Mescaline , no headfuck??? Not so sure

[al-laddin]

So I feel that mescaline does in fact have headfuck, for me it does anyway, and many others. I read all to often its "a gentle psychedelic" and such but if you've had mescaline HCL or an extraction you can measure a dose accurately and see for yourself. Take a "medium" dose...say 325-350mg and tell me theres no headfuck. I believe that many people that claim mescaline is more gently than lucy have no idea how much they have taken. With how wildly alkaloid content varies in these plants theres absolutely no way of knowing what kind of dose you took without doing an extraction, and weaker cacti are much more common than strong. I would like to hear from someone who a has taken a comparable dose of mescaline 300 mg + to mushrooms and LSD. Do you believe that mescaline at this dose is not as deeply penetrating and "heavy" as the rest of the classics? I would say 300mg of mescaline is about equal to 250-275 ug LSD and probably 3-4 grams of strong cubensis mushrooms. And has quite a different headfuck, especially visually.

 

[Azure Cloud]

What do you mean by "head fuck"? Are you referring to a bad trip or just an intense trip? I have had very intense trips on cacti but never a bad trip unless I combined it with HBWR.

 

[Goddess Mode]

^^ Generally I think terms like head fuck are probably as simple as they sound. I just use it to mean strong mental effects irrespective of whether they were positive or negative.

Everyone who I've talked to had professed strong mental effects with mescaline, just as strong as the other classics. I haven't yet tried it personally, but my guess it's that the reason it's called gentle is just because it doesn't seem to produce difficult trips as often as something like mushrooms. That's what I've observed so far, anyway.

 

[Azure Cloud]

I was at Schwagstock tripping high as hell on mushrooms. The Schwag was playing on the main stage. There was one dude dancing and I saw glyphs swirling around his head, and only him.

We made a psychic sort of connection and then spoke to each other. I assumed he was on shroomz like me. Turned out he took like 400 mg of mescaline. But we both agreed that we were having a very good time.

I don't know if I'm going off topic but it seems appropriate.

 

[al-laddin]

Azure, I know Ive said that mescaline has been mostly hedonistic for me, but Im assuming that its because I have not yet consumed a high enough dose. Even at the lower doses I have consumed however, I found that every now and again I got sort of negative thoughts, albeit mild. After doing a ton of research on these plants lately, Im starting to conclude my previous assumptions on mescaline being gentle were wrong and that I in fact have not gone deep enough to really experience it fully.

So if you are not familiar with the term "headfuck" or its synonym "mindfuck" its commonly addressed amongst psychedelic users as a state in which ones sanity may be compromised. Perhaps "psychologically challenging" may be a better description. I have found that experiences that are psychologically challenging for me are commonly, if not consistently spiritually rewarding. It seems that the more head fuck a compound provides the more spiritual growth results. Its seems to be the whole no-pain no gain phenomena at play her, IME. However, people seem to report MDMA as spiritually rewarding but lacking in way of head fuck so this type of compound may be an exception. I personally have no experience with molly due to my concern of its neurotoxicity.

Goddess Mode, I seem to stumble upon many reports of mescaline as being "gentle", so its interesting that in your experience people report it as strong mentally.

 

[Cream Gravy?]

I was at Schwagstock tripping high as hell on mushrooms. The Schwag was playing on the main stage. There was one dude dancing and I saw glyphs swirling around his head, and only him.

We made a psychic sort of connection and then spoke to each other. I assumed he was on shroomz like me. Turned out he took like 400 mg of mescaline. But we both agreed that we were having a very good time.

I don't know if I'm going off topic but it seems appropriate.

Damn dude, I've actually seen the Schwag too, a little over a year ago. I was on mushies, they were cheap and rampant at the fest I was at. Rock on dude, rock on.

 

[Azure Cloud]

Azure, I know Ive said that mescaline has been mostly hedonistic for me, but Im assuming that its because I have not yet consumed a high enough dose. Even at the lower doses I have consumed however, I found that every now and again I got sort of negative thoughts, albeit mild. After doing a ton of research on these plants lately, Im starting to conclude my previous assumptions on mescaline being gentle were wrong and that I in fact have not gone deep enough to really experience it fully.

