tripping can feel very much like a 'moment of death'
you can become so aware of yourself and your surroundings that it will feel like an eternity between minutes. you may hear your heart moving as slow as a funeral dirge, or it may sound as manic as happy hardcore beats. your pupils will be so wide that any light source in your vicinity will appear to have a multicolored fringe around them, burning with the intensity of a thousand suns. your sense of gravity will be way out of whack, and you may get tingling sensations of sinking into your seat, or floating sensations of drifting into the light.
your brain is going overdrive at this point, and everything you see, hear, and think about will have a cascade of images and ideas that follow them inside your head. you may attempt to speak or write, but some words trigger intense 'flashbacks' of connotation like a burst of flame in your internal dictionary. you may be watching a movie or listening to an album, and your communication center will notice that by giving your attention to this media, you and the artist are effectively communicating at the speed of light, even though the actor or musician may be deceased by now. is this song written just for me? did he know people would be watching this while tripping? or is this how everybody knows everything is supposed to be, and i have just been blind all this time?
because everything you are experiencing right here, right now, conjures up memories from your past, it can feel like your life is flashing by your eyes. perhaps you are sitting in a sofa you've had at a different home before, and the smell can trigger a potent flashback of when you lived at the old place. there can be an intense feeling of deja vu, because your brain is accessing memories far from the past, yet experiening them like they are happening now. you will look at the clock again and curse at father time for taking a vacation. "before i got myself into this, i thought 4-6 hours would be just fine. now four hours will feel like four weeks"
sometime during the experience you may have a thought. this thought i will call the 'seed'. it could be anything, but eventually the seed may lead you to think you have overdosed and passed out and died, even though 'you' are the one thinking the thought. maybe you 'forgot to breathe' (not possible) and these amazing hallucinations are actually from the DMT that you read about, released in your brain just before you die. because you are tripping, any emotions attached to your death will be brought up. what if my family finds my cold body here; i want them to know i was a good person. i had no idea the second time i took shrooms would kill me. i thought i would have more time to accomplish things in life. i was going to get married and finish my degree and give to the needy and apologize to the best friend who never calls. emotions will flood your senses and you may have the most cleansing cry of your life so far.
this is what i call ego death. your own emotional system will dredge up repressed feelings of doubt, guilt, shame that you ignored in your day to day life; you will show yourself how you can change your life to be the person you want to be. you will realize the only reason anyone hurts anyone else is because we are frightened to lose control. by facing our darwinistic fear of death, we are allowed a taste of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. you may pray to your gods at this point, repenting from your evil ways and begging for mercy. maybe your god says "meh. in the grand scheme of things, you're just a speck of dust to me. you'll get another chance next time, good luck"
since you have just condemned your old life in the face of god, an enormous weight lifts from your chest. you may have a vision of your old body laying still in your chair as your spirit ascends into 'heaven'. your brain is flooded with joy and happiness that you were even given a chance to live a life on this earth. you made your best effort and did a pretty good job. now you can fly through space and visit alien worlds with colors and shapes never before imagined. Lucy may meet you in her sky of diamonds. or you could swim down to the deepest chasms of philosophical thought in your yellow torpedo.
eventually the cascading thoughts and emotions will slow down and wane, and you will gradually re-enter the land of the living. if you've been laying alone with eyes closed, you may 'wake up' suddenly when you notice you haven't been blinking in your dream world. you will wonder if the real things you see now are actually real, because just a couple hours ago this very room seemed stranger than the fiction in your third eye. you will remember your struggle with death, and give thanks to the cosmic entity that blessed you with the ability to feel pain and joy. you see every second tick by again, and wonder why you are not smelling roses or learning japanese or making babies right now. every moment that passes is a missed opportunity to live life to its fullest. every day without a new friend is a day wasted. you want to make a list of your goals for the future and get started right away. you might swear off drugs, tv, or credit cards. you want to call your mom and tell her you love her. this is the afterglow, and it can be present with you from sunup to sundown for months after your trip.
i think psychedelic drugs are almost a mind virus. because you cannot fully describe the experience, EVERYONE tries them without knowing what to expect. some go into it looking for 'oo sparkly', some think they'll get to see god or deceased relatives. no matter what you've heard about tripping, it always ends up surprising you. which is strange, because it is the realization that your own brain is responsible for the effects, that makes the effects seem so mind blowing. then when you find out what your mind can do, you feel you have to turn others onto it. of course you can't force them, because that would be mean... but you strive to understand them and see if they're ready to unlock their minds
peace and love
