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#Post#: 855--------------------------------------------------
Psychedelics
By: Phil Potts Date: August 31, 2021, 8:30 pm
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Due to Digwe's interest in the topic..
There are 4 I know of. Ayahuasca aka peyote of Carlos Castaneda
fame, lysergic acid diethylamide aka LSD or 'acid', psilocybin
aka magic mushrooms and 5-meO DMT aka toad (venom).
Starting with psilocybin, my take is that in small dose it is
activating serotonin2a receptors, creates an alpha wave state
which has been observed by imaging. This is more uniform in
frequency and amplitude than baseline in the same subjects).
This is then similar to the meditative state, and allows for
thinking to diverge from habitual pathways. That is not going
over the same thoughts in the same way, so reprocessing
emotionally and desensitizing to memories, often deriving a
different meaning. Literally a new brainwave.
That is not to say hallucinogens are an unalloyed good thing
because of promises in tx of depression or addiction to other
drugs. European studies of processing social isolation and self
and other interaction are interesting. Generally conversations
along the lines: hi I'm bill... Hi Bill I'm Ted, nice to meet
you.... No that's just your name, who are you really Ted? As you
see, the difference between being interested in interacting and
acting weird is a fine line.
Enhancing learning and cognition, ie ie processing with
activation of serotonin receptors is what happens naturally if
we are in balance. Recreational use and schizophrenia both put
tripping in excessive hydroxy tryptophan with hallucination.
Many drugs to treat schizophrenia or depression work the
opposite way by blocking 5HT, but people then complain of flat
affect, not being able to feel anything and sometimes zombified.
I hope this little Ted talk gives you some idea on the how and
why of psilocybin used with PTSD that you have seen.
#Post#: 857--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Digwe Must Date: September 1, 2021, 1:09 pm
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Very interesting. Thanks for posting this. My own knowledge of
micro-dosing psilocybin is entirely anecdotal. I've just seen
it work.
Something I've noticed are the different recommended timing
protocols when micro-dosing psilocybin. Paul Stamets recommends
5 days on and two days off. One young vet we know follows a 21
day regimen with about a week in between. I know of several
folks who have m-dosed for a few weeks, gotten the benefits and
never felt the need to repeat. The positive changes appear
permanent. Apparently the new brainwave must be sticky.
So would the regular pause in dosing for those who continue to
m-dose be to avoid tolerance or toxicity? I've not seen anyone
get really physically dependent on shrooms - but it is not my
field - I might just be unaware. I do think that there might be
a tendency for some people to think that if a little is a good,
more must be better. But, that does not seem to be a chronic
problem among those I know who m-dose.
I take several herbal nutritional supplements and several
mushrooms (chaga, cordyceps, lions mane, reishi) and notice that
a pause once in a while seems to re-invigorate the effects.
When I suggested micro-dosing to RE - that's all I was
recommending. When I was young I knew a couple of people who
literally lost their minds as a result of acid. Gone for good.
Fragile to begin with, they never should have tripped - at least
not without Tim Leary or Richard Alpert in the room with them.
I would never recommend a transformative dose of psilocybin or
any psychedelic to anyone without a professional therapist. I
can't even recommend a recreational dose as I haven't done one
in over 40 years.
I believe that when the pharmaceutical industry is able to
isolate a compound from psilocybin that can be patented and sold
at a huge profit, suddenly micro-dosing will be viewed favorable
by the medical establishment.
#Post#: 858--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Phil Potts Date: September 2, 2021, 2:51 am
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Something I've noticed are the different recommended timing
protocols when micro-dosing psilocybin. Paul Stamets recommends
5 days on and two days off.
You may have that backwards, if not, it should be. Tolerance
builds quickly and to prevent it requires 4-5 days break.
One young vet we know follows a 21 day regimen with about a
week in between.
That would work without needing ever higher dose, for the reason
above.
I know of several folks who have m-dosed for a few weeks,
gotten the benefits and never felt the need to repeat. The
positive changes appear permanent. Apparently the new brainwave
must be sticky.
Yes effectively the new outlook or insight associated with the
sense of feeling enlightened, which we know is associated with
greater connectivity between areas of the brain, reduces default
to the habitual pattern which is like the groove on a vinyl
record.
The vets you mentioned would have some feeling down with the
withdrawal as a natural reaction to removing something that
usually creates euphoria, but the overall positive outweighing
the negative. If they are receiving them as a treatment in a
country or state where it is legal, I imagine they knew to
expect it and that it would be transitory.