So if you are not familiar with the term "headfuck" or its synonym "mindfuck" its commonly addressed amongst psychedelic users as a state in which ones sanity may be compromised. Perhaps "psychologically challenging" may be a better description. I have found that experiences that are psychologically challenging for me are commonly, if not consistently spiritually rewarding. It seems that the more head fuck a compound provides the more spiritual growth results. Its seems to be the whole no-pain no gain phenomena at play her, IME. However, people seem to report MDMA as spiritually rewarding but lacking in way of head fuck so this type of compound may be an exception. I personally have no experience with molly due to my concern of its neurotoxicity.

Goddess Mode, I seem to stumble upon many reports of mescaline as being "gentle", so its interesting that in your experience people report it as strong mentally.

Considering that a mind fuck can occur without the aid of drugs, I wouldn't be surprised that they could occur under the influence of any compound.

I've just never experienced it whilst on cacti. I'll also admit that I've never had pure or synthetic mescaline either.

 

[Goddess Mode]

Just to add in a potentially unique perspective, I actually don't generally find compromised sanity to be psychologically challenging. I find the entire experience ecstatic, if not orgasmic, and then afterwards I feel both spiritually rewarded and mentally refreshed. So for me it's more like, no gain... no gain. Different strokes, I suppose.

Perhaps the term "gentle" can be too easily misconstrued. When people say that to me about mescaline, I usually assume what they actually mean is "loving". I have heard of some damn powerful trips from mescaline. Then again, maybe most people *are* just using low doses. Only being able to base it off of what I've read, I often assume that mescaline doses are way overly cautious just due to the old prediction from decades ago that a gram would be fatal, which is not even close to true. I honestly tend to think that a "real" dose, the way I think of psychedelics anyway, probably starts around somewhere around 700-1000 mg, and then moves up from there. Given mescaline's high safety, I think that calling it a weaker psychedelic just because you're only willing to take doses which aren't as strong as you would for other psychedelics is pretty unfair. Pretty much the same line of thought you seem to be getting into.

 

[Azure Cloud]

Damn dude, I've actually seen the Schwag too, a little over a year ago. I was on mushies, they were cheap and rampant at the fest I was at. Rock on dude, rock on.

Hell yeah, the Schwag rock. Nobody sings Jerry like Jimmy does!

Too bad about Camp Zoe. That was a great place to party.

 

[Azure Cloud]

Goddess makes sense to me.

Too bad there are no hard and fast statistics out there. All I can say is I've heard more people claim difficult trips off LSd vs mushrooms and personally never encountered anyone claiming to of been rode hard by mescaline. I also personally know very few people that have done mescaline so....

 

[al-laddin]

No Im actually challenging the idea that its "weaker". I think that it being "easy" is a social myth due to the fact that ,mescaline is far more difficult to obtain in proper dosages then say LSD and Mushrooms. The amount of liquid snot that one has to ingest doesn't help either. Bottom line is I believe many have only experienced light to moderate effects and self delude themselves into believing that they have properly experienced mescaline as they would have LSD. With LSD you eat a nearly tasteless fraction of a fraction of what it takes to feel anything from a mescaline. I myself may be guilty of assuming I have properly experienced mescaline. I have received fully visually active doses comparable to an LSD experience but I never did get much in the way of "mind fuck".

To complicate things it seems to be general consensus that tryptamines are heavier on the mind than phenethylamines, but again there are exceptions to this rule too (2ce). So I dunno. The purpose of this post was to reevaluate the notion that I have personally experienced among psychedelic users that mescaline generally is easy on the mind. Although, I cant recall in Hollywood one instance where cacti consumption was portrayed as an "easy" experience. The film Young Guns comes to mind.

 

[Azure Cloud]

Peyote has like 50 active compounds in it. Whereas San Pedro has 8. That can make a big difference....i.e, the Hollywood reference.

 

[Ismene]

But they both only really have only 1 psychoactive alkaloid - mescaline. The rest just make you vomit your arsehole up. The theory is that pedro is less nauseating than peyote because there's fewer bullshit alkaloids to ingest along with the mescaline.

