the first two times i tripped, in high school, and the third, my second year of college, were not undertaken with any amount of knowledge about set and setting. they were difficult, painful, edgy and weird. my body was on fire as my mind tried to stick around and cope with the situations i'd put myself in. i had no intention of ever doing it again.
then, a couple entered my life through a Green party meeting, and asked me to trip acid with them after we became friends. we tripped in a group of 6; the couple and their friends, who are now married, had tripped many times together and trusted each other like, well, family. the album, to which i have since tripped many times and always with amazing results, was tripping daisy's _jesus hits like the atom bomb_. we laid on sleeping bags, drank OJ, didn't try to talk or entertain each other or seem normal... just sunk lower and lower and slower and slower until... BANG. the shared space, the Beat, the Real Experience. none of us knew how to talk about it at the time, but my friend recalled later that at one point he opened his eyes to see if we were there with him... and at that exact moment ALL of us opened our eyes for the same reason... i peaked as i never have before or since in total bliss and release into the Beat (i say since because that reality has become my baseline on every drug :P). with some stuttering, almost every trip since (for nearly four years now...) has been a spiritual awakening, a humbling and empowering and gentle reminder that the world isn't Reality and Reality isn't so far away.
here's something i wrote to that same friend last night, my current description of what I understand or remember about the Beat:
there are two simultaneous realities, the square one and the Beat. the Beat fits all music and all instinctual movements. if you can settle down, and be genuine with several virtue-type words like hope, faith, gentle nature, childlike playfulness, etc... you will find the Beat. when you find the Beat, you wake up into your whole self, and are reinitiated into the club of old souls. uncanny things will happen which could be explained by coincidence, except that they happen more and more frequently. 'the look,' a physical acknowledgement of a shared space of love and recognition that is not telepathy but what i called Shary McRealinheimer once, will follow you. no matter how square you look, the Beat dances you and the Real Kids of the Sun will see you and welcome you home. it will happen more often if you look like a Freak, because they won't be as easily scared off. (acknowledging the reality of the Beat and the Share is difficult enough, coming out of the western brainpress, and getting up the courage to practice with strangers and loved ones is much harder still... difficult sounding like a nutter) some Kids are much better at 'the outloud version' and will readily acknowledge with body movements and mumbled words what is happening. some Kids remember the Beat (its existence, not its rhythm) all the time, and they make art to remind the rest of us. this surprise recognition thing is part of the Purpose or something. we, the old souls, the neutral angels, are secret agents with the shared mission of figuring out how to recognize one another as... elves, aliens, ninjas, muppets, cartoons... and form heaven through genuine communication, courageous acceptance of total freedom, and mutual responsibility.
god and the devil share the Secret Recogniition office in the Secret Purpose building. god's job is to make this recognition incredibly simple, and the devil's is to make it almost impossible. they pretty much set the whole thing in motion with the whole mushrooms vs. language thing, and now they play with bubbles all day and do cartwheels in the park. they have huge, hard eyes that pour out love.
animals stay in the Beat all the time, and they spot you too. little kids feel the Beat, too, and if we start them right and don't feed them a line about 'growing out of it' so they stop playing with reality and only play in their heads, they'll be much stronger than we are by our age. speaking of kids... the old souls stand like old trees in various proximities... those close to one another are trying across lifetimes to strengthen their links and bonds in preparation for the final merger, the square Circle... the people you are closest to seem to come out of nowhere and you feel like you've known them all your life; when you share the Beat with them you'll find this is quite apparently true. some Kids have been working together for aeons; they are real soulmates and find each other electrically, magically, with a POP, though whether this is easy or hard has maybe to do with karma and specific challenges the two need to work out. their act of creation is a square Circle, a fuck and an act of perfect Love, and the combination carried out in this spirit is a magic person, a naked cluemonkey, a wave of potential in the great WHOMPWHOMPWHOMP of the Beat. the Beat is mad, chaotic, frenzied, but also slower, softer and smoother than the square world. the Beat is Godhead, it is nothing, it is you and it makes square reality look like TV. it is the Real Experiencing the Real. it has layer and layers and layers of complexity but is totally simple.
just voices from the Beat, metaphors strung together, guesses and intuitions... responses welcome  i wonder sometimes if any of this stuff resonates with anyone else...
--------------------
in peace,
just footsteps
http://www.whyvegan.org
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