My fiance and I are having some friends visit from several states away. We haven't seen these guys in forever and we plan on taking a couple strips when they come. This will be the second time I have done acid and I want it to be better than the first time. A couple of different variables really hindered my trip. I got a pressure headache about halfway through and it caused a wave of negativity through the whole trip. It wasn't a terrible trip, but I would like some advice on ways to make the trip better and avoid things like headaches or buzzing head noises. Any advice or personal input is welcome!
Some people are considerably more susceptible to physical complaints from LSD than others, make sure to stay hydrated during the trip is about the best advice I can give to prevent a headache. I'm not quite sure what you mean by buzzing head noises but LSD is a strong mind altering psychedelic drug. Your senses and perception of those senses are likely to be significantly altered and amplified, so there is bound to be some odd affects during a trip, being in a group that you trust can be helpful though.
Every acid trip can be a little different. The best thing you can do is trip in a comfortable place for you. Was this headache in the front of your head? Like maybe the forehead area. If so your stimulating your pineal gland and it is nothing to worry about it. I have had it happen when tripping hard. The only thing I have been able to do is ride it out but it has never been super uncomfortable or lasted too long in my case.
The pineal gland has no pain receptors, or sense receptors of any kind. Pain in the forehead is either a normal headache, a migraine, or sinus pressure. The link between the human pineal gland and psychedelics/tripping/DMT is complete speculation. There has been zero data found to link those things in any way. The biggest "news" in this area was that, in live rats, DMT is found in their pineal gland. Two big problems with this, one is that rats are incredibly different organisms from humans (see Olney's Lesions), and DMT is such a simple organic molecule, that it is found in virtually every single cell of every single living organism on earth. This discovery is about as dramatic as "blood cells found in gerbil stomachs". I'm not trying to flame but please, resist the pseudo-science bandwagon. It is the first brick in the building of the dark edifice of ignorance and superstition. Before you say something like "your forehead pain during a psychedelic experience is probably pineal gland stimulation", just take a few minutes to look up if that could actually even be the case, which it can't. What is the case however, is that every psychedelic, just like many medications, can cause a headache. Avoid the crap knowledge, demand a higher standard of "what is". It makes everyone's lives easier maybe now this person will just take an advil, and actually treat that headache, instead of sitting there hurting, thinking "its the DMT in my brain that runs my dreams", something which all established medicine disagrees with. :sifone:
I feel like by now, this has crossed the threshold on deserving the attention of repeatedly standing corrected, into becoming curious as an unstoppable, fully fleshed out meme. Or maybe it's just another pesky urban legend? Has anybody noticed that dreams and smoking DMT don't like anything alike? Lol and I'm somebody who suffers from an intense perturbed hynagogic sleep disorder. Merciful God, please deliver me from this species..
I know myself and a few other members have had this headache feeling on DMT and to a lesser extent LSD. There may not be pain receptors but you are stimulating the pineal gland. This is the explanation given by shamans. They would not say pineal gland, merely connecting to the spirit world. I am including the Eastern philosophy of chakras and the like when I say pineal gland. Coming two sets of knowledge. They would consider the third eye the charkra of the spirits. The psychedelic experience is related to the soul not the body. The soul can cause sensations in the body. It is two different parts of the same whole. The soul can do things to the body you could not imaging. We are dealing with an advanced thing within a container. The brain is not very well mapped, we do not really know what happens to and what it thinks when tripping. We don't even know allot of normal brain functions and studies related to psychedelics are rare. So overall we do not know what wires can be "crossed" so to speak. Phantom pain for limbs that do not exist anymore is a common occurrence for example. The brain has found pain there even if logically it should not. Of course the medical science of the west has no place for the opinion of someone in a hut in the amazon. I see your perspective but I think you are only thinking in the western perspective. In my case this sensation did not last long enough for me to medicate it so I have no experience with advil or anything like that. So in my opinion if the OP had this pain for a while it would purely physical. Just don't be surprised if it's intense for a short while. In that case don't assume it's only a headache.
