Empathy

It's been about 10 months since the last time I had some cubes. Last night I had 1.76 grams. I had my friend with me, and it was his first time. He had 1.66 grams. Neither of us had a private place to go to, so we went to my chiropractic office to watch something on my laptop through my Netflix account. We decided to see What Dreams May Come. I started feeling the effects about 30 minutes after eating the shrooms, but my friend said he hasn't started feeling anything yet. At first, I had a hard time focusing on the movie, and my thoughts kept wandering off for what seemed to be a really long time. Then I would realize it and tune back into the movie only to find out I've missed only 20 or 30 seconds. That made me realize that my brain can think really quickly, and I could go through a whole bunch of thoughts and ideas in matter of seconds. Colors were intense, and although I have a 17" laptop screen, it felt like I was watching a movie in a movie theater.  All peripheral sounds coming from the street and from the heater were also very noticeable. Perception of space was different. The room would look tiny when I would stand up and huge when I would sit back down.  When I would look over at my friend, it was quite weird to see that he had a head, because I couldn't see my own head. I could just see my arms, torso and legs, and it felt like I was headless, and yet my friend wasn't. The movie made me think about what does it mean to exist. If I lost my arms and my legs, I would still be me and would still exist. If I lost all my senses: hearing, smell, touch, taste, sight... I would still know that I exist. So, all I am is electrical impulses in some part of my brain, and these electrical pulses control my body, which is a very complicated, large vessel and my armor, and it's not really me.  Then I started thinking how silly it is that we, these electrical impulses, which have limited time on earth, try to make the illusion that we are these important, beautiful things. We groom ourselves and educate ourselves and spend a lot of time working on our appearance so other people (who are also insignificant electronic impulses) will like us. I felt like I was just a microchip but connected to flesh instead of metal. I started to empathize with all these women who put on makeup and try so hard so that people will like them. I also became very empathetic towards my patients who come to me. I remembered the hopeful looks in their eyes, when they come in with pain and how they are looking up to me in hope that I will relieve their pain. Then I got a text from my friend "Hey, are you and [your friend] hanging out?" I totally felt the way he was feeling. I could feel his "I hope I am not missing out on something fun" feeling. Then I got a text from my receptionist, "What time is the first patient coming in tomorrow?" and I could feel her concern and worry that she doesn't know what time she needs to come in and she's afraid I'll be mad at her. I also received a text from my fiance "I hope you and [your friend] are having a gay ol time. tell him i said hello" and I was able to feel how she wanted to be a part of our experience and was compromising by keeping in touch with us through texts. Normally I would find some of these texts annoying or dismiss them, but this time I was very empathetic and appreciated the texts. I wished that everyone in the world would have this experience so they would learn to see the world the way other people see it, and everyone would be so much nicer to one another.