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SeventhRoad
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First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. 1
#26816861 - 07/11/20 09:25 AM (3 years, 6 months ago) |
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I took 12g of very fresh, un-dried cubensis, entirely small fruits, blended with lime juice. Took them about an hour after waking up in the early morning with a muffin and a cup of coffee. The whole trip lasted about 3 hours, with light hallucinations but no experiential changes persisting for about another 2 hours after that.
On the come-up I just wrote down changes in my perceptions on sticky notes, which started 20 minutes in. I won't include those in their entirety, but they had things like 'tingling,' 'afterimages!,' 'splotches of peripheral odd (not bad),' and 'must keep empty note to write my smart boy thoughts.'
After about an hour I headed to my living room and watched a documentary about the sun and tripped on that for a while. After 30 minutes of that I started turning introspective, and the insights started feeling pressing enough that I rushed to my computer and began typing. The following is basically stream of consciousness, including self-edits and reorganizing that all happened during that stream of consciousness. It's very left-wing and queer because I'm very left-wing and queer, so you may not want to read it if that sort of thing might set you off.
Quote:
Conservative thought in many ways comes from never having to recontextualize your lived experiences based on major life changes.
Those life changes still HAPPEN to conservatives, but they're given molds for them in advance - you met the love of your life, this is how a relationship SHOULD be, you've had children, this is how children SHOULD act, you're revisiting who you are, this is what you were BORN TO BE.
A lot of queer thought is about shattering those molds, which lets you take your unique lived experiences as a person and view them free of preconception, letting you place them into their own context and design your own molds for how they should be and where they should go. Part of libleft thought is that those molds shouldn't ever be ascribed to someone externally. They should be allowed to form their own molds of how they want their experiences to match together.
Tradition is safe, because it acts as a guide - when you're unsure of yourself and have a new experience that you don't know how to react to, it tells you what to do with it. It tells you how to fit it into What Things Are.
But it also stifles you - if you have an impulse to do something out of tradition, when you've lived your whole life according to tradition, it tells you that you're acting Against it, and that that's Wrong. And the more you've lived life according to that mold, the more your past experiences accord with the mold being good and making you happy. But the more you break free from it, the more new experiences you have telling you that your own judgment can be trusted, and your own judgment can lead to you being truly happy.
This is why my father is so resistant to admitting that the cops are part of a bad system. Because the system has been his life, and has been good to him, and he's been part of it, so opposing it would mean recontextualizing ALL of his old memories as something that happened to him AMID A SYSTEM EXTERNAL TO HIM, because he's never even had the opportunity to live a new experience that forced him to sift through his memories and dig apart what parts were HIM and what parts were things AROUND him. Because he's lived his whole life in one place and never needed to contrast himself with the mold he was given, he's never needed to not even take things for granted, but realize that there may be things _that he is taking for granted._
Later addition: Tradition can also form itself organically, because your own past experiences are also muddled with the past experiences of those you interact with, so if other people have lived their life according to the mold, breaking that would mean their lives may have been wrong, not just what you've been taught.
I think that's why people see things like veganism or trans people as a personal affront: they're examples of how something you've taken for granted can be a personal choice, and one into which you should apply some amount of thought. Experiencing these new things in the form of the people representing them is pushing you to have that new introspection all at once, so rather than shutting down until you've fully processed that new perspective, the only way you can keep going with what you were doing is by fending off the introspection altogether by rejecting its representation. And the more times you've done that, the more experiences you have telling you that rejecting that representation made you happy. This is how ideology ingrains itself. I originally wrote conservative ideology here, but this is true of any ideology, maybe even parts of my own. Rejecting new perspectives is intrinsically harmful to holding a holistically defensible personal ideology, since it's a sign that those new perspectives may undermine something you take for granted.
Fuck. Thank you mushrooms for recontextualizing my lived experience. What people have said in the past about shrooms splitting apart your memories and thoughts into their base components and letting you do the work of interlinking them yourself is absolutely true.
Hallucination is a side effect of the main effect of psychedelics: they allow you to perceive your own interpretation of the world. The dosage only influences the intensity at which this happens (and whether it overtakes external stimuli), and the characteristics of various kinds of trip are just from the other side effects of the substance. Shroom trips are more relaxed because they mellow you like weed. LSD trips are more intense and spiky because they don't.
The come-up of a trip is where you allow things to happen to your mind, in the form of sensation and experience, and the come-down is where you regain the ability to have more coherent abstract thought, which lets you fit the come-up into a narrative. That's what I think...all of this is.
People look to cosmic explanations or conspiracies to give meaning to a world they can't otherwise contextualize. It's a pattern matched as a defense mechanism between the conflict between the mind's natural demand for meaning and a perceived meaninglessness borne out of either the actual amoral meaninglessness of the universe or just out of ignorance for how things actually came to be the way they are (or a conflict between what someone knows to be true from tradition and perceived reality). Conspiracy and cosmic patterns are the mind making sense of experiences out of whack with what past experience expects, reinforced by ideas others may provide.
