So true. Citta seems like a conservative fella/gal, so be it, just he/she should stop debunking other peoples ideas suggestions because he feels his opinions are the "real ones".

The DMT state is nothing more than the brain on drugs.

The reality state is nothing more than the brain on different drugs.

What is real? and what are we?

My belief: there is more to it than chemistry, but it is impossible to prove this while we are in the human form (and afterwards it doesn't matter). The scheme is organized in such a way that information that would shatter the material plane is not allowed to crystallize in the earthly mind, at least until we reach an adequate level of understanding which lets us integrate the knowledge without disrupting the process (going mad). The experience is real, but it leaves absolutely no traces. The individual has free choice to handle it as he/she sees fit.

Another nice explanation would be that the answer to the final questions is wired into our brain and psychedelics let us recognize this built-in knowledge. (But the question then would be where this knowledge comes from and why are we built that way - spiritual knowledge doesn't seem to serve any evolutionary purpose.)

What is real? In one sense, nothing is fundamentally real. We define what is real. We establish criteria to determine what is real. And when something satisfies the criteria, we call it real.

What are we? That’s a mystery.

yes but just because we define it doesn't make it real. A few hundred years ago humans defined their reality as a flat when reality was actually round.

Of course, as you noticed, the much more fundamental question to all of this is what are we? Because without that clearly defined everything else is built upon a shaky foundation.

The only thing, I'm comfortable saying, is that I am aware. But even that I have to question, because I feel as though my awareness grows more and more which puts into question how real the awareness I grew from actually was. Damn it...I think I just stripped away the last remaining foundation I had.

For the first time in my life I have to question. Perhaps I am not...and if that turns out to be right then what is?

One thing DMT is. It's a catalyst, no..., it's a cannon aimed directly at the doors of your perception. How far you fly through that door is dependent mostly upon how comfortable you are with the interior recesses of your mind.

When it comes to these questions, it's very difficult or impossible to say anything with certainty!

I agree with this statement. It is as I see it as well. Perhaps it is both of your answers combined together.

I just can not see the knowledge being stored in our brains or bodies (DNA). If you are not your body than surely the memories and knowledge can not be stored in it. When we are thinking or trying to remember we get to our memories but we do not know how.

If I want to kick the ball I know exactly how to do it, it is something I was taught to do.I can describe it to anybody how am I gonna do it before I do it and I will do it exactly that way.

But nobody ever taught me how to think or how to remember but I do know it. If you ask me how I do it I will not be able give you any scientific explanation. We can not prove we can think but we all believe it cos we all can do it.

The same as trying to prove what we saw on our journeys. We can not do it but we know that there is more to it that just the chemistry. If all people on earth experienced hyperspace that we would not need any prove.

I know and feel there is more to it that just a chemistry but I still ask my self this question: Is there more to it then just our bodies, our flash and bones ? Is there nothing after we die ? Is it like when you switch the light ? Dark and nothingness ?

Einstein once said this: "Our situation on this earth seems strange, every one of us appears here involuntarily and uninvited for a short stay without knowing why ? To me it is enough to wonder at the secrets". I like it very much

In terms of gibran's observation that different people have different kinds of experiences on DMT, we additionally must acknowledge the broad spectrum of our own experiences. I have witnessed such a plethora of flavors to the experience, and even though DMT is inducing each one, it's almost like different rules are at play for different kinds of experiences which makes pinning down the DMT ontology all the more difficult.

At perhaps the lowest end of experience is DMT solely playing off of light afterimages. You're looking at the physical room in you're in, close your eyes, and there it is in geometric lights and colors. From this perspective it seems like it's a casual trick of the mind.

As the experience begins to get more bizarre most likely with higher doses, better set/setting, improved vaporization technique, the inclusion of MAOIs...it becomes harder and harder to rationalize these things which are quite often irrational and incapable of so easily explaining away.

Part of the problem with saying it's all just brain chemistry is that modern reductionist neurology does a pretty poor job at phenomenologically explaining the way we experience the world anyway. They do a good job at physically mapping the brain and noting the correlations between in activity at certain neurological structures, but it doesn't map very satisfyingly onto how we actually experience. To borrow an analogy from Stan Grof in regards to the brain generating consciousness: when you watch a television set that's producing numerous sights and sounds, there are numerous electronics in the television set that are firing off and working in sync with the images and sounds and should those internal connections and machinery malfunction, the images and sounds would be altered as well. It would obviously be incorrect to assume that the television set itself is the source that is generating the content it's displaying just as there exists the potent possibility that the brain merely mediates consciousness but is not actually the source. I'm unaware of any way of currently proving/disproving this with the scientific method and rationale of scientism.

