Question to old hippies about LSD, especially if you've read Leary

Why on earth did you ever stop dosing? I mean, there's so much out there to learn, I CAN imagine living my life without the use of a spiritual sacrament, but why not. Even if it's just once a year or something, why would I ever stop, not that at this moment I feel one bit of doubt about whether I should be doing it in the first place. (I think that was a run on ;-) ) Anyways, maybe you know something Leary and Huxley didn't, but their books just make so much sense, and even when I smoke pot and start getting philosophical with myself, it just feels right. I mean, it couldn't be right for a so called enlightened soul to ride the wave of conditioned society could it. I mean, Turn on Ti Do, is the high road it seems to me; not in a levels or elightest sort of way, just in a conscious way you know. Where is this group of acid heads at now, is anyone getting philosophical in that way anymore, and actually doing something about it to help society to become more conscious.
Lots of questions that I've already answered within myself, not that I'm rigid, just voicing them seeing what someone with experience thinks.
It couldn't be time to give up on humanities awareness yet could it?

 

LSD teaches lessons. Once you learn those lessons, the drug has little appeal. A much more noble endeavor would be to achieve similar states of enhanced awareness without drugs.

 

It's funny you say that, because everyone I've met who's on a spiritual path, used psychedelic drugs a lot and has supposedly moved on to something more noble persay, (like you said, states of enhanced awareness without drugs) is doing exactly that, meditation groups, fasting, spiritual drumming, firewalking, dancing ect. Don't get me wrong, I totally agree with you. Even though I have yet to dive deep into meditation exercises, so I can't judge, but I wounder sometimes if meditation along with a sacrament, fasting, stretching, drumming ect would feel noble within myself. I know these are questions I can only answer myself but I'd love hear your stories about how your paths were followed years ago. I never had a grandpa or parents with much more than working/surviving types of stories to tell. We could share stories about our paths, that'd be mass cool.
Cheers,
George

 

Up front I feel I must say, I do not encourage the use of psychedelics. Charles Manson is obviously an example of someone who should never have dosed. Having said that, I also think a sane, intelligent adult should have the right to alter his consciousness in a safe, private setting. Why then, have so many old hipsters stopped dosing?
Like the rest of life, while tripping, we experience what we expect. Otherwise credible newspapers published scare stories to deter use. So some gullible tripsters had bummers. Lack of knowledge about the importance of set and setting caused problems also. Some got burned out from overdoing it.
A lot of it has to do with supply.The DEA closed down the supplier of 95% of the US supply and a large portion of the European supply with one bust in rural Arkansas or Kansas? Since fewer old freaks no longer trip we no longer have what few connections are left; they seek out guys your age or younger. Last but not least in my home state of Kentucky, first time posession of one hit is an instant felony-jail time and considerable fine minimum. It's scary. I'd do it a couple times a month if I could. I still enjoy it and am experienced enough to know how to get the most out of it safely. The metaphysical revelations have changed my life immensely. But there's still a "party" aspect that is still just a lot of good fun and I think that's the reason there's growing interest in Morning Glory seeds and San Pedro cactus, etc.
I still manage to dose about twice every five years or so and still learn something about myself and the universe at large. It's a drag not being able to more often.
Have a safe trip.

 

The serious psycheldelics are only for geniuses-- and, we're far and few between. STAY AWAY!


Are you ready to know there are more than 4 dimensions?

Are you ready to discover that time is arbritary?

Are you willing to discover that no one cares if you live or die?

Can you accept this, and more?

STAY AWAY FROM IT!

Signed, Burl n. Corbett, experimenter (in the past).

 

I'll take more please; I'm not afraid of death, it's life without passion that saddens me the most. Thanks Stephan for your thoughts. I've read so many psychedelic books now, I can't even count. I'll get some pot or some coke if I feel like having a fun little party, not that I even do that all that often but acid, man, it's such a sacrament to me. I recieved more spiritual incite from one acid trip than from 17 years of church. It gave me a much stronger connection with humanity in general I think. I feel like I can look in someones eyes now and feel them and why their emotions are the way they are so much better than I could before. Time seems so attatched to ego and ego to suffering. I remind myself to eliminate time, be mentally in this moment, think about my plan sure, but then continue to be in the moment setting up my life exactly the way I want it. I'm in the drivers seat. To me love is most important, so that's what I'm doing with my life; setting it up so I can spend my daily moments loving something or someone, and loving that particular being in as many ways as my mind can think of.
Love Alex

 

What High Desert said. That and I kept getting pregnant, and I will NOT dose when pregnant or breastfeeding (and my kids nurse, for years.) I just outgrew it. Not a big thing.

 

Thanks, George. I just checked out your gallery, and combined with your thoughts, I think you've got your head on pretty straight. I AM concerned about that one photo, though. I've heard of beating your meat but not engraving it ; )
Just a couple more thoughts from someone who's been deliberately altering his consciousness herbally, chemically and naturally since '67. It's all down time. In otherwords it's not a life focus but a part of life to be set aside from dealing with family and other relationships, doing all the daily physical maintenance chores, and most importantly, deciding what kind of life you want. Since I was a kid I knew I wanted to be an artist. But I let my parents, friends and advisors talk me out of it. I accepted their belief that I would never make any money. I compromised and went to Commercial Art School. I quit when my Vietnam draft lottery number came up and waited for a year. The only thing that kept me from going completely crazy was herb and acid. Somehow, I fell through the cracks and was reclassified. I drifted from meaningless job to job. Went back for more graphic design studies three more times between jobs (a total of 10 years and thousands of dollars wasted). All this time the visions I experienced while tripping and the different way of looking at things that lasted after coming down urged me in the direction of Art. I wish I had listened. Instead I accepted the belief from society that I should forgo fine art to earn a living. I only recently realized that while Van Gogh never sold a single painting in his life, Piccaso was rich and famous and Dali owned his own island! The key is to be mindfully conscious as much as possible; in the moment and take the time to discover if something holding you back is reality or a belief.
The late, great Bill Hicks; standup comedian, had a great routine about why all the news about drugs was always negative. Why were there never any positive news reports, like: " A young man, while tripping on LSD today, came to the conclusion that: All matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. There is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves."..."Now for the weather."
All drugs are not created equal, though. Tobacco is the most addictive, deadly drug there is. People who win the struggle to quit Alcohol, Heroine and other hard drugs go to AA meetings and chain-smoke. I smoked for 30+ years and it took me 10 years after watching my father die a horrible death from lung cancer at age 59 before I was able to quit. Tobacco is the worst. Speed kills. Coke eats up all your money and leaves you with a limp dick. Herb is a good way to spend some down time and listen to some tunes and is good practice for present mindfullness, because, at least in my experience, when I'm stoned I'm completely in the here and now; not going over the past or worrying about the future. It's one of the lessons we're here to learn. Time itself does not exist. It's a root assumption we all agree to because our brain can't handle all the information that is what we call "the past", "the present" and "the future" all at once. Even though that is the reality; it's all happening now and it's constantly changing as we change our attitudes and beliefs, the "past" included. Imagine all the waves of information surrounding you right now: All the AM and FM stations clear and full of static. WIFI, Short wave, cell phone microwave tower beams, street sounds, the steady hum of man, machine and nature around us. Now try turning on enough radios and televisions so every channel and station available to you here and now is blasting away. You can't deal with it, right? Our brain does the same thing. It filters out "the past" and "the future" and focuses on the present. But "the past" is still there and we can and do change our personal experience of the past all the time from the present. With evolution our brains have developed a valve to narrow our consciousness's ability to experience all the different states of consciousness, for survival purposes. But man has always found ways to open this valve, and for a time, experience more than what our phsical senses reveal.
I think these occasional excursions, taken with care and knowledge can be beneficial and will be revealed in some enlightened future time to be a legitimate field of study.
There is one herb that is gaining popularity today, though, that acually scares me: Salva Divinorum. I've always approached any psychedelic with caution and as much information as is/was available before experimenting. I've taken some pretty heavy doses in my time, but from what I've read about it, Salva Divinorum is more intense than even I'm willing to try.
Again, this is just my opinion. Read, (of all the books I've ever read, the one book that has given me more answers is "The Nature Of Personal Reality" by Jane Roberts}, talk to others with experience, meditate, try yoga, martial arts; they all provide pieces to the puzzle of life.
I think a lot of my generation had a problem with moderation. They jumped head first into the experience, overdid it and got burned out. It wasn't the fault of the substance, it was theirs. There is a difference between use and abuse.
If you dose, know your source, remember set and setting, bring along a friend and have a safe trip.
That's enough "wisdom" for now. My ass is getting tired.

 

• Anyone familiar with string theory (physics) knows there are at leat 15 dimensions. Scary? I think it's exciting.
• Of course, time is arbitrary, it's entirely subjective and only exists as a matrix to experience what we believe (and create) as time, space and matter.
• No one cares if you live or die? Pretty harsh. Have you ever been in an Emergency Room? A thug comes in from a gang fight on the edge of death and a team of health professionals work under extreme pressure and stress to save his life. And these people are strangers.

• But wait, there's more. There are an infinite number of realities to choose from. We have all been given (and have given ourselves) the ability to create our own personal reality. All so-called objective reality is agreement. We all experience reality differently but concentrate on the areas where we do agree and call THAT reality. Someone with a different view of reality is considered flaky at the least or downright insane. For instance Christopher Columbus, Einstein, Mohammad, etc. The beliefs en mass at any given time creates the world reality as we know it.

The reason kids in the 60's made the mistake of using speed, cocaine and heroin was they were fed a bunch of misinformation and downright lies about pot and psychedelics by an older generation that didn't really know what they were talking about. When the kids realized pot wouldn't turn them into crazed killers, the figured they couldn't trust the warnings about the hard, dangerous drugs. Not that there are no risks with psychedelics. Their illegal status makes it difficult to know what one is taking. In the summer of '71, I visited Canada and there was a health organization that would provide anonymous free testing of a sample of a drug and give a detailed report about what it was, quality, any contamination from manufacture and strength. Not unlike our Food and Drug Administration.
I don't know if this program still exists, but it's an example of a more realistic approach than spreading scare stories.
Aldous Huxley and Timothy Leary were both geniuses and they couldn't agree whether psychedelics should be made available to the general public or just made available to the elite.
In retrospect, a slower more careful dissemination probably would have been wiser, but that's in the past.
Knowledge and education, as objective as possible is the only approach. I worked with a guy who was 18 at the time who admitted he loved taking "acid" on weekends. Always had a good time. I admitted I liked LSD too. He looked at me horrified. "LSD? NO WAY". "IS THAT WHAT IT IS?"
Of course this was in the 80's and doses were half what they were in the 60's and 70's, but I think it shows how perception and belief create our experience.
I can understand wanting to spare someone from a bummer and I have met some "acid casualties". I don't endorse or encourage anyone else dosing. But either they will or they won't, no matter what you or I say. The best we can do is tell them the truth as best as we understand it and teach our children well.

 

I wanah be strung out on duh strung theory.

 

most people reach a point where hallucinogens just aren't necessary. Once you validate your spirituality through whatever means (you don't need drugs to do that for you, but it does make it easier for you to realize you were right all along) you don't need external validation anymore. Once you are *really* tuned in to those things, a trip is more like a rollercoaster ride than the amazing spiritual experience it was before. And people grow up. They don't need or want to waste 20 hours of their life chasing rainbows and tracers. I have much more important things to do with my time.

 

I was thinking of string theory when I said there are more than 4 dimensions. I was also thinking of wormholes and other scary phenononem (sp.) implicit in molectural physics. ALL FUCKING, RIGHT!!!! I can understand it, vaguely, but not spell it! FUCK IT! My dictionary is downstairs.


Actually, mushrooms gave me my only bad trip, and horrendous it was.