This kind of massive manifesto is frustrating because these are all insights that must have occurred to anyone else who's taken psychedelics, but they feel so profound to a first timer because they're the first time this new perspective is even perceptible. I'm sure they'll read as fun when I'm sober, or especially to friends who haven't tripped. Hell, they'll even agree. But there's no substitute for the experience of having perceived your own interpretation, judgment, and opinion of your surroundings as a stimulus as direct as any other sense. You can't apply judgment to your own judgment effectively until it comes into your mind this directly. Until then it's like imagining how you'd act in a situation you've never been in.
Edited by SeventhRoad (07/11/20 09:43 AM)
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MrTinAZ
If only I knew



Registered: 07/01/20
Posts: 138
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: SeventhRoad]
#26816986 - 07/11/20 10:34 AM (3 years, 6 months ago) |
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As a social sciences teacher, I was curious to read this but I will admit I was equally expecting to facepalm. A lot of time when people use words like leftist/rightest (or variations) and "manifesto" it is just a bunch of indoctrinated garble telling people "the right way" things should be or how things should be done, or basically explaining their ideology in a way that implies it is superior.
Perhaps this is because of 2 issues with manifestos that yours does not have, which could be in large because of the mushies. SELF & identity politics: we know that mushrooms allow people to see broader perspectives and less stuck on the ego and concept of self. Many manifestos get stuck on a variety of issues focusing on self & ego, or on telling others what is best to do which in my mind also comes from a sense of self. You speak of self in a constructive way free of ego.
Most manifestos are usually centered around identity politics, either advocating for 1 group plan or 1 group power that "would do better". Your writing does not do that at all which is great. You pretty much only focus on yourself, and your own place in a way that encourages others to do the same.
It might sound simple enough, but writing this kind of stuff without it being shaped by ego or sounding like it is advocating one way over another is not easy. Well done.
"This is why my father is so resistant to admitting that the cops are part of a bad system. Because the system has been his life, and has been good to him, and he's been part of it..."
This quote was particularly powerful and I agree with it. In addition to the challenge of recontextualizing I'd like to expand on what you said about the system has been good to him:
That is the EXACT reason racism and discrimination exist, and it is sad so many people are blind to it. Culture existed 500-1000 years ago but the concept of race did not, we created the concept of race to justify actions that we would not be OK with doing to other human equals. We do not consider hunting to be murder, we consider it to just be us doing what we need to do to eat. White society has mostly evolved to realizing killing a black man is murder, but as we see some have not gotten there. This is the easy kind of stuff to spot but the systemic oppression is much more veiled and nuanced, and your quote is a great indication of that.
If the system of oppression did not benefit some people then it likely would have been ended or diminished but a lot of people don't understand that. Kids think racism is about words and hate and don't realize it is built on money and oppression 1st, THEN came the hate and justification.
People didn't start hating others 1st and THEN creating oppressive systems to ensure they profit more than those people. People started off sticking to their own cultural groups but not being as hateful, but once they started profiting off of other cultures they had to develop hate and oppression. These kinds of people think of themselves as "good people/(good christians oftentimes)and that it is OK to do what they do since they only do it to people "less than them" but not to their "equals".
BTW I am NOT saying your father is a racist, oppressive, or hateful person. I am showing how oppression started and is perpetuated. People older than us have been indoctrinated to think if you are nice to other people you are not a racist. When I was in middle and high school they taught us like America had overcome racism and oppression and was this great place for all people now where everyone is treated equally. I believed it until I was an adult and looked around. Once one's eyes are opened it is very clear that people who don't think racist/oppressive thoughts can still support an oppressive system without even realizing it because they are conditioned to accept and keep the status-quo since it benefits them & their people.
Ask anyone if they want equality and most people say yes, but if the cost for it was that they have to do work labor for extra hours to make it happen or give up 5% of their paycheck they would say no.
Edited by MrTinAZ (07/11/20 10:36 AM)
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Psicomb



Registered: 01/13/18
Posts: 4,635
Loc: the womb
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: SeventhRoad]
#26816991 - 07/11/20 10:38 AM (3 years, 6 months ago) |
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Sounds like as magnificent of a 1st trip as it could've been. Much appreciated that you wrote down all these thoughts.
Psychedelics and patterns in political/philosophical thinking amongst users has always been really interesting to me.. you know, whether or not we can really get people to "turn on" and make radical social changes in society.
On the flip side, though, is the people who go down the other side of the spectrum and develop a larger sense of paranoia about the community and a desire to keep society controlled/managed and their psychedelic use amplifies those thoughts and feelings and seems to cement that way of thinking further.
This is all observation, though, and may not be super accurate
Edit: really great post too TinAZ, thanks for typing all that
--------------------
When we constantly pull things apart trying to see how it works, we may end up with only an understanding of how to destroy something - nick sand
Edited by Psicomb (07/11/20 10:41 AM)
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SeventhRoad
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: Psicomb]
#26817076 - 07/11/20 11:06 AM (3 years, 6 months ago) |
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Looking back at the manifesto now that I'm fully sober, I think "leftist" might also be inaccurate - most of what I rant about is an opposition to an externally-defined self, often found in authoritarianism, rather than to more right-wing ideology (the enforcement of some kind of societal hierarchy), even if the two often go hand in hand.