 

[transitionsynth]

I've had some significantly powerful experiences on mescaline-containing cacti. They were a headfuck according to your definition, in the sense that reality was no longer constrained to any kind of sane interpretation. I'll refrain from hyperbole, but these were definitely trips that took me to the psychedelic mecca as I call it, at least as deep or much deeper than heavy LSD or even in some cases comparable to breakthrough DMT trips. As you quite rightly say in the OP, I have no idea what the dosage was, since I was using plant material. However, I can say that I dosed high, because the trips were equally as immersive and visually insane as I could want from any psychedelic. I agree, most people don't go as deep as I was able to on the plant material, but I was able to fit down about 3x as much plant material as any of my fellow travelers at the time were able to do. So I have a pretty good basis for saying that I dosed high, even without weighed extracts.

As I look over my notes from my cactus experiences, I don't note any darkness in the experience. However, don't confuse what I'm calling bright as lacking depth. These trips were deep and transformative. Now, there are any number of confounding factors as far as this is concerned. For example, my mescaline usage is all contained to a relatively short period of time about five years ago. It could be that I was in a very care-free phase of life, and that the trips simply reflected that. I also note that my cactus usage was mostly contained to my "honeymoon" phase of psychedelic use, so that could have played a role as well. Who knows? I think you're quite right in saying that some of the reputation mescaline has earned as being "gentle" comes from people eating cactus, not being able to fit enough plant material in their stomach before they puke, and getting a rather mild experience. I have no doubt that mescaline can take you all the way, because it has taken me all the way.

 

[Goddess Mode]

No Im actually challenging the idea that its "weaker". I think that it being "easy" is a social myth due to the fact that ,mescaline is far more difficult to obtain in proper dosages then say LSD and Mushrooms. The amount of liquid snot that one has to ingest doesn't help either. Bottom line is I believe many have only experienced light to moderate effects and self delude themselves into believing that they have properly experienced mescaline as they would have LSD. With LSD you eat a nearly tasteless fraction of a fraction of what it takes to feel anything from a mescaline. I myself may be guilty of assuming I have properly experienced mescaline. I have received fully visually active doses comparable to an LSD experience but I never did get much in the way of "mind fuck".

To complicate things it seems to be general consensus that tryptamines are heavier on the mind than phenethylamines, but again there are exceptions to this rule too (2ce). So I dunno. The purpose of this post was to reevaluate the notion that I have personally experienced among psychedelic users that mescaline generally is easy on the mind. Although, I cant recall in Hollywood one instance where cacti consumption was portrayed as an "easy" experience. The film Young Guns comes to mind.

That's what I meant by saying the same line of thought you're getting into, I'm agreeing with you. I've thought that about mescaline for years, I just haven't been able to try it to verify. I've heard stories of people taking several grams of pure mescaline without issue, so I consider those to be perfectly normal doses too since they're safe. I think there needs to be a serious reevaluation of mescaline's potential in the public eye. That's my uninitiated opinion, anyway.

Yeah, and it gets even more complex than that. The notion of "tryptamines vs phenethylamines" is far too simple. Heck, the notion of "psychedelics" is far too simple. Given the possible variance in receptor and functional selectivity, it is quite possible to get two psychedelics which do completely different things in the brain. Likewise, it creates the idea that doses of these drugs should be similar, when they very often aren't. The only real truth is that LSD is LSD, mescaline is mescaline, 2C-E is 2C-E... but no one wants to think that hard all the time.

 

[Azure Cloud]

But they both only really have only 1 psychoactive alkaloid - mescaline. The rest just make you vomit your arsehole up. The theory is that pedro is less nauseating than peyote because there's fewer bullshit alkaloids to ingest along with the mescaline.

That's like saying delta 9-THC is the only cannabinoid of relevance in cannabis. The other compounds may not be active on their own (but some are) but they do influence the character of the trip, eg MAOI's and such. I would think an experienced tripper could tell the the difference between cacti extract and synthetic mescaline at similar doses.

 

[Psychonautical]

True Pure Mescaline is more like Mdma.
It's a very trance related drug. You really only get the "most" out of it.
with the "less" you are doing. Like... for example. Going for a run in the woods may turn into a energenic flow with an Ecstatic energy. Sometimes a "godhead".

