I used to love Salvia, but now I'm too scared to try it again

hi everyone.

i did salvia 10 times, i guess. i used to love the overwhelming and undescribably familiar visions and places that she made me travel to, and how the experience was becoming more bizarre and realistic each time i tried it. i always used a pinch of 20x extract, but once i smoked a little less than 1g of plain leaf, which led me to an equally great experience.

last week i bought a new bong, until then, i always smoked sally through a small and crappy homemade bong, from which there was always a lot of smoke leaking. i loaded this new bong with the same amount of 20x that i was used to smoke, but i guess that i ended up ingesting a lot more of smoke in a single hit (since the pipe was bigger and there was no leaking anymore), so i completely blacked out from this world and had my first breakthrough.

OH MY GOD, THAT WAS TERRIBLE!

i completely lost awareness of this world. i was immersed in salvia land, totally convinced that it was the real reality in which i always lived on. at some point in the journey, that reality and my ego were ripped apart and i couldn't understand anything, my thoughts were just rushing desperately through that bizarre cartoonish ambient trying to interact with anything to convince myself that i had a material existence, but just as i tried to interact, the reality would be ripped again into a new one, it felt as if i was trying to breathe but there was no air. lady salvia tortured me hard. first, she made me believe that her reality was the only thing that existed and then she showed me that i didn't belong there. and it was so real that even when i came back, it took hours for me to convince myself that it was only a trip, i was absolutely terrified.

so yesterday, i was sitting a friend and decided to smoke it again. i was still disturbed, so i decided to load only two pinches of plain leaf, aiming for a mild trip. the stange thing is that, while sober, i completely forgot how the previous experience had started, sort of a partial level 6 experience. but as soon as i joined the salvia world again, i remembered everything of it, because i was exactly at the same place, turning myself into the very same entity that i was in my previous breakthrough, before the nightmare started. then i realized that i was going to the same place again and fought it back. i was sitting in the same chair that i was during my breakthrough, so i quickly jumped out of it into my bed to avoid being dragged into the same trip and started shouting to the entities that they would not trap me again and started arguing with them (my friend said that i was acting totally schizo, like there was someone else in the room, i was fighting the salvia entities with loud and clear words). i still felt like they were trying to drag me, but i was grounded to the bed, this also brought me an intense feeling of enlightenment, it was like i had figured out all the secrets of the salvia world and of the entire reality about that beings, but unfortunately, as soon as i came back, i couldn't put that into words and, when the after-effects wore off, i couldn't see any meaning in that anymore. freaking bizarre.

now i'm really really scared of trying salvia again. my other trips were always very different between them, but now i had sort of the same negative scenario of my nightmarish breakthrough smoking two mere pinches of plain leaf. what terrifies me more is knowing that i could only fight it back because of the small dose, and that if i had smoked extract and had the same reaction, it would probably lead to an even worse experience.

so, i ask for your insight about how should i deal with this. i always use salvia with the ultmost respect for its power and i'm fascinated by the intense experiences i have with it. i didn't want to quit these experiences. but now i'm just too scared of absolutely freaking myself out when on it. i know it's only ten minutes, but these can be the worst ten minutes of your life, and i discovered this in the hard way.

 

Don't smoke it?

 

meh, i think she hates me, but i want it, lol. masochism?

i mean, i always had enjoyment on it before the bad trip. do you think that a very negative experience like mine is a reason to quit?

better, for you that had a very bad breakthrough, the trips you had after it were also frightening? the enjoyment is over? or is it personal?

 

I find Salvia experiences to be very unreliable in regards to predicting whether it will be enjoyable or not. I have had great experiences followed by a bad one. Then some more good ones after that.

I don't think one or two bad trips necessarily is a reason to quit if you find the experience interesting, maybe try a slightly lighter dose or something. A break at least may be helpful though.

