Today I took a trip to hell, and it was the best trip I ever took.

%u201CThe shaman is not merely a sick man, or a madman; he is a sick man who has healed himself.%u201D %u2013 Terence McKenna

Mind Set

Overall, I was feeling great about life. I was guiding a woman through her first time in today.  Unfortunately, she was in a vehicle that got involved in a minor accident that morning and was a little shook up by it.  Also, a series of events threw off a large part of my day, leaving me sitting at home while I needed to work, and I was a little upset at this. We began our journey at 3PM.

Setting

The trip occurred in my home. Warm fireplace going, my tripping playlist going on a good sound system, LED RGB lights fading through thousands of intense colors spread across the living room.

Dosing

7.5 grams p. Cubensis blended with 2g Syrian Rue, a whole grapefruit, and two squeezed lemons, topped with half a can of Starbucks Refresher to speed uptake and reduce energy-loss. Let sit for 15 minutes.  Spit 45/55 between two of us.  I took the 45%.

Diet

Light dinner the night before. Average breakfast eaten 6 hours prior to dosing.  A drink for lunch, and half of a Starbucks Refresher drink two hours before dosing. 

Prologue

I%u2019m close friends with the person I was guiding.  This was her first time in.  She%u2019s foreign, so there was a language barrier.  Once in, I found her to be in a good state of mind and health, but she continually shunned my presence away, making me feel unwanted in my unstable state.  I battled the inability to communicate with her throughout the trip.  As wonderful of a person as she is, she can bit a bit stubborn, selfish, judgmental, and prideful.  She fared well throughout her journey, reaching the state of total ego-loss. Her trip will not be described here, but it was a positive life-changing experience for her, as was my experience.  This is the first time I%u2019ve had an experience like what is about to be described below.  Normal experiences are those of pure goodness.  This is about my 5th full-dose trip.  Each trip has been an entirely different learning experience, improving the things in my life that need the most improvement.

The Come Up

The method of dosing caused for a slightly faster come-up than usual, but not the fastest I%u2019ve had. 

15 Minutes %u2013 Begin to feel weak.
20 Minutes %u2013 Stomach became upset.
25 Minutes %u2013 Sharpening of vision, mild feeling of drunkenness. 
30 Minutes %u2013 Stomach pain became quite strong and I had to lay down. CEV.
35 Minutes %u2013 Minor OEV.  Mostly translucent polka-dots covering flat surfaces.
40 Minutes %u2013 Body was heavily disagreeing with me.  Shaking, shivering, and pain.
50 Minutes %u2013 Pain began receding, being replaced with waves of joy and pleasure.
60 Minutes %u2013 OEV became stronger and more defined.  An extreme crystalline sharpening of vision, rooms brightening up to intense levels.  Minor hallucinations.
90 Minutes %u2013 Come-up completed, entering into the climax. Gut felt mostly better, but fought it for another hour until it eventually receded. 

My friend had a slightly larger dose, and seemed to be about 10 minutes ahead of me.  Once she started experiencing the psychological and visual effects, she closed off and entered her own world and wouldn%u2019t communicate.  I tried communicating with her during the come up to make sure she was alright, but communication wasn%u2019t happening.  I found myself fairly uncomfortable due to this scenario, and left her to herself while I kept on eye on her.

The Climax

I kept a notepad and pen during the experience to record my thoughts that I was not able to communicate to my friend like I normally do.  Notepad writings are in quotes. 

Comfort
%u201CWhy do I always strive to make myself comfortable?%u201D
      I found myself extremely fidgety and unable to relax since I started coming up.  Drumming fingers, pacing around, shaking leg, wanting to talk, but not being able to (in order to not upset my friend, who didn%u2019t want to talk).  I was trying to make sure everything was absolutely perfect and comfortable so I could relax.

Acceptance, Right vs Wrong
%u201CWhy is it so hard to just BE?%u201D
     At this point, I began doubting myself and who I was, what my intentions were, if I fit in at all, or if I was just an odd-ball that people hung around to feel better about themselves, or took pity on me.

