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Psychedelics and death.
    #3280961 -

My own experiences on psychedelics seem to suggest that death is "going home" permanently. ...That it is something to be welcomed with open arms when your time comes.

Now... I'm not saying we should all join Heaven's Gate.. but all signs seem to point to death being "the answer" we all seem to want to know. But.. at the same time I interpret it as being something that I am not supposed to know yet.

Death is like the ace up my sleeve in a game that never truly ends... I can either play it early and take the easy way out... (sure I might have "won", but at the cost of the faith in my abilities to play the game through without cheating.) or I can play the game fair and keep it in my sleeve until the day it falls out on it's own and I'm forcefully removed from the game by hired thugs.

This may seem like a strange metaphor, but think it through.

Did you see the movie K-Pax? At the end he dies.. but he dies at the same time that he repeatedly claimed his alien friends would be picking him up.

There is a boundary that we cannot cross without the commitment of truly letting go with no intent of ever coming back. To many, this means you're dead. You're buried in the ground, and you cease to exist mentally.

But no one truly knows, until it's their turn.

...I realize most of this is just rambling and somewhat inconsistent, but the basic thought I am trying to express here is that death could very well be massively mis-interpretted.

How can one claim a state of spiritual groundedness without acknowledging the mystery of death as being open-ended? How can anyone who goes around making statements on the assumed basis that death is a bad thing possibly be seeing things open-mindedly when it's one of the only things that is undeniably impossible for us to know for sure?

Would anyone care to share their own psychedelic experiences on the subject of death?

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281032 -

I would agree, I find it too much of a coincidence that a large mass of cells suddenly finds itself with a consciousness, then lives with it for ~90 years, then dies and this consciousness dies too. There is a spark somewhere that creates the human conscious. To think that it dies when our bodies die is silly. K-Pax was a good movie, and this situation is similar to that of the book The Little Prince. I do believe that there is another plane of existence that we have access to when our time comes. Making your time come early...well I think that would be a tragedy. There is much to be learned and gained from life in this plane, even if it is that all people suck (I don't necessarily agree, but this is one possible mindset of a suicidal person).

But yes, I do think that there are other realms of existence.


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"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281057 -

going to bead, so real short, but..
death is somewhat connected to the process of rotting?
as long as there are something to be conscious, a "intact shell" to return to, you live.
gona take on this tomorrow, love this topic

but for now, I'm gonna go die in by bed (just play along will ya :P)
exhale = dieing? mind??
inhale = living? body??

good night! hehe


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Disclaimer!?

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: dblaney]
    #3281122 -

Ah, but I think it's important to clarify the difference in our beliefs.

You've stated that you believe our consciousness must continue on after death.

What I'm saying is that I entertain the possibility of this being true, but do not necessarily materialize a belief in it. Instead, I see death as a big surprise. Maybe I'll continue on, and maybe I won't... either way, the suspense is killing me. Har har.

But seriously.. to state a belief of continued consciousness is the same (to me) as stating a belief of end of life at 'death'. I find both foolish, because we cannot know yet. One day we will know, but not yet.

The acceptance of not knowing is what allows one to put down the emotional attachments to death.

All too often people associate acceptance of not knowing with a nihilistic attitude of not trying.. but on the contrary, by accepting I do not know and will not find out until it is my turn, I effectively relieve myself of the burden of wondering one way or another. This actually allows me to live life more freely... instead of wondering to myself, "What's the point?" I've uncovered an even better question: "What do I want to be the point?"

Life's meaning is found in the acknowledgement of our own ability to find our own meaning.. which is often overlooked when we are busy thinking that we are going to find the 'true' (illusory term) meaning.

...Just wanted to clarify the difference between our beliefs before any self-proclaimed skeptics come in and lump all "believers" together into a bunch of UFO-chasing alien-huggers...

Not that I'm pointing any fingers. :smile:

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: Gomp]
    #3281126 -

Nice post jacques :laugh:

Those are pretty much my view when it comes to death, in that we have to let go of the desire to come back in order to fully emerge into whatever 'truth' it enlightens our consciousness to.

However, the idea of reincarnation comes into play. It's one of the concepts that I'm basically completely on the fence about, as the idea of it seems to tie into my experiences, but I have no direct reason to assume reincarnation exists. If it does though, then I think the act of truly letting go at death will be what leads to nirvana/heaven/enlightenment/*other vague label of the undescribable*.

I think the same thing can be done prior to bodily death, but it would be that much harder to let go of the connection to the body as well as the desires for survival and continuing experiences ect. Kind of like 'the door' thread I posted.

What's funny is that as much as we theorize about death and whatnot, the experience is inevitable for all of us (besides the immortal swami of course :smile:). The transition IS going to happen. WE are going to experience it in all of it's wonder or lack thereof. No matter what we think the truth is, we will all experience the actual truth soon.