 

The more you do something the more you learn. I looked into a mirror once after smoking a bong of 160x and I thought I was trapped in the mirror. Weird eh? But every time after that I just look at a mirror and I think "Nah, I've been through this shit before" and I drop the strange interchange completely. Maybe that's why you decided you understood the second time haha.

 

ty for your posts guys. your idea makes a lot of sense, doobie.

decided to take 10ml of tincture in 3 10 minute shots lying down in my bed to try to overcome my fear right now. still on the buzz. definitely salvia like. very spacey felling, but very mellow overall, zero visuals, i lost my patience to just keep there and started to walk round the house (funny, it feels like there are vertical gravity waves making your body gently shake when you walk). started to feel the body load and slight entry in salvia space while the second shot was still in the mouth, which made me question myself why would anyone in the world enjoy feeling this, lol. it is no way pleasant. time seemed to be passing really really fast, in the last two shots i looked to the clock feeling that two minutes had passed, but it was actually more than ten.

feeling there with my mind not being fucked made me remember the strongest hallucinatory effects that i previously felt much more clearly, and ultimately understanding how salvia has convinced me that reality was the other side.

i was merging/turning into a very bizarre cartoony structure in a realm with completely different laws of physics, but very bright, clear, alive and habitated (not by humans or any sort of terrestrial or humanoid beings, but i was not a human there too). the feeling that the habitants of there were familiar to me and that i was familiar to them was strong, i was telepatically communicating with them like we were close friends.

my merging/morphing into that structure was accompanied by a very strong and dynamic body load, like it was physically undoubtedly happening. i felt slight fear and a strong confusion, opened my eyes and saw my friends and the consensual reality, but it was very dull and unconvincing when compared to the closed-eye world (yes, the hallucination feels MORE real than reality). i started to laugh cos i couldn't speak, and i couldn't control my body either, even with eyes wide open i still could phisically feel the morphing (it was pulling me), so of course i was convinced that it was really happening, i closed my eyes again to check what was happening to me and that realm was still there, as vivid as always, so i let it go and completely lost awareness of my body, all my experience afterwards was completely there, as that structure that i morphed into and that posteriorly was ripped apart. the visuals afterwards still look blurred and chaotic in my memory, i just remember some bits of it, but i clearly remember how the ego loss felt emocionally, which is what really scares me (the despair).

cliff notes: tincture didn't make me trip, but cleared some amnesiac effects from past breakthrough. felt the body load tho, and the salvia signature feeling, which remembered me how unpleasant and how interesting the salvia high is. i love salvia.

ps: nice to have a different perspective without mindfuck, but tincture is way overpriced for what it delivers, imo.

 

Yeah I'd be scared too

 

indeed.

btw, now i'm strongly convinced that visuals in a strong trip are directly affected by how the body load feels like, so that's in your body, not in a supernatural force (i sincerely considered it lol). and it diminished my fear. at least until i'm there again.

 

Maybe you stepped into your own mind. Mind fuck

 

yay, so i got the courage, smoked the damn 20x and broke through again. very very strong experience, ego death, truman show sindrome, despair, intense despair. the experience was as terrifying and looked even more real than the last one (incredible integration between salvia world and consensual reality during the comedown, strong oev's). but when i was definitely back to my mind, i didn't feel anything close to the shock and fear that i felt in the first one, i was 100% positive that i had an intense but short bad trip caused by a hallucinogenic herb, and could live with it.

i'll definitely continue doing it. passing through this twice in a short period made me more aware that i'll always survive the experience, no matter what. i'd only like to be able of tripping in salvia world with all the interesting visions that i had before without actually breaking through every single time... time to go for a lower extract, i guess.

are all breakthroughs in salvia scary as hell or is it me?

 

I find some salvia trips quite pleasant and euphoric but I've used ketamine alot as well, and there is a SLIGHT similarity I find between the two. K is a little more reassuring and forgiving than salvia although it lasts quite awhile longer.

I read your first breakthrough experience again and i really like the way you write. You made it colorful and conscise.

