Corpus

Of course you don't understand because you don't get visuals with DMT, so how could you? Just be open to the possibility that the experiences you have had cannot inform you of the DMT breakthroughs' visual component and salience because it is inconceivable. Being meditative when confronted with this is a different scenario to being meditative under the more commonly used psychedelics, or 5 MeO DMT. Concluding its due to over-thinking, and worrying about visuals seems a little premature. We appear to be communicating at cross-purposes and will continue to do so because we do not share the experience in common to discuss. No worries.

The profoundness of DMT is not in question- but the clarity and other-worldliness of the visual effects (which would require massive doses of other agents like LSD to achieve, upwards of 1mg) IS intrinsic to the profundity. This is consciousness expansion with/as objects, and this form you have not experienced. "Seem to be stuck on visuals"- a nice Leo-ism, accusatory and unfalsifiable, yet the point remains- you cannot state how DMT with breakthrough visuals affect the trip until you have been there. "Lots of visuals" may or may not be sufficiently akin to DMT visuals for you to know, and the "obscuring" I mentioned (in quotations) could also be referred to as a modulation. In retrospect, this would have been a better turn of phrase. @KingEnergy But have you really lost your entire reality to visuals? Try vaporizing a breakthrough dose with headphones on/music playing. You may find that your notion of "entire reality" is limited. I dunno if I am making my points clearly enough- profound visuals provided by DMT are intrinsic to the experience and by their captivating nature allow subtleties to be overlooked.

If you don't get visuals with DMT as you claim, then you are assuming how profound and insightful this kind of DMT trip is ie for the majority. You don't need to persuade me- psychedelics stamp on the face of meditation then grind its nose to a bloody deformed mess with its heel but the expanded consciousness on vaporized DMT is so intertwined with the eye-candy that unless one uses it in very particular ways, the expanded consciousness gets "obscured". Unless one has had the visually-dominated DMT experience any utterances are just imagined/ speculation.

I'm not sure its quite so clear-cut. Insights gained on psychedelics, with the clarity and "wow-factor" they impart, inevitably fade and in some people nil remains of consequence whereas others can retain the sense of the insight. Having additional practices such as meditation can also re-impart the same insights but more blandly, thus subtly fostering a sense of disappointment at the realization- because you have a more glamorous version to contrast it with. Thus the magnitude of the insight gained without psychedelics is in some way diminished by psychedelic use. