wrong. The experience of samadhi from meditation is above and beyond any dose of any psychedelic.

I think you misunderstand. I'm not saying that psychedelics are better than meditation; rather, I would not have been able to have that full body experience from meditation had I not done psychedelics. Something about doing psychs opens the mind and creates new pathways that makes meditation a more powerful experience.

What do you think?

There is a term that I think buddhists use: makyō, it is considered a pitfall in meditation but nevertheless a natural part of the process.

Funny... there's a CD I listen to while on LSD by a Japanese group called Makyo. Your link totally puts their music into context for me now... haha!

 

[TheAppleCore]

No two altered states are the same. An LSD trip is completely different from a DMT trip, which are both completely different from meditative states, which are different from dreams, etc.

If you want a "trip", take a psychedelic.

 

[webbykevin]

The question makes no sense, a psychedelic state is achieved by definition with a psychedelic substance, at least in the context the OP is implying I think. So it is a mutually inclusive experience, it's like asking the question how can I drink a glass of lemonade without drinking a glass of lemonade... You Can't !, the experience of drinking a glass of lemonade actually requires you to be drinking a glass of lemonade, same with psychedelic drugs, the only way to have a psilocybin experience is to take psilocybin, other wise it's something else you are experiencing.