%u201CWhat%u2019s goodness?%u201D %u201CWhat%u2019s bad? Am I good, or am I bad?%u201D
     In my attempt to come to acceptance with myself, which was an increasingly losing battle, I began to question whether my past actions were mostly good, or mostly bad.  How I treat my family.  How I treat my friends.  Was tripping a bad thing, or a good thing?  This was particularly confusing due to having spent almost all of my life in the LDS culture, where so many things are bad, but the rest of the non-religious world considers neutral, or good.

%u201CIs any of this REAL!?%u201D
     I was becoming so lost in the entheogen that I had a hard time understanding if I was in my body, if I was truly in my house, or if I just thought that I was.  I felt removed and in an entirely different realm of existence.  My entire sense of reality had been completely destroyed and I felt myself slipping away.

Loosing Myself
%u201CWhat am I, and who did I let go?%u201D
     I had become seriously confused to the identity of my conscious being.  I didn%u2019t know if I was me, or if I was a friend, a complete stranger, or something from another realm.  I felt like an entirely different person in every way. I recalled my past to see if that%u2019s who I was, but I didn%u2019t feel like that person from the past was me.

%u201CWhat is letting go?%u201D
     At this point, the confusion and sense of being another person was overbearing, and with the increasing intensity of the trip, I knew letting go was eventually inevitable.  I pondered what it means to let go, how to do it, and what would happen.  I truly believed I was going to die.

An Ego in the Shadows
%u201CCan an ego hide in the shadows?%u201D

Over the last year, I%u2019ve been able to suppress the natural tendencies of the ego, but I%u2019ve not been able to overcome it for more that short periods of time when situations allowed.  In my deep confusion of self-awareness and who I was, I began looking for the ego to see where it was hiding.  It was trying to influence my life from a dark remote place where I couldn%u2019t find it.

%u201CIt can. I found it.%u201D
     I was able to identify my ego as that different person that I felt had taken over me.  I felt like my ego didn%u2019t want me to be going through this experience.  It knew what was coming ahead, and didn%u2019t want anything to do with it.  It was kicking and screaming and refusing to be captured.  Perhaps it was my inner-self, but somebody dragged my ego from the shadows and forced it into the light.

%u201CHave I been hiding in darkness?%u201D
     At this moment of discovery, I realized that is was time to face some cold, hard truth.  A darkness in me began to surface, and it wasn%u2019t happy to be surfacing.  I was feeling very miserable.  I realized that my ego, dark as it was, was a part of me.  I captured the ego and became it, abandoning my inner-self.

Hurled Through Space



The image above is a rough sketch that I drew in the moment to describe what I felt my consciousness was doing.  Even though I knew I was still in my home, I felt like my entire being was hurling through space at an incredible rate.  I felt the coldness and emptiness of vacuum.  It wasn%u2019t unpleasant or sickening, just beyond my control, and I actually believe I was in an earthly orbit.  In a way, I actually enjoyed the experience.

Prison
   I entered a prison of an alternate reality.  Locked in, confined, empty, alone, with no contact with the normal world.  I spent the majority of my trip here.  Whether I laid in bed, sat in a bright room, played the flute, or changed the music, I was imprisoned and there was no escaping.  I knew that I could never leave prison until I met the judge and accepted my sentence.

Letting Go

   The psychedelic had hold of me, and there was no returning from where I came without letting the drug run its course over the next several hours.  My sense of reality and self had been completely obliterated.  I was ready to accept death and pay for my wrong-doings.  My sense of despair was overwhelming and my soul desired to be no more.  I accepted my fate, stopped fighting for life, and gave in.

Corona Radiata | The Gateway to Hell
   The room was dark, pulsing with intense color from the LED lighting system.  The music was powerful, deep, and loud. Several days ago, I added a song to my playlist by Nine Inch Nails that that I thought might have an intense effect on the trip.  As Corona Radiata began playing, it drew me into an intensely deep, lower-level of consciousness.  The music grew, becoming darker, more powerful, more intense, and more overwhelming, sucking my deeply into its grasp.  There was absolutely no escaping. I slipped away into unconsciousness

Today, I Took a Trip to Hell

And it was the best trip I ever took. The hell I had entered was dark, full of every amount of misery, torment, and despair imaginable.  As I tried to analyze my situation, I felt hopeless as I was no longer an embodied being, nor my normal self.  Hell was hot.  I was sweating profusely, unable to cool down.  I thought about taking my body outside of the house, but it wasn%u2019t a possible thing to do at the time.  The feeling of being imprisoned had intensified infinitely, and I felt I would never be able to escape.

