Have i messed up my brain with too many Psychadelics??

[crazynate:]]

Idk, after a year of heavy psychedelic use and a few month break, I still notice how much different my perceptions are... Basically all the sensations and perceptions, mainly with visuals and thoughts, that you experienced heavily with psychedelics, will still remain for a long time after... But Im not annoyed with it at all, I enjoy being sober and seeing, or noticing more vibrant colors than before and having deeper thoughts than ever before.. I'd say it's made me a different person and probably killed a LOT of my brain cells, but in the end I look at it as myself evolving... and I still do enjoy tripping, just not as frequently as before cheers!

 

[Sentience]

LSD is not neurotoxic. It doesnt kill brain cells, at least not directly. Its not like alcohol that is neurotoxic.

What it does do however is alter the behavior and production of neurotransmitters and causes your brain to form unusual synaptic pathways which can alter your physical brain, but without destroying any neurons.

Opiates and mescaline are also not neuro-toxic.

 

[10YR AA Gone]

I have obviously relapsed almost 2 years ago, but there is something I want to stress.

In all those 90 trips or 100 trips or whatever they were, and some of them were insane - eating a 5-strip. The whole world around me turned into an impressionist painting that was alive and sparkling with energy.

NONE of them compare to an honest, sober, hardcore religious/spiritual experience that comes from willingly giving away your self. When you let go, sacrifice the self, then you will touch freedom.

This is what a Buddha talked about, it is bigger than your addiction, it is bigger than your life, it is bigger than eternity, it is all around you every second, yet your "self" prevents you from experiencing it.

I don't know if your life will ever put you in the position where you can choose to give up yourself, but if you do, and survive it.

It is the GREATEST HIGH and FEELING of INFINITE power that makes LSD looks like elementary school.

This is what the great religious texts were written about, this is what everyone is "looking" for really, something that is so true it is enough to make a grown man drop to his knees in tears, and a violent one give up all his possessions.

This is what all the religions have gotten so tragically wrong. If you are fortunate enough to experience this with a sober mind for a few moments or hours, much less walk in it as the great spiritual leaders of humanities past did - you will be "okay" for the rest of your life.

You may relapse, you may be sober, you may have children, you may not, I believe it is what Jesus tried to show his disciples, and the purpose of undergoing Masonic degrees.

A sober minded sacrifice of your self hood, will set you free, will remove your fears of death, and expose a great secret that stands in front of every man.

My best to all of you, may you each find your own way home to yourself.

 

[love_sex_desire]

In all those 90 trips or 100 trips or whatever they were, and some of them were insane - eating a 5-strip. The whole world around me turned into an impressionist painting that was alive and sparkling with energy.

NONE of them compare to an honest, sober, hardcore religious/spiritual experience that comes from willingly giving away your self. When you let go, sacrifice the self, then you will touch freedom.

This is what a Buddha talked about, it is bigger than your addiction, it is bigger than your life, it is bigger than eternity, it is all around you every second, yet your "self" prevents you from experiencing it.

I don't know if your life will ever put you in the position where you can choose to give up yourself, but if you do, and survive it.

It is the GREATEST HIGH and FEELING of INFINITE power that makes LSD looks like elementary school.

This is what the great religious texts were written about, this is what everyone is "looking" for really, something that is so true it is enough to make a grown man drop to his knees in tears, and a violent one give up all his possessions.

This is what all the religions have gotten so tragically wrong. If you are fortunate enough to experience this with a sober mind for a few moments or hours, much less walk in it as the great spiritual leaders of humanities past did - you will be "okay" for the rest of your life.

A sober minded sacrifice of your self hood, will set you free, will remove your fears of death, and expose a great secret that stands in front of every man.

My best to all of you, may you each find your own way home to yourself.

I see much validity in your post 10yr. Al though I have not used traditional meditation practices, with my own analytical contemplation of metaphysics I have paved a path of enlightenment, heavily influenced by psychedelics. It is very difficult to experience true enlightenment from a chemical. Al though there are exceptions to this, albeit very few. At the risk of "dicksizing" or sounding arrogant I am one of what I believe to be a rather small minority that have experienced a bona fide spiritual experience under the influence of psychedelics (LSD in my case, and I'll have to write a trip report on this sometime as it was by far the most amazing experience I've had in my LIFE, not just on psychedelics). Al though this spiritual experience was not solely the result of psychedelics, as this experience was the result of a combination of my own contemplation and frame of mind as well as around 4 years of LSD inspired revelations, and my own integration and expansion of these revelations.

Psychedelics can act as a catalyst to open your mind to a higher state of awareness, but these experiences are rendered completely useless unless you can integrate them and expand upon them in your normal everyday life. Used in conjunction with analytical thought and contemplation, psychedelics can help guide our spiritual paths. Psychedelics alone will never lead to enlightenment, but they can be very useful in laying down a foundation of spirituality by expanding your mind to a state of higher awareness and potential. Not to say that psychedelics are necessary to achieve enlightenment, but when used responsibly they can act as a catalyst to inspire spiritual awareness. It takes years of analytical contemplation to become enlightened, but once this foundation is set, psychedelics can catalyze this enlightenment.

I understand that Buddha and other enlightened ones did not rely on psychedelics to reach their level of awareness, but it is unfortunate to say that in our modern age of attention deficit, mass production and blasphemy that some people may require psychedelics to achieve this state of awareness. Humanity has become so conditioned and detached from nature through our robust political/social systems, technology, and mass dissemination of infinite information that we are so removed and distracted from nature that psychedelics can help show us how conditioned and ignorant we are by these social institutions we are born into. Psychedelics can show us how conditioned we are by providing us with a contrasting altered state of consciousness to put our own consciousness and awareness into perspective.

Many indigenous people have used psychedelics in conjunction with their own spiritual paths to celebrate or gain awareness of the divine source of creation. Ayahuasca, peyote, ololiqui, and many others have been used spiritually for centuries, so it is hard to say their is no validity in using psychedelics for spiritual awareness. Psychedelics alone will not lead to enlightenment, however an intelligent, open mind who has heavily contemplated philosophical and spiritual metaphysics may experience enlightenment from psychedelics. An excellent quote on the responsible use of psychedelics from Maynard James Keenan, the poetic singer from the philosophical/psychedelic progressive rock band Tool, sums up much of what I am alluding to:

"I think psychedelics play a major part in what we do, but having said that, I feel that if somebody's going to experiment with those things they really need to educate themselves about them. People just taking the chemicals and diving in without having any kind of preparation about what they're about to experience tend to have no frame of reference, so they're missing everything flying by and all these new perspectives. It's just a waste. They reach a little bit of spiritual enlightenment, but they end up going, 'Well, now I need that drug to get back there again.' The trick is to use the drugs once to get there, and maybe spend the next ten years trying to get back there without the drug."

Psychedelics can be our allies in the pursuit of enlightenment, but enlightenment can only be achieved through our own volition and will to truly understand the magic of the inner workings of our universe, and our place in it.