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enviablecoc
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Creeping insanity.
#28633776 - 01/24/24 08:15 PM (3 days, 12 hours ago) |
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I have so far done mushrooms once and lsd a handful of times, but a common theme especially on my first few trips was faces full of malice peering at me from dark corners, claws reaching out and scratching at my mind. I'm usually capable of dispelling these entities, but I always get the sinking feeling that if I slip up my mind will be lost forever.
Has anyone else experienced anything similar? Their presence has lessened with recent trips, but curiosity regarding their nature prevails. I wonder what they mean symbolically or otherwise.
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Blue Cthulhu
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I highly recommend researching “Jungian shadow work” and starting from the premise that they represent aspects of your own self that have been repressed from and early age, and cast into shadow.
In addition, the fear of insanity is common/normal when tripping because psychedelics have the tendency to dissolve barriers within the mind, cause time dilation, and impair short term memory such that our very sense of self and cohesiveness of self is threatened. There’s a reason that early LSD researchers classified LSD as a “psychotomimetic” meaning that it induces an experience that mimics psychosis.
And it’s also true that we can grow more comfortable with the psychedelic space, especially with a secure set and setting.
One time I was at Phish show and an old guy was going around selling LSD with the marketing pitch: “Doses! Doses! Lose your mind, and get it back again Doses!” And I chuckled. Because it’s both what we fear and crave.
-------------------- "Things are true that I forget, but no one taught that to me yet." A disembodied-re-embodied consciousness be-ing (With all the accoutrements.)
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enviablecoc
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I'm familiar with jung and the concept of the shadow, but I'm not sure what I might be repressing. I've retrieved some lost memories while tripping recently so I suppose I'll just continue and see what I find.
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Blue_Lux
τό κᾰτᾰπεπτωκός φροντιστής



Registered: 12/07/19
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That is not what Jung meant by shadow. This is the most botched piece of his work, and unfortunately the most popular ideas, the ones spread and idlely mentioned, about it are false.
-------------------- ☆✮★⋆I ♡ the music, not the bling⋆★✮☆ https://rictornorton.co.uk/eighteen/1730news.htm 𝔦𝔫 𝔫𝔬𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔢 𝔟𝔬𝔫𝔦 𝔭𝔢𝔰𝔰𝔦𝔪𝔦 𝔪𝔞𝔩𝔬𝔯𝔲𝔪 𝔣𝔦𝔲𝔫𝔱 May I ask what your bud type is? ❂ LXIV⁶⁴AMOR ❂Profundæ lātissimæque vēritātēs amandæ sunt, sīc ideo necesse est: rēs maxima amanda est; pōtus sit is bene scīmus cum nōs id adeō explet, cum altō hīc movet īmus: rēs maxima omnis amor.
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enviablecoc
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Blue_Lux]
#28634492 - 01/25/24 01:05 PM (2 days, 19 hours ago) |
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What is it exactly then? As I've understood it it's everything we repress as not being ideal for the ego. Like primal urges that conflict with social demands and whatnot, I could see unwanted memories being a logical extension of this unless I'm mistaken about the entire concept.
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Blue_Lux
τό κᾰτᾰπεπτωκός φροντιστής