But if you are like at home, at night, with dim lights set in your house and a good sound track of music pre programmed you can just lie back and trance out to.
Mescaline can take you just as far, as 2c-e... just without the... "other worldly seriousness" which can exist with 2c-e.

But this has at least been my experience. I've always equated Mescaline to being Rich Persons MDMA. There is a Pride that can encompass ones soul while on mescaline that i havn't really found with other drugs.

 

[Ismene]

That's like saying delta 9-THC is the only cannabinoid of relevance in cannabis.

I think it's a question of degree tho - perhaps the other alkaloids in cannabis have more of a psychoactive effect compared to delta-9. Whereas with cacti mescaline is vastly more powerful than all the other alkaloids. I'm not convinced anyone could tell the difference between synthetic psilocybin and mushrooms. I don't think they could even tell the difference between extracted alkaloids from peyote and san pedro to be honest.

 

[crOOk]

So I feel that mescaline does in fact have headfuck, for me it does anyway, and many others. I read all to often its "a gentle psychedelic" and such but if you've had mescaline HCL or an extraction you can measure a dose accurately and see for yourself. Take a "medium" dose...say 325-350mg and tell me theres no headfuck. I believe that many people that claim mescaline is more gently than lucy have no idea how much they have taken. With how wildly alkaloid content varies in these plants theres absolutely no way of knowing what kind of dose you took without doing an extraction, and weaker cacti are much more common than strong. I would like to hear from someone who a has taken a comparable dose of mescaline 300 mg + to mushrooms and LSD. Do you believe that mescaline at this dose is not as deeply penetrating and "heavy" as the rest of the classics? I would say 300mg of mescaline is about equal to 250-275 ug LSD and probably 3-4 grams of strong cubensis mushrooms. And has quite a different headfuck, especially visually.

People are different. Compared to mushrooms, there is next to no headfuck for me. DMT on the other hand has even less headfuck, close to none for me. The most I took was 650mg of the citrate (with no tolerance) which should be around 350mg of HCl, I haven't done the exact math, but that sounds right. Visually it was extremely intense, I was immersed in another world and even after 10 hours it still looked like the entire house was moving when I looked outside. The visuals had completely dissipated after around a day. Yet, there was no confusion, painful biographical insights or the like which I experience on mushrooms. Sure I was fucked, it was much more intense than I had anticipated, but it wasn't heavy on the head. It's very humorous, positive and empathogenic for me. Best long acting psychedelic I know.

Btw how long did it take for you to kick in? It was 9min for me, puking and tripping heavily by minute 14. I found that very impressive since it contradicted everything I had experienced with plant matter where it'd take 2-4 hours. Also, can you be 100% sure what you had was mescaline?

So if you are not familiar with the term "headfuck" or its synonym "mindfuck" its commonly addressed amongst psychedelic users as a state in which ones sanity may be compromised. Perhaps "psychologically challenging" may be a better description.

Very well said.
And in this respect I would again stress that mescaline is one of the least mentally challenging psychedelics for me, DMT being another, acid being only slightly challenging, 5-MeO-DMT, DPT very challenging and mushrooms the king in this respect. :D However the mushroom experience is also extremely rewarding, but then again so is mescaline, probably even moreso. My mescaline experiences have all been absolutely magical and the dragged out comedown was beautiful every time. The afterglow is also worth mentioning which is much more intense for me than with any other psychedelic and usually lasts between 1 and 2 weeks.

 

[transitionsynth]

Btw how long did it take for you to kick in? It was 9min for me, puking and tripping heavily by minute 14. I found that very impressive since it contradicted everything I had experienced with plant matter where it'd take 2-4 hours. Also, can you be 100% sure what you had was mescaline?

Interesting that you say this. There was one occasion in which I ate a large amount of San Pedro cactus soup and the come up was almost non-existent. About fifteen minutes after getting down the last gulp, there was already considerable psychedelic activity. Surfaces waving the way they do in the peak of a medium LSD or mushroom trip, colors more pronounced, music enhancement. I have a line in my notes that says, "No way this is happening already." I wasn't at peak yet, but it was nice to go straight into psychedelia and bypass most of the comeup, which is usually ridden with anxiety for me no matter what the substance.