 

I have a friend who went through this stuff and later on he was able to morph his own world into what he wanted. Try it and see how it works out haha

 

hey, thank you.

while trying to describe my trips to my friends, i realized that being too much descriptive about the visions would never let me translate the real meaning of them in the context of the experience, so i try to avoid that.

wow, this must feel like being god, haha. too bad i'm always in the passenger seat when the trip is too strong. anyway, any breakthrough that converts into a good trip must be the most fantastic dream one could have, i'd love to experience this.

my gum hurts. damn tincture!

 

Personally, this is my sweet spot when it comes to salvia.
For me, it's ideal to have a dose that takes you out there, but isn't so overwhelming that you just end up awakening in another world with no recollection of all of this. The reason being, is because when you hit that sweet spot just right, it's kind of like you are just in between two extremes - the polarities of not having enough and not really tripping, and it's opposite, having more than enough and being blasted out of reality.

When you are in the middle, the entire Salvia experience to me seems fulls of clarity. You are still entrenched in this reality, but still reminded of it's falsehood at the same time. It opens up an extremely bizarre paradox that has to be experienced in order to be appreciated.

The only thing is that with your "small-dose" trip, you seemed to have spent it fighting off getting sucked into a larger one. Once you figure out that that is a fight you can inherently win without having to fight (i.e. just beg lol), you can really sit back and marvel at the space in between two atoms, the juxtaposition of two realities, the salvia sweet spot.

 

Truman show syndrome... can you explain?

 

I think you worsened your own problems.

A bad trip is just a bad trip - you let yourself forget.
Your mental and emotional states influence your trip - you shouldn't have tripped again if still disturbed.

 

I like you guys, finally some well spoken and coherent psychonauts.

Duck, I see what your saying but I also see where o.p. is coming from. If you ride your bike and fall, instinct is to pick it up and do it again right away as to not develop a lasting fear of re-occurrence. Normally I'd say psycs don't work that way, but salvia has a strange way of screaming 'remember me?' when it hits you. The taste, the smell, the body buzz, it's all very reminiscent of the previous trip. So I did the same thing as far as, keep doing it so you won't be afraid to do it again. After a while, you just accept the fact that your only important job at this time is to remain in a laying position with your eyes closed. if you think your falling or have something important to do.....well it will just need to be handled when you get back.

I'll admit even now, when smoking salvia I take a nervous sigh first. can't help it.
There's no way of preparing for it. Once you've done too much there's nothing you can do. Cabin pressure has been lost and the plane has switched to autopilot. and this particular autopilot is loud and clumsy while the captain is being drug through a circus in the thin layer of the crawlspace behind the curtain of reality.


measure twice.

 

yeah, perhaps i wasted that one, but it was meaningful, anyway. i think that my previous trips were very close to this sweet spot you mentioned. perhaps i got more sensible, or perhaps it's the better bong (a bit of both, i guess). i'll try to calibrate my future doses aiming for those again, i love this kind of trip.

i agree that i shouldn't. but anyway, my last trip led me to see things more naturally, it actually helped me a lot in surpassing these fears. i'm glad i was irresponsible this time.

lol, i invented this one, sorry. i meant realizing during the trip that consensual reality was just a big joke played on you. it happened in both breakthroughs.

the forces that were manipulating the new reality (salvia world) were also preventing me of being a part of that new realm, like i was condemned to nothingness forever. i don't know if this can be actually qualified as ego death (i still had emotions and awareness), but it's not a pleasant situation to be convinced of, i guarantee.

 

or quit riding bikes forever, heh. your words make sense, i think that if i gave it too long of a break, i would continue thinking in the bad experience too much and ending up more afraid of it than i rationally should.

so true... even the hallucinations, when it's kicking in and i start to have cev's, it feels like it's the same patterns, the same entities, it feels extremely familiar, even when the trip develops to a completely different experience.

nice post, kush.

 

No you didn't.