Registered: 12/07/19
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Maybe read Jung and find out?
-------------------- ☆✮★⋆I ♡ the music, not the bling⋆★✮☆ https://rictornorton.co.uk/eighteen/1730news.htm 𝔦𝔫 𝔫𝔬𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔢 𝔟𝔬𝔫𝔦 𝔭𝔢𝔰𝔰𝔦𝔪𝔦 𝔪𝔞𝔩𝔬𝔯𝔲𝔪 𝔣𝔦𝔲𝔫𝔱 May I ask what your bud type is? ❂ LXIV⁶⁴AMOR ❂Profundæ lātissimæque vēritātēs amandæ sunt, sīc ideo necesse est: rēs maxima amanda est; pōtus sit is bene scīmus cum nōs id adeō explet, cum altō hīc movet īmus: rēs maxima omnis amor.
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redgreenvines
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Registered: 04/08/04
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what you experience in life, and in movies, (there are a ton of scary movies that hordes of people love to watch), all of it goes into your memory.
what comes out while stoned is not other than what is in there.
Often when I see some new kind of gore I say sarcastically "I really needed to see that, and now I will never forget it."
basically garbage in garbage out.
I would not make a big deal about what comes out, just observe and continue on your way.
--------------------
_ 🧠 _
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Blue Cthulhu
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Blue_Lux]
#28634727 - 01/25/24 04:56 PM (2 days, 15 hours ago) |
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Quote:
Blue_Lux said: That is not what Jung meant by shadow. This is the most botched piece of his work, and unfortunately the most popular ideas, the ones spread and idlely mentioned, about it are false.
I've been to quite a few Jungian seminars at the Jung Foundation in NYC. The popular ideas out there are actually quite close to the mark. I think there are some that would prefer his ideas to be esoteric and accessible to only a few... but the shadow is a very basic concept. Based on a dream he had of seeing his own literal shadow.
“shadow is that hidden, repressed, for the most part inferior and guilt-laden personality whose ultimate ramifications reach back into the realm of our animal ancestors…If it has been believed hitherto that the human shadow was the source of evil, it can now be ascertained on closer investigation that the unconscious man, that is his shadow does not consist only of morally reprehensible tendencies, but also displays a number of good qualities, such as normal instincts, appropriate reactions, realistic insights, creative impulses etc “ [CW9 paras 422 & 423].
So, clearly the shadow IS what is repressed. So OP pursuing memories that are resurfacing could most definitely help him unlock feelings, drives, etc. that are repressed.
-------------------- "Things are true that I forget, but no one taught that to me yet." A disembodied-re-embodied consciousness be-ing (With all the accoutrements.)
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Aldebaran
Psilo-Scribe



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Quote:
a common theme especially on my first few trips was faces full of malice peering at me from dark corners, claws reaching out and scratching at my mind.
I've often found that mushrooms have a slightly sinister vibe, as you drift sideways into some strange realm of the unknown. Your description reminded me of some imagery from an old trip journal:
Quote:
Hands pressed underneath the concrete torches shining into dark cellars animal heads Not sure I like this.....

The whole vibe of creeping insanity and things "scratching at your mind" is very Lovecraftian:
Quote:
The one test of the really weird is simply this—whether or not there be excited in the reader a profound sense of dread, and of contact with unknown spheres and powers; a subtle attitude of awed listening, as if for the beating of black wings or the scratching of outside shapes and entities on the known universe’s utmost rim.
(from Lovecraft's Supernatural Horror in Literature)
Quote:
Has anyone else experienced anything similar? Their presence has lessened with recent trips, but curiosity regarding their nature prevails. I wonder what they mean symbolically or otherwise.
My closed-eye-visuals on a good dose usually start off with random scenes and then resolve into a 3D space of weird glowing, moving abstract structures set against an inky black backdrop. I always thought they seemed like a vast underground space, an abyss, almost like an alien realm of the dead. The strong feeling of the presence of something other, some looming numinous presence, is another thing that comes from higher doses.
A quote that resonates with these experiences is "The unconscious feels to the ego like an alien visitor, an other within the psyche" (from a free ebook on the unconscious and creativity by Matt Cardin).
After many trips I've started to think of this vast underground space as "the chthonic realms of the unconscious" and I'm only half joking.
I feel as though psychedelics blur the usual boundaries within the "psyche." Unconscious processes begin to bleed into waking consciousness. The imagery can start off fairly random, but as a strong trip takes hold the images become charged with an ominous significance, signs that point the way to where you are heading. From another trip journal:
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I can feel this starting to kick-in a bit, like staring into the back of a dimly lit club. An ominous feeling that new realms are opening up. CEV – snakes, animal skins, slithering. The white light shining out of a club doorway, graffiti dissolving into patterns of snakes, psychedelic fish. However much you expect the visuals to arrive, they can seem threatening when they do.

