Hi TheMerryPrankster,
This is my first post on BlueLight. Your TR was one of the best I've read and inspired me to join. It isn't everyday I have a chance to talk to someone who has taken it as far as you have and lived to speak about it. I'm glad you shared and I feel for the suffering that came along the way. I wish you a complete recovery.
I'm interested in understanding a little more about some of your experimentation with breathwork and nitrous. You mentioned pranayama earlier. Can you describe this to me in more detail? The reason I'm interested requires a story of my own. Nitrous hasn't gotten me very far until recently. It was compulsive, elusive and not particularly rewarding. Could be because of the nitrous quality issue you brought up, my inexperience using it, because I never valued it particularly it as a tool for exploration or the fear of hypoxia. Tried lots of combos too when I happened to have it laying around (though never acid). Wasn't until recently that I tried combining it with breathwork and nitrous finally opened up new dimensions for me. Specifically, I tried this with rebirthing style breathwork. In case you are unfamiliar, it's similar to holotropic breathwork created by Stan Grof. I do it for a minimum of 30 minutes (I often go an hour or more) of focused intense breathing. It's deceptively simple sounding; the rules are no pauses in the breathing (consciously-connected breathing) and deep, balanced breaths. The balance in the depth and duration of the in- and out- breath is key, otherwise it's more like hyperventilation which is different. I usually lie down when I do this. It's an intense experience in it's own right. Breathing alone can get you crazy high; this kind of breathing induces psychedelic experiences that are more physical than mental. It also brings up all kinds of emotional stuff and should be tried with a facilitator the first few times, in part to get through it, in part to do it properly and in part to help work through some of the stuff that comes up. Now all this is fine and dandy, but I decided to try adding nitrous at the end. So when I'm ready, I sit up, fill a balloon while keeping the breathing going. At this point my entire body is already buzzing, my hands are hard to move, my eyelids feel surreal and I take a balloon and hold it. Crack another while holding it and take another balloon. Normally I can only take one ballon and pennies. Now I can comfortably take two balloons because the deep breathing added to my overall lung capacity. My body is highly oxygenated at this point, I can hold it in for a long time comfortably. Then just when it breaks through a level I begin to feel a slight craving for air like clockwork, and rather than blissing out I ruthlessly start with the breathing again. Trust me, I want to stop and enjoy, and perhaps chase the feeling with another balloon, but after all that work, I want to go deeper. So I go right into another 20 minutes of this. The cool part is that for those twenty minutes the state stays with me to some extent and the breathing takes on a new quality. The nitrous is also clearer and I feel like I can remember it better. I take solace with the work of breathing and dedicate myself to the task with anticipation for the next balloon. I know that the next time I take a balloon hit it'll take me even further and reveal itself with greater clarity. I've gone a maximum of three additional rounds (8 chargers total) before I have to stop and just bliss out. I've had wonderful experiences of great clarity. Not the kind with elves, aliens or supreme beings, but graceful, loving almost-totally-enveloping light and serenity. It stays with me for a while afterwards. I feel like it's safer too (could be wrong) but I don't experience any aftereffects and don't have an urge to take it further than that. Can I go further, absolutely, but there is a trade off between the amount of work involved and the intensity of the experience that keeps my muscle flexed and growing, and nitrous without all the breathwork is but a sad reminder of how good it can get for me. I haven't been doing this very long so I can't say where it will lead, if it's safe or whether I can nurture the discipline to keep at it, but I wanted to get your insights into this fascinating topic through your own experiences. Thanks again and best wishes!
Edit:
P.S: feel the need to add a few more disclaimers since this post is visible to the entire world. I googled rebirthing + nitrous many times and found nothing but it is inconceivable that nobody has tried this. Considering some of the crazy things people are doing it seems safe to me, but I can't underestimate that this is very intense. There is a "vibronic-barrier" you cross through when inhaling nitrous after a rebirthing session, first time I experienced it I exhaled immediately. Then I worked my way up from there. I've had 4 facilitated sessions and about 50 hours of rebirthing breath work without nitrous before attempting this. I found the rebirthing breathwork very powerful on it's own. I've also logged about 1000 hours in the psychedelic headspace, so basically what I'm saying is altered states are not new to me. Rebirthing is an established group of which I have no affiliation. Google is your friend. If others have experience with this I really want to know. Please PM me.