Legarto Rey wrote:Protostar, your commentary is betraying a "trollish" intent. The caricaturesque nature of your references to this site and the potential of psychedelics in general, seems rather disingenuous. Schmaltzy attempts at polite discourse, followed immediately by obvious trivializing of psychedelia, the Nexus and those who visit indicates a thinly veiled disdain.
Lot of bright folks here. You're only welcome if you choose to be. My money is with Northerner, you're a retread.
Peace
I obviously don't know the history of Protostar's interaction on this forum, but simply based on his description of his experience, I think you and Northerner are being a little harsh on him. I think I understand where he's coming from. ...and it
does happen whether you are an "experienced user" of psychedelics or not!
I have experimented with psychoactive compounds for the majority of my life. Some I have found to produce incredibly profound, spiritually-enlightening experiences where others have been a roller-coaster ride through hell. The experiences vary from compound to compound. LSD was a god-send to me and has completely re-engineered my artistic style of painting. It unlocked volumes of abstract thinking that I am still trying to mentally organize even today. I morphed from you typical college student with no ambition at all to an intellectual guru with a profound understanding of extremely abstract and complex concepts.
I was not one to merely "dip my little toe" into the pool of the unknown, either. I was tantamount to a wingsuit glider in regard to using acid. I was eating 6 to 8 hits at a time! -- Go big or go home!
I have had similar experience when experimenting with mushrooms, but it was "hit or miss" in regard to having a mentally-fulfilling experience. I discovered that some types of mushrooms made me angry whereas others made me feel happy, more focused or even feel
stupid. I remember telling my girlfriend (who was also shroomin' at the time) that I was angry. She asked me what I was angry about and I couldn't really say? I was just... "angry." I didn't want to hurt anyone or be a downer. I just didn't like anything and everything made me mad. Looking at a beautiful flower would just piss me off. "Stupid f-ing flower!" Another time I would eat a different type of mushroom and everything was hilarious! Seeing a smashed animal in the roadway was "funny!"
I concluded that whatever type of mushroom I was eating was somehow able to control my attitude. Even though I experienced interesting imagery and heightened senses, the idea that I could "select an attitude" like one might choose food from a drive thru menu was not appealing to me at all.
...And then came my journey into hell!I experimented with an extremely refined 20X concentration of Salvia which to me was by far the most horrible mental experience I have ever endured in my life. I had read all of the stories about meeting angels, beautiful ambassadors to other worlds and feelings of indescribable peace... so I figured I'd give it a try. Hell, it was legal to buy, so how harsh could it really be? It couldn't possibly compare to 7 hits of acid, right?
This is what I recall: There was this strange "Cat in The Hat" like Dr. Seuss character that appeared before me and said, "Well, well, well... what do we have here? You want to see things?
....Well I'll just show ya!" It grabbed me by the throat and stretched me across the entire 47B light year width of the universe. I could see and feel my body stretching and getting thinner to the point of being only an atom's width thin. When I reached the other end of the universe, my feet left the ground from my starting point and snapped like a rubber band to where I now found myself.
I ended up in a really creepy spherical room. There were multitudes of strange Pepto Bismol covered faces that were all staring at me and laughing. Their faces were all wedged together (like bricks in a wall) and made up the spherical outer shell of the room. The thick, pink ooze dripped from their faces and mouths while they all laughed and shouted out rude comments. A bunch of contorted, disfigured and sinister-looking entities tossed my limp, powerless body around like a rag doll and all I could do was... well... "endure." Then I heard sirens from police cars approaching from all directions. I felt like a bunch of "universal police" were coming to arrest me for trespassing on their sacred ground. ...Then I came finally out of it.
My point in all of this is that we are all tampering with the inner workings of our mind. When you do extremely physical things (like football, rock climbing or MMA) you put your body parts in danger. You can break something so badly that you never regain full use of it ever again. The same goes for these psychoactive drugs that we are constantly experimenting with.
You can damage your mind just as easily! ....Be careful!
Here's one of my first paintings to emerge from my experiments with LSD. It's titled "Judas" (6ft x 4ft) - Oil on Canvas:
...and for god's sake, will you
please make me a full member? I have a lot to discuss!
-Birdman
"You going to pull those pistols or whistle Dixie?"