So would the regular pause in dosing for those who continue to
m-dose be to avoid tolerance or toxicity?
Avoiding tolerance, though plenty of people have eaten poison
mushrooms hoping to get high.
I've not seen anyone get really physically dependent on shrooms
- but it is not my field - I might just be unaware. I do think
that there might be a tendency for some people to think that if
a little is a good, more must be better. But, that does not
seem to be a chronic problem among those I know who m-dose.
Take enough and you hallucinate, do that long enough and you're
not sure what is real. For a few unfortunates, that's even if
they stop. For anyone else, really rebalancing takes months.
I take several herbal nutritional supplements and several
mushrooms (chaga, cordyceps, lions mane, reishi) and notice that
a pause once in a while seems to re-invigorate the effects.
What are these effects? I don't know these herbs.
When I was young I knew a couple of people who literally lost
their minds as a result of acid. Gone for good. Fragile to
begin with, they never should have tripped - at least not
without Tim Leary or Richard Alpert in the room with them.
That's what I meant by not knowing what is real or not any more.
I would never recommend a transformative dose of psilocybin or
any psychedelic to anyone without a professional therapist. I
can't even recommend a recreational dose as I haven't done one
in over 40 years.
I've asked people to tell me the insight they got from these
transformations, but so far they can't. Maybe they forgot, I
guess we need to give them a pen and paper with the drug and we
should get something like scripture. I've only tried it myself
once and not enough to hallucinate. I wouldn't even say I
enjoyed it.
I believe that when the pharmaceutical industry is able to
isolate a compound from psilocybin that can be patented and sold
at a huge profit, suddenly micro-dosing will be viewed favorable
by the medical establishment.
Just like antidepressants for acute depression, it should be
used for a limited time. I would need to see data showing
ongoing micro-dosing is having a continuing positive effect and
not just habituation. Pharmacos do not like anything for a
limited time, they like you to be on ten times the initial dose
ten years later. Even if twenty odd studies showing a high
efficacy are published, there's the problem of them being sold
on for fun.
They may become legalised like cannabis in various states
anyway. I support that approach, because most of us abuse
alcohol mainly from the fact we are baptised in it when we come
of age, it being legal and acceptable. It is legal because of
big business in brewing and advertising and tax revenue, though
it is at least as damaging as coca ine or heroin and much less
so than cannabis. Something like half of all people who commit a
murder or are murdered are drunk. I can think of an example
right here of a grieving mother I know trying to get an appeal
on an outrageous travesty of justice. Her son was run down by
his wife, both were at a party, drinking. We tell people to stop
drinking so they can drive home, after they already started
consuming something that disinhibits them. Never mind that
bingeing every weekend through your 20s is the perfect cycle to
create the functional alcoholic.
#Post#: 861--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Digwe Must Date: September 2, 2021, 6:37 pm
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Apparently, numerous academic institutions are researching
psilocybin. More than I had realized. Until watching this
Stamets video for the second time I'd forgotten that Harvard,
Yale, Stanford, Johns Hopkins etc are studying the shroom.
There must be tremendous profit potential.
I've never met Mr. Stamets but my wife has met him. They both
spoke at a Bioneers conference about 15 years ago. From what I
gather, he is the real deal. His work on using mushrooms to
remediate contaminated soil is worth an entire career - it's
just one aspect of his.
HTML https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smBMn-CV9KE
The names I listed are all mushrooms. I drink a cup of chaga
tea (closer to coffee) every day. It grows on birch trees and
is common in Siberia and Canada. I'm trying to get some into my
birch trees here. I drink it as a tonic and like it a lot. I
drink it for immunity enhancement. However, it also seems to be
a general energy boost and stamina enhancer. Cordyceps is a
weird mushroom. One can grow most medicinal and gourmet
mushrooms easily with kits, plugs, spawn etc. - but not
cordyceps. There is a caterpillar involved. It also enhances
immunity and several other functions.
We have (at last count) about 125 herbs, trees and perennials
with medicinal qualities. About half are native and the rest
we've planted. Some are common and well known - like Hawthorn.
It is frequently prescribed in Europe - by establishment docs -
for cardiac issues. There are some that are more regional, like
Bearberry (kinnikinic) which is really good for the urinary
system.
The use of psychedelic plants and mushrooms has been going on
for thousands of years. They've found them in burial crypts in
Egypt and the Americas and Asia. They have obvious spiritual
significance. So sayeth Harvard Divinity School.