It's one of those things that people wish would be true. It sounds so good, so elegant, and it's been talked about by some smart cats (terrence mckenna and whatnot) so it must be true, we just haven't proven it yet. Ok, so if shamans would not say "pineal gland", and western medicine would not say "pineal gland", then why do you say "pineal gland"? that's my question. From where is this knowledge coming from? So when you put a psychedelic into your body, so that your body can metabolize it, and bind the psychedelic to receptors in your brain . . . well, you see what I'm getting at. Your body is quite involved in the whole process. I reject the dualism you are describing here. Soul is body is soul, Ying/Yang, that's an eastern expression of my point. E=mc^2 / wave-particle duality; there's a western expression of my point. Do you notice that you are careful to trust any claims about "the brain" and "the body" due to a lack of empirical evidence from MRI machines, but "chakras", "soul", and "spirit world" seem to be obvious truths? Because if a headache is short and intense, it has to be chakras and pineal gland activity, definitely not just a short and intense headache? Occam's Razor is a very, very useful cognitive tool to live around. It cleans away a lot of the conceptual noise that we are subjected to and have to navigate around. Also I think you'd be surprised to learn just how Eastern and mystical I am! It's just that I see much, much more truth, beauty and mystery in Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDS) like Aspirin, and how they work, and what that tells us about everything from what we are, to what stuff is, than I do in an unproven, speculative, pseudo-religious idea of a spirit world unlocked by an organ in your brain from smoking a psychedelic drug. If you could teach a shaman in the Amazon our language and semantic universe, he might point out to you that his references to "spirit world" are metaphorical, or he might reveal to you, that he has quite dogmatic beliefs about cosmology and ontology, beliefs that his father told him, and which he had no choice but to fervently believe, in a way entirely identical to a "bible thumper" or a militant islamist, given the intense isolation and hardship of a tribal amazonian life.
so therefore it's entirely possible that the physical molecule + the physical brain can completely explain the phenomenon of tripping. it's just that we don't understand the brain and it's interactions with psychedelics well enough (yet).
As someone with Asbergers I am confused by the intent of the emoticons I think. You use them often. Smug, angry, happy to have debate? I do not know. But I do not want to argue. I can see you are on a different wavelength. All I can offer is my experience and the experience of those I know. These things are indeed speculative because they are hard to prove. Conventional science operates on the assumption that what can not be seen, touched, or heard is therefore not real. And I do not agree with that, and it seems you do. I am reminded of this quote. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxP6sSB_Do4"]Terence McKenna: Science sitting in Judgement - YouTube So your saying it's like an atheist thing? Life has no complexity or meaning beyond a random accident of evolution. Sure it's possible the mind can play tricks. It's not an attitude I find often among psychedelic users but no one can prove anything until death. And then it's a little difficult to share your findings. I guess I just prefer to think of life as being a little more mysterious then that.
Softening my words and showing that discussion is my intent, not flaming. Also putting in smiley and winky faces to show I am coming from a good place with good intent, and probably trying to avoid sounding TOO serious. I am happy to have a debate, and even a little smug, so 2 out of 3 Then it is us, most of all, who must argue and discuss. You learn the most from those most different from you. I don't believe you have done this. You have not offered me the "experience" of anyone. You have offered the advice that "short, intense head pain is not a headache, it is your pineal gland expanding in a psychedelic sense". Something which I present a thoughtful rebuttal too, with actual proof behind it, like that the pineal gland can't feel anything. All you've said is I'm on a different wavelength, so no point talking. Sounds a bit like you just don't want to admit that maybe an idea you have is not a good idea. There are things probably outside the domain of science. I don't believe pineal gland activity in psychedelic states is one of them; this seems like a completely medical question that could be approached using pure psychedelics, MRI machines, control groups, studies, etc. Wonderful rhetoric but just his opinion. I think a lot of people are turned off from science because of a hubris behind it which has manifested in horrors throughout the years, eugenics comes to mind. This doesn't mean science is flawed, this only means it can be perverted and misused and misunderstood. The same can be said for mythology and superstition, but tenfold. People who say things like this do not understand the first thing about evolution Believe me there is no shortage of true mystery in the universe when you approach it purely scientifically. All great scientists were completely awed at the beauty and oneness with which nature present herself. I myself have recently learned Calculus, and was blown away by something call "Euler's Identity", which is a formula in mathematics that will give anyone a strange feeling once they learn what it means. Just saying that before you write off the edifice of what we actually know, in order to embrace concepts of fantasy, because your universe lacks mystery or meaning, educate yourself, so that you aren't mistaken in this case. There is more mystery in science and what we know than you could ever tackle in your lifetime. No need for the literal beliefs of myths