To be honest, I'm a little curious  :slider:


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281142 -

Quote:
I realize most of this is just rambling and somewhat inconsistent, but the basic thought I am trying to express here is that death could very well be massively mis-interpretted



Death has deffinately got a bad reputation. Religions instill fear in us of the afterlife - judgement by a higher power or type of reincarnation, etc. on the other hand, science instills fear in us with its lack of afterlife, of ceasing to exist completely, and therefore the lack of purpose for living in the first place.

Quote:
My own experiences on psychedelics seem to suggest that death is "going home" permanently. ...That it is something to be welcomed with open arms when your time comes.



Mine too... Psychedelics and the notion of ego loss have helped me understand and accept the idea of physical death too...


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Turn on your lovelight, let it shine on me

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: deff]
    #3281179 -

deff said:
To be honest, I'm a little curious  :slider:


Me too man, me too. :smile:

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: lovelight]
    #3281189 -

I think it would be funny if when we died, it turned out to be a wild party of cosmic goodness. We'd die and then be all like, whoa, if I would have known it was this good I woulda got outta that damned body sooner! It would be like having a body and being alive was just some kind of short stage of experience, and it was almost a cosmic joke that we even took it seriously at all.

I get on this thought train a lot when tripping.

Good thread  :thumbup:


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: lovelight]
    #3281224 -

Indeed lovelight... I think it's worth noting that science and religion have both such deeply instilled fear of death in most people that we tend to, without thought, tag death with a "bad" tag when taking previously-assumed facts for granted.

If that's unclear, what I mean is like.. in any given conversational situation, death is often "assumed" to be bad. It is only in the occasional very specific conversation (such as this one) that we tend to consider otherwise by specifically targetting death as the subject of discussion.

The rest of the time our egos kick in and automatically tag death as "bad" when it is encountered in a less direct and awareness-inducing way, such as it being the secondary content of a statement.

If I'm still being unclear, I'm speaking of the difference between, for instance, this statement:

"Death may or may not be the end of our consciousness."

and this statement:

"Hey, did you hear bob died?"

When our brains encounter the second statement, the death part is handled by our ego and is automatically deemed bad without us even bothering to think about it.

These kinds of "programmings" can be difficult to deal with, but at the same time you can learn a lot about moving awareness into different emotional states from this kind of thing.

Perhaps the next time we hear that someone died we will sit and ponder where they might have gone with wonder, instead of just allowing our egos to push emotions of sadness on us.

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: chunder]
    #3281245 -

Hahaha.. yeah, I've thought that kind of thing before too.

It's thoughts like that that lead me to discourage people from viewing suicide as necessarily a negative.

Edit: P.S. Does your avatar have any meaning? I've always liked it. The contrast between the background texturing and the foreground object just makes my brain smile. :smile:

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281249 -

To be honest, I don't consider death automatically a bad thing.

I recognize that most people do, such as in your example.

But I just view it as an inevitable surprise :laugh:


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281252 -

I agree...no one living on this planet can be entirely certain. In fact, what I said earlier is nothing more than a hunch, a speculation. But in all honesty no one will know until it happens to them.

The ego is a very powerful thing...hence the necessity to not let it get out of hand by 'killing' it every once in a while...putting it in its place.

This is an interesting thread that touches on existentialism...which of course I love discussing, so I'll be back!


--------------------
"What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?"

"Belief is a beautiful armor
But makes for the heaviest sword"
- John Mayer

Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin.

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: deff]
    #3281273 -

Well to be honest, neither do I..

but I'm also willing to admit that there are definitely times when my ego is kicking stronger than my awareness, and at those times I tend to react to death negatively.

Besides, nothing sounds more arrogant than acting as if I am beyond my own advice.

My advice is aimed at others and myself... a form of reassurance of the direction in which I should be moving.

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281290 -

:smile:

Even those who fear death still die, so what's the point?


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: deff]
    #3281309 -

Why you askin' me? :wink:

Heheh.. I think we're on the same page...

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281347 -

Quote:
Perhaps the next time we hear that someone died we will sit and ponder where they might have gone with wonder, instead of just allowing our egos to push emotions of sadness on us.


Exactly...

Back to the psychedelics too: I think society would be better off in many ways if they explored these pearls of wisdom. Understanding death means understanding life better also... the negative notions and boundaries imposed on our culture would surely disappear.


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Turn on your lovelight, let it shine on me

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: JacquesCousteau]
    #3281367 -

I thought in K-Pax it turned out that there really was an alien but it had been possessing robert parkers body, and then the alien left robert parkers body and took one of the mental patients back to kpax...

how otherwise could you explain the video camera distortion and missing mental patient?


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: lovelight]
    #3281371 -

It was rhetorical :cool:

All this talk about death is making me hungry


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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: deff]
    #3281398 -

hahahha    eat some :mushroom2: :mushroom2: :mushroom2:

Edited by lovelight (10/26/04 08:10 PM)

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Re: Psychedelics and death. [Re: lovelight]
    #3281418 -

And at the same time get a new perspective on death!!


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