Demons

I found several demons towering over me.  Big, dark, red, evil, powerful, and terrorizing.  I trembled in their presence and wanted to be removed from this terrible evil more than anything in the world.  The demons growled and snarled, their black empty eyes penetrating into the depth of my soul.  I recognized the presence of these demons %u2013 that they had been following me and haunting me for some time.

The Light of Awareness

At my moment of greatest agony and hopelessness, as if from nowhere, I was bestowed a powerful gift %u2013 the ability to perceive the truth of my current reality for what it actually was.  I approached the largest demon and stared him in the eyes, and saw the true self of the demon.  I found my father, particularly my relationship with my father.  The demon represented a darkness within myself that I refused to ever accept or identify. 

I learned to use this powerful gift, and identified the other demons that were with me.  One demon was lies and deceit, another demon was greed, and other selfishness.  One represented my entire family as a whole.  The size and darkness of the demon represented how dark the thing was in my life.

Realization and Acceptance

This trip into hell was punishment to my ego for my wrongdoings.  Upon true realization of the things that have been holding me back in life, I accepted that these things were wrong, that I had to stop lying to myself that everything I did was good.  I knew my inner-self was in a good place in life, but there were some major things I needed to overcome to move forward and discover greater peace in life. 

After these full realizations and acceptances, I was let go.  Released.  I%u2019d needed a whooping, and I got it bad.  There were no heroic actions of conquering the demons.  My prison term had been served, and I was let go, using the experience I%u2019d had to improve my life and remove the things that have been holding me back from progressing forward.

Coming Down

I sat up from laying on my living room floor.  I was soaked in sweat.  With several deep breaths, I calmed my heart and mind, and relaxed for the first time since I started coming up.  An overwhelming peace fell upon me.  I was still shook up from the experience, an experience more real than anything I%u2019d ever experienced in life, but I knew it was over, I had learned my lesson, and knew I had discovered some great things that held me back.

I spent the next two hours coming back to reality, writing down the experiences, taking notes of the things I%u2019d seen, experienced, and learned.  I laid awake in deep contemplation the entire night until morning when I left to work.

The Lessons

I was not able to identify all the demons that were haunting me, as there were many. Instead, I focused on the greatest of the demons.  The rest I%u2019ll come to identify at a later time. Here are their identities:

     My Father %u2013 I have a poor relationship with my father, who loves me dearly and wants the best for me.  He spends a lot of time thinking of me, hoping I%u2019m well and happy, but disappointed with the way I live my life.  While I%u2019m generally quite happy with the way I live and the philosophies I subscribe to, the poor relationship has created a darkness that is holding me back.  I have to sit down with him with a pre-written letter as my guide, and pour my heart out to him.  Tell him who I really am, what I truly believe, that I%u2019m a good person and a good soul, and how much I love and appreciate all he has ever done for me.  Until I do this, this demon will continue to haunt me eternally.

     My Family %u2013 I need to speak kindly about my siblings and parents, even though we disagree.  After I speak to my father, I will analyze the situation and develop an approach to how to open up to my siblings in a manner of love and understanding. 

     Lies and Deceit %u2013 This was a smaller demon, but I recognize that from time to time, I needlessly will tell a lie for any variety of reason, none of which are any good.  If I want people to trust who I am, I have to be honest in all my dealings. I realize I lie most frequently to myself. 

     Selfishness, Pride, and Greed %u2013 I sometimes will do or say something that benefits only me, or tears another person down in order to benefit myself.  I cannot reach the spirituality I seek while I do things like this.  I care deeply for each of my friends and family, and it%u2019s wrong to ever speak poorly about them or tear them down to get ahead.

Moving Forward

I am fortunate that I thought to take notes in order to recall all of these things.  I was gifted with a very rare opportunity to have my dark issues forced upon me.  With these unforgettable lessons, I will destroy these shadowy demons one at a time.  It is my hope that I can reach a greatest state of being through self-improvement and awareness.  Never has my knowledge of a loving God (whoever that step is above us) ever been so evident in my life, and my testimony of such things is concrete and unbreakable.