Even after reading an introduction to Jung's work I'd hesitate to say exactly what he meant by some of his concepts, but I think a psychedelic trip illustrates the general idea of the psyche incorporating more than you normally think of as "me." I think you encounter these other parts of your psyche, things filtering in from the unconscious, and they present themselves as something unsettling and totally "other."
Or to put it another way, I like a phrase I heard on the Weird Studies podcast: "...it's all in your mind, it's just that your mind is a lot bigger than you think."
Lovecraft talked about entities scratching on the rim of the universe, but I tend to think of his stories as expressing something about the strangeness of inner space, the chthonic realms of the unconscious...
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I'm usually capable of dispelling these entities, but I always get the sinking feeling that if I slip up my mind will be lost forever.
There's a lot of truth to the "Lose your mind, and get it back again" phrase in the post by Blue Cthulhu:
Quote:
Blue Cthulhu wrote: There’s a reason that early LSD researchers classified LSD as a “psychotomimetic” meaning that it induces an experience that mimics psychosis. And it’s also true that we can grow more comfortable with the psychedelic space, especially with a secure set and setting.
I'd go as far as saying that tripping at high doses involves "getting comfortable with psychosis," where reaching a moderate, lucid level of insanity (not walking in the street naked claiming to be Jesus) is part of the programme - you just need to be careful with the dose and not push it too far or too fast. It's about recalibrating your sense of fun and realizing that there is no need to panic, it's supposed to be like that. Losing your mind is half the fun.

My general advice for going insane on shrooms (assuming you are in a good setting) is to let yourself be consumed by the trip or whatever it presents itself as, and this sinister "other" you are trying to avoid turns out to be a part of a greater whole that shifts the trip from a nightmarish descent into the maelstrom, towards an unexpectedly blissful resolution. In other words, the nightmare you are trying to escape, and the bliss you may be seeking within the trip, turn out to be the same thing. The way out is the way in.

I found that an inevitable consequence of raising the dose from one trip to another, chasing better visuals or trying to go further into each trip, was that at some point you reach that sinking feeling of panic where you've gone too far, everything feels wrong and you are faced with something you have no idea how to handle. Be reassured that plenty of people have been there before you and come back to tell the tale. From an old trip report:
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I tried to jot down descriptions of my CEVs, but they were spiralling out of control. I closed my eyes and immediately felt as though I was falling asleep, moving down some kind of tunnel where I was attacked by wild dogs. I opened my eyes again very quickly.
My CEV seemed to occur even with my eyes open, as my imagination blended with my normal vision.
...At this point the trip was coming on incredibly strong. I had a vision in my CEV of an elevator crashing down onto my head. It's the kind of dose where part of me was thinking “make it go away!” and another part of me was enjoying it and thinking “if you don't like it, don't do it.”
...My hands looked blood red and alien. I felt hungry and detached from reality, and from somewhere came the idea that “I just ate myself.” My imagination was soaring, like a machine that I was controlling. I had visions of gliding above a landscape, looking for myself, like some giant bird of prey. It was as though a beast had just woken up within me, flexing its claws, and was obliterating me from within.
It felt as though I was experiencing the afterlife, Egyptian style. I imagined waking up in a tomb, with miraculous powers, and clawing my way out. My notes make repeated reference to the fact that “I have claws” and that “this is the Onderwereld” (underworld) and that I just ate myself. I was staggered by the power of the trip – I seemed to be traversing some other realm inside my head. A typical passage from my notebook:
“You really need to experience this. Onderwereld. This is the undeath. This is your afterlife. This is the mortar between the stones of your tombs. This is the stuff that dreams are made of. This is the end. This is the beginning. This is the weapon. This is the girl. This is an indirect way to experience Egypt. This is an indirect way to experience yourself.”
I reached a point during the trip that I get to sometimes – where both life and death are theme park rides taking place inside some kind of colossal Godlike machine that creates reality as we know it. It was as though I had been obliterated and absorbed into this fantastic machine...
-------------------- I wrote that, but I meant something else
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Blue Cthulhu
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Aldebaran]
#28634882 - 01/25/24 07:10 PM (2 days, 13 hours ago) |
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Wow, beautiful post Aldebaran. Very cool to see excerpts from your trip journal. The parts about eating yourself remind me of experiences I have had (and seem to be having with more frequency, recently) of the image of the ouroboros - the snake/dragon eating its own tail. The merging of the crown chakra with the root. A symbol of infinity, of endless energy recycling itself, and the merging of Heaven with Earth.
Also, as long as we're referencing literature now (love the invocation of Lovecraft), your statement about Quote:
a nightmarish descent into the maelstrom
reminds me of a favorite of mine of Edgar Allen Poe's: https://poestories.com/read/descent
Maybe should be required reading before shrooming? lol
-------------------- "Things are true that I forget, but no one taught that to me yet." A disembodied-re-embodied consciousness be-ing (With all the accoutrements.)
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enviablecoc
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Aldebaran]
#28634931 - 01/25/24 08:06 PM (2 days, 12 hours ago) |
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This was a lovely read.
Quote:
The way out is the way in.
I've understood this intuitively on some level, but you all made the connection for me, I appreciate it.
I will continue to delve deeper, and let the claws of the self that scares me rake across my mind. Thank you all for the insights.
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markbuckingham
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Try smoking a tobacco cigarette.
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markbuckingham
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Try smoking a cigarette. Mark
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enviablecoc
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Like while tripping?
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Blue_Lux
τό κᾰτᾰπεπτωκός φροντιστής