That's precisely my point.


I’ve mentioned this in other threads, but it’s worth repeating. In my most existentially difficult DMT experience, I was quite upset when I realized I had died.

An unseen being, in what seemed to be a sincere effort to comfort me, said something like this:

“Don’t be worried about dying – you were never actually alive in the first place.”

(It wasn’t comforting to hear this.)

hehe I would understand your worry. See these are the things we are not ready to hear I think. You were allowed to remember it for a reason. Someone could really go insane after experiencing this.

So now it comes to other question. What it means being alive ?

Breathing?

Anaerobic bacteria do not breathe yet are living.

I’ve mentioned this in other threads, but it’s worth repeating. In my most existentially difficult DMT experience, I was quite upset when I realized I had died.

An unseen being, in what seemed to be a sincere effort to comfort me, said something like this:

“Don’t be worried about dying – you were never actually alive in the first place.”

(It wasn’t comforting to hear this.)
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Gibran2- Im playing devils advocate here but how can you be so certain that the state you reached in your difficult experience was that of having died?

It seems to me that you are ,rightly or wrongly, labelling this state as death when you have no way of knowing this for sure.

Everything is chemicals.

You eat chemicals, your brain communicates in chemicals and any sort of transmission that can pass through any given environment are transmitted from and onto...

chemicals

Even if the experience is sourced from an external transmission, the experience is still based on chemicals.

I had a death simulation with a stupid dose a mushrooms a few years back. Basically my sense of my body was fading and I was hallucinating angels.

I've also had a feeling once on ayahuasca that I had wet the bed. I hadn't.

I'm of the firm belief that to accept DMT as an outward transmission from a "higher being" is to completely underestimate the power of your brain.

The bottom line is, if you're brain can decode it, then it can also fabricate it.

I’m quite sure now (obviously?) that I didn’t die. But I definitely left my body far behind.

The reason I believed it at the time was because of the nature of that DMT experience. I’ve described this elsewhere: It was, and remains to this day, a unique experience. It was unlike any DMT experience I had before (or since). And I had well over 100 experiences prior to that one. It simply wasn’t like a DMT experience at all – visually or otherwise. Comparing that experience to a typical breakthrough is like comparing a typical breakthrough to everyday “sober” reality. It was many orders of magnitude beyond what I had ever experienced.

Another unusual feature of this experience was that my ego was perfectly intact – and my level of awareness and alertness exceeded my everyday experience. I also had left my body in a very profound way. I wanted desperately to return to it, but I was further from it than I had ever been before. I wondered what had happened to it. I wondered if it was OK.

This experience was so different from a DMT experience that I started wondering if it was indeed a DMT experience. I thought that maybe it wasn’t – maybe I had a heart attack (I’m not that young and heart disease runs in my family – I have a brother who had a heart attack while still in his 30’s)

Due to the uniqueness of this experience, I came to the conclusion that it in fact wasn’t a DMT experience, but rather a “death” experience. (I wish I hadn’t come to that conclusion. If I hadn’t, it would have been the best DMT experience of my life by far.)

There’s no way for me to know if I actually “died” or not, but it was a very reasonable conclusion to make at the time. Getting back wasn’t at all easy either. At one point, when I was just becoming aware of my body again, I opened my eyes. I looked around my room, and it’s hard to describe what I saw. In one sense, everything was as it always is, yet I “knew” that what I was seeing was a fabrication. A creation of mind.

The experience was an awakening from a dream. I could feel “myself” awakening. And I knew that if I awakened fully, the dream would end. But I desperately wanted to return to the dream. I willed “myself” back to sleep, back into the dream. And that’s when I finally realized I was back.

This experience left me with a strong sense (which still persists somewhat today) that it is possible via DMT to leave this “consensus reality” behind and not return. What exactly that means, I’m not sure.

Ahh… But the brain can’t decode every experience. At least mine can’t.

I’ve had many breakthroughs where I am looking around at my environment, quite alert and aware, and I realize that what I’m seeing and experiencing is not “translatable” into consensus reality. When I realize this, I know that I won’t be able to bring the memory back. I’m able to bring back memories of what I’m thinking (verbally), so it’s very strange – there I am, looking around and fully aware of what I’m seeing, and thinking to myself “What I’m seeing can’t be expressed with ordinary senses, so when I get back, I’ll have no memories of this. How strange that I can see it all so clearly, yet I must leave the memories behind.”