@TinAZ I'm flattered by the praise - I think about this kind of thing quite a lot, and examining society as an interaction of human-based systems and people's reaction to them has always been more illuminating than thinking about things as the combination of billions of individual decisions (which seems to be how folks without the opportunity to view their experiences free of context often approach society).
I appreciate your clarity, but my father absolutely has plenty racist beliefs. The distinction between that and his personal conception of 'a racist' is definitely a difference of degree rather than character, which I think is true of most people who view racism/bigotry as done largely/exclusively by loud, proud Nazi-adjacent types.
I'm also aware that the stuff I wrote is a sort of overly-academic perspective on the more spiritual feelings I've read in a lot of other trip reports: the idea of the self as a gestalt of individual experiences upon a blank slate isn't especially distinct from the idea that we all are connected or that we all come from the same place. There's no meaningful distinction between individual experiences and our interactions with each other.
Edited by SeventhRoad (07/11/20 11:07 AM)
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MrTinAZ
If only I knew



Registered: 07/01/20
Posts: 138
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: Psicomb]
#26817079 - 07/11/20 11:07 AM (3 years, 6 months ago) |
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Quote:
On the flip side, though, is the people who go down the other side of the spectrum and develop a larger sense of paranoia about the community and a desire to keep society controlled/managed and their psychedelic use amplifies those thoughts and feelings and seems to cement that way of thinking further.
That is a very interesting point, there certainly are always the people that seem to "know" the answers no matter what, and seem to find ways to reinforce their beliefs regardless of the situation or validity. I won't say they are "wrong" because that is as subjective as them "knowing", but I think it is OK for us to accept many things are more fluid and less concrete than we realize.
Rufus, the character Kevin Smith wrote for Chris Rock in the movie Dogma, says it even better than I ever could:
Bethany: "So you're saying that having beliefs is a bad thing?" Rufus: "I just think it's better to have an idea. You can change an idea; changing a belief is trickier. People die for it, people kill for it. The whole of existence is in jeopardy right now because of the Catholic belief system in this Plenary Indulgence bullshit. Bartleby and Loki, whether they know it or not, are exploiting that belief, and if they're successful, you, me, all of this ends in a heartbeat. All over a belief".
Edited by MrTinAZ (07/14/20 05:03 PM)
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Gayfish
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: MrTinAZ]
#26866342 - 08/06/20 11:46 AM (3 years, 5 months ago) |
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Man. This was a heavy read for an uneducated fellow such as myself lol. Thanks for taking your time to write it up, and share it.
In an attempt to simplify this so I can try to understand it, we are a result of the experiences that we’ve experienced. And a lot of people don’t have the freedom or time or intuition or whatever, to step back from this collection of experiences and analyze it from an outside perspective? Doing so they would realize their beliefs are just an indoctrination that they’ve accepted as fact, because from their view of reality, it is fact (it’s what they’ve experienced)?
Assuming I’m slightly on track (forgive me if I’m not, like I said it was a tough read for an uneducated noob lol), isn’t this a slight variant of nature vs nurture? And how exactly does this fit into the argument that anything is innate (such as being gay, trans, into bdsm/various other kinks/fetishes). From what I understand, majority of the people associated with those communities believe that what they experience comes from within. For example: “I’m gay because I am. It came from within. It had nothing to do with external factors.”. Following the earlier train of thought, couldn’t it be argued that being gay (or straight) is just a result of external experiences that the person in question had no control over? We’re born into this world and experience things out of our control for at least the first 5 years of life, wouldn’t some of these experiences shape the person that someone becomes?
Again, please forgive first and foremost my arrogance or lack of understanding, and secondly my terrible grammar lol. This post comes from a place of questioning and curiosity, NOT out of hate, so please forgive me if I failed at representing that correctly.
-------------------- We don’t make sense around here, we make dollars
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MrTinAZ
If only I knew



Registered: 07/01/20
Posts: 138
Loc: slightly north of Mexico
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Re: First trip, I guess I wrote up a leftist manifesto. 1.2g dried equivalent cubensis. [Re: Gayfish]
#26866794 - 08/06/20 04:26 PM (3 years, 5 months ago) |
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You would have to ask the OP to elaborate on what he wrote because I can't speak for him and the meaning of his writing other than my interpretation.
But as far as nature vs nurture: perhaps it can be both? Us humans really like absolutes but things don't always work that way. For example: Why does Darwin's theory disprove the existence of a god? Sure it might invalidate the bible just throwing people down on earth, but it doesn't mean that simple cells and different things weren't put here by a god and that those developed into humans due to a framework created by a greater power. I am not saying that is what happened I have absolutely no clue but I am just using it as an example of how the human mind and society seems to prefer one extreme or the other in regards to ideology rather than moderation or combination of things.
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