HTML https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g2PS_yp-nQ
#Post#: 863--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Phil Potts Date: September 3, 2021, 2:33 am
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I watched both vids right through. Is Paul Stamets in a temple
wearing a symbolic robe of sorts? He is talking about continuous
use, and I find him overly optimistic. I want to know what his
microdose range includes over time. I suspect it's a case of
robbing Peter to pay Paul depleting normal reserves of 5HT (see
pic below).
What the second vid talks about, with a lot of research he has
done I didn't know about, (I only knew about the imaging studies
by others and European research mentioned) is Saul becoming Paul
after eating mushrooms growing along the road to Damascus. Key
difference is that is a high dose once or twice or thrice, but
not ongoing use. No mention of people wanting to do it again,
and again, which is an issue if it becomes easily accessible.
People certainly do with some other similarly acting chemicals.
They mention it being used in religious ritual in Mexico, which
I expect would not be very frequent. It also raises the
question of whether this was the same Aztecs performing human
sacrifice using it. I wonder if anyone has an answer.
Peyote and Toad are from the same geographic locale, but I
gather are only individual or very small group. Those two shed
some light on the phenomena described in the vid.
Peyote for encountering entities. If the shaman guide of Carlos
Castaneda is sure Mescalito appeared and played with Carlos, but
the sober observer saw Carlos chasing his dog around the yard,
do we believe the shaman who insists 'that was no damn dog!'?
Can I be objective and conclude they're not entering another
dimension on the spiritual plane and are just rolling the dice
on their sanity with the hallucination?
Toad is meant to cause the living death experience mentioned
and then no fear of death, I'm not sure. What really is the
difference between any of this and Hunter Thompsons chemical
experimentation. No feeling of oneness and brotherhood of man
for him maybe, but the whole music festival and rave party scene
of the millenials has something of that subjective experience
described with psilocybin.
60% success rate claimed for quitting smoking, I knew about.
Does smoking correlate with a lack of spiritual awareness and
strong ingroup preference as it would seem? No, as a
neuroscientist he should have said the alpha state under
intoxication is highly suggestible and amenable to hypnosis.
At the end of the day, I'm no less convinced that everything
needs to be done in moderation and there's really nothing where
the more the merrier applies.
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#Post#: 958--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Digwe Must Date: September 15, 2021, 2:04 pm
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Sorry it took so long to respond. I got hurt a couple of weeks
ago and haven't been able to sit at the desk for more than a few
minutes at a time. Got grumpy.
I think you are correct. P Stamets is certainly overly
optimistic. He is an apostle, not just an advocate. That
doesn't negate his view. One just has to put it in perspective.
I also think he is feeling vindicated since many credentialed
academics, and many labs, are researching the shrooms now. P.S.
was dismissed as a stoner quack for a long time. He's not only
built up a very successful business (We have a patch of his
oyster mushrooms and a patch of his wine caps) but he has done
much to use fungi to remediate polluted soil and ecosystems.
"At the end of the day, I'm no less convinced that everything
needs to be done in moderation and there's really nothing where
the more the merrier applies."
Again, I have to agree. Unfortunately, it took me way to long
to figure that out or take someone's word for it. So, I pay the
price.
Sticking with the moderation theme, I do not find the prospect
of using a micro-dose for the reasons we discussed intimidating
or frightening at all. You don't know it's there. That's why I
suggested RE look into it. However, the prospect of a
transformative trip, or even a recreational dose has no appeal
for me. Perhaps if I were to get really ill or have some other
bad trauma I'd consider it.
But, for now, it's back to my wife's excellent raspberry wine.
Hope all is well.
#Post#: 960--------------------------------------------------
Re: Psychedelics
By: Eddie Date: September 15, 2021, 7:24 pm
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I saw the movie about Stamets. Pretty good if you can get past
all the computer generated mandalas and special effects.
When I was a teenager psychoactive mushrooms grew in great
abundance in my area. We made it into tea and drank it around
campfires. It wasn’t nearly as profound as LSD.
More recently I tested microdosing mushrooms and found it
pleasant but not mind expanding. I’ve also done a fair amount of
peyote, although nothing anytime recently. It tends to make me
nauseous, but that passes.
Fwiw, I never met any entities, not even when I smoked a bit of
DMT, although it was far more hallucinogenic than mushrooms or
peyote ever were.
I would consider Aya or Bufo, given the right circumstances. I
doubt those circumstances will come to pass, but you never know.
I once went nearly 20 years without ingesting even
alcohol....nothing stronger than coffee. But I’ve lightened up a
bit on my old age.
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