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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Aldebaran]
#28635000 - 01/25/24 08:55 PM (2 days, 11 hours ago) |
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That was one of the most invested ones ive seen. Kudos
-------------------- ☆✮★⋆I ♡ the music, not the bling⋆★✮☆ https://rictornorton.co.uk/eighteen/1730news.htm 𝔦𝔫 𝔫𝔬𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔢 𝔟𝔬𝔫𝔦 𝔭𝔢𝔰𝔰𝔦𝔪𝔦 𝔪𝔞𝔩𝔬𝔯𝔲𝔪 𝔣𝔦𝔲𝔫𝔱 May I ask what your bud type is? ❂ LXIV⁶⁴AMOR ❂Profundæ lātissimæque vēritātēs amandæ sunt, sīc ideo necesse est: rēs maxima amanda est; pōtus sit is bene scīmus cum nōs id adeō explet, cum altō hīc movet īmus: rēs maxima omnis amor.
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CHUCK.HNTR
feral urbanite



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Posts: 2,254
Loc: SF, CA, USA
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Blue_Lux]
#28635001 - 01/25/24 08:57 PM (2 days, 11 hours ago) |
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Cool thread haven’t thought about Lovecraft or Poe in a minute
-------------------- "What is the practical application of a million universes?" -Alan Watts
   
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CHUCK.HNTR
feral urbanite



Registered: 09/30/19
Posts: 2,254
Loc: SF, CA, USA
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Quote:
markbuckingham said: Try smoking a tobacco cigarette.
Tobacco can be grounding Mapacho (nicotiana rustica) is the best for that
-------------------- "What is the practical application of a million universes?" -Alan Watts
   
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Blue_Lux
τό κᾰτᾰπεπτωκός φροντιστής



Registered: 12/07/19
Posts: 2,146
Loc: chillin' on Charon's skiff
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Smoke some dokha out of a midwakh
-------------------- ☆✮★⋆I ♡ the music, not the bling⋆★✮☆ https://rictornorton.co.uk/eighteen/1730news.htm 𝔦𝔫 𝔫𝔬𝔪𝔦𝔫𝔢 𝔟𝔬𝔫𝔦 𝔭𝔢𝔰𝔰𝔦𝔪𝔦 𝔪𝔞𝔩𝔬𝔯𝔲𝔪 𝔣𝔦𝔲𝔫𝔱 May I ask what your bud type is? ❂ LXIV⁶⁴AMOR ❂Profundæ lātissimæque vēritātēs amandæ sunt, sīc ideo necesse est: rēs maxima amanda est; pōtus sit is bene scīmus cum nōs id adeō explet, cum altō hīc movet īmus: rēs maxima omnis amor.
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enviablecoc
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Interesting, I smoke cigarettes, pipes and cigars on occasion. Never while tripping though. I'll try it.
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enviablecoc
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Re: Creeping insanity. [Re: Blue_Lux]
#28635012 - 01/25/24 09:05 PM (2 days, 11 hours ago) |
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Why these specifically?
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