I'll stick with vodka, thank you. That, and Silver Cup chewing tobacco.

 

i think you learn everything you can on yourr first trip. after that its just cheap thrills. so it takes awhile ot realize this. then you move on. maybe a cheep thrills a few years down the road who knows? but as far as L goes. it only shows you that there is a door. it dosent open it, or show you another one later down the road.

 

I took my first LSD trip on Purple Haze in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park in 1967-- the rush came slowly, but when it hit, I instanty went from an agnostic to a Buddhist.


No shit.

I will recommend it to no one.

I could luckily handle it, but others I have known, eventually went insane.

No shit.

 

Annual Causes of Death in the United States
Tobacco 435,000
Poor Diet and Physical Inactivity 365,000
Alcohol 85,000
Microbial Agents 75,000
Toxic Agents 55,000
Motor Vehicle Crashes 26,347
Adverse Reactions to Prescription Drugs 32,000
Suicide 30,622
Incidents Involving Firearms 29,000
Homicide 20,308
Sexual Behaviors 20,000
All Illicit Drug Use Combined, Direct and Indirect 17,0001
Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs Such As Aspirin 7,600
Marijuana 0
Source: Journal of the American Medical Association, Jan. 19, 2005, Vol. 293, No. 3, p. 298.)

 

"once you've opend the door you can't keep opening it, it's already open"~kesley

 

I have to strongly disagree. I think acid can be a great leveler, as well as not being an elitist drug (as if there were such a thing.....) First one would have to define "genius" (I see from your post you include yourself, but few others....) "Normal" people can learn a lot from psychedelics, as long as they are reasonably sane to start out with.

I certainly don't think one has to be a "genius" to use acid or any other psychoactive drug. One of the purposes of the original Hippy Movement was to eliminate class barriers, not create more of them.

JMO.

 

Where do "they" grow this type of outlook Maggie? Or maybe you have a daughter or a younger sister who's feels this way to who wants to make a friend online with a guy named George. ;-) When I think about it, it seems there's really nothing to do accept give peace, love and openness to conversations to everyone I meet in my day. Do you think big action like protests and such actually do anything for raising the consciousness level of our society. (That's really a question) That's really what it's about anyway isn't it, more earthly conscious people who realize the earth situation is just a big interconected web in the first place. It seems that if we would all realize just that, then everything else (inner-species harmony, harmony with nature, resistance to polute, importance of love and family ect ect) falls right into line.
Peace,
George

 

Hey, George. Yeah, I have some daughters, (three of 'em ages 19 down to 6, and a boy, who is 14) but they aren't allowed on Hip Forums. Sorry. (mama says too much and this is my place, ) Even old hippy mamas need a place to let it all hang out.

Yeah, I think protests can raise awareness, you can see that other people care about the same things that you do, and that you aren't alone, and that the issue matters. That helps you be more aware of the issue, as well as feel connected. Just the fact that one can protest, alone raises awarness. With what is happening in DC and the freaking "Patriot Act" I am terrified that our rights to protest may soon be deprived of and it will be one more thing we will have to look back on say "Remember when?"

George, I completely understand why you asked the original question. You are 21, and still learning your own mind, which, for many people, when acid is the most helpful. (for some, it is always helpful throughout their lives and I don't have a problem with this, I know people my age, and even older who still trip, and are still getting a LOT out of it, everybody has their own path) I remember being your age, and my now dh and I had some doses and wanted a freind (who is about the age I am now) to trip with us, and he turned us down saying, "Naw, I've gotten what I can from it, I don't want to trip anymore." Bear and I were freakin stunned, Say NO? To acid?

I'm not saying I'll never do it again. Maybe, when I'm more heavily into menopuause, or completely done with it, I'll need my brain "Rebooted" but for now, (that's what I'm thinking now) I'm content where I am.

I'm not saying "never" just "don't need it now." But I totally understand why people want it and need it and are still learning a lot from it.

Carry on, my friend.

 

You are truely kind Maggie, I love you.
George