I’ve also had breakthroughs which take this a step further. I have been given opportunities to participate in experiences in hyperspace, but with a condition – I’ll remember nothing of the experience. Basically, I was invited by entities to participate in something – something important – but I was informed that I, as a human being, am not allowed to bring back any memories of my participation. I always agree, and just as they said, I bring back nothing. Not exactly nothing – I bring back a “feeling” that something very significant has happened, but I don’t know what it was. On several of these experiences, although I didn’t remember the content, I remembered that, wherever it was that I was taken, I’ve been there before.

I had this happen one time strongly and couple times milder.
I call it "end of the show", which it really feels like. It felt like "this is it, it's all been a show and it's now ended", and it can feel like there's no going back. Not scary really but very confusing. The first time it happened was with 27mg and my friend who was sitting about 1-2m from me, disappeared, or at least I didn't see him, that even made the feeling stronger.

Ahh… But the brain can’t decode every experience. At least mine can’t.

I think Gibran2s comment says alot about how the DMT experience is uniquely personal.....but retains some features in common, namely, IMO, the effect of the mindset adopted whether this be a conscious endeavour or something more nuanced and subtle.

I find reports of partakers actually interacting with entities remarkable and not lacking in credibility although Ive not had these myself.But I always seek to observe without trying to impart meaning to the visions and this may explain why Ive not had such experiences.What I am certain of is that particularly with the larger doses taken rapidly this substance can induce a state which is impossible to describe adequately and can cause a stream of imagery which, for me, has been totally indistinguishable from watching a movie in HD but with a more rapid flow from one "screen-shot" to the next and is accompanied by an all-encompassing annihilation of the self that the 20-30mg breakthroughs cannot give an inkling of.

I think all dedicated enthusiasts of DMT should try this kind of trip at least (or perhaps, only) once.

It's called disorientation maybe?

Well maybe not as straight up as we know it, but I'm sure there's many non-psychedelic induced states that can have such an effect on recall. The kicker with this one is your minds eye is showing you what you are seeing which obviously doesn't have to follow physics/set dimensions etc, in combination with anything you may have left from your physical eyes (IF any remains) overlapping with that.

Then there's the state dependent memory factor.

At a party a few years back, I heard this song with the most beautiful vocal. Granted I had enough MDMA in my system that maybe it wasn't all that beautiful, but it certainly sounded pretty good at the time. Anyway, I heard this track twice that weekend, yet for the life of me I couldn't remember how it went. 8 months later I'm in bed just after another session with MDMA and it pops right in there

Can't remember it now though

Back to DMT!

I've had such strong deja vous with this molecule that I swear upon remembering one of my experiences when once again under the influence, I replayed the exact same trip. It had the most unforgettable character, yet the THIRD time it occurred, I ceased enough info to bring something back. This trip featured a scratchy drum track with some strange bird like creature playing some form of O's + X's on my retina's, scratching it's marks in time to the track. Something about "three strikes and you're out". Very cool that I had that trip 3 times!

But anyway I can see that trip was based on reality in that it had a very game-showesque setup, albeit with a hyperspace turbo-charge. Though the first time I experienced it, I came back with just the all too farmiliar "WTF?!"

Disorientation? Please explain.

In my experiences, there is no sense of disorientation at all. My mind is clear, I can see clearly, I’m alert and aware. There are things I see – and I see them quite plainly and clearly – that I know at the time (not just in retrospect), I won’t be able to later recall visually. It’s not because of a “mind’s eye” violation of physics and/or dimension either. It’s something much more subtle yet quite obvious when encountered.

For example, once I saw objects flying out of a box, and these objects had a visual character that caused me to think “this will be a whole new art form”. I was actually getting excited about the prospect of bringing back some information about this “new art form”, and then realized that the fascinating quality was that ineffable visual property that can’t be brought back.

Imagine if people saw only in monochrome. Imagine that there was no concept of color. No words for color, no colors associated with objects or anything else. Now imagine that during DMT experiences you saw color. It would be a new visual property that you have no words to describe. The objects you see would still be recognizable, yet they would be different in an unexplainable way. And due to “state dependent memory”, once back in consensus reality, you would be unable to visualize this new and ineffable visual property. It’s like that.

I’m also curious why you insist that these experience features can be easily explained away with the utterance of a single word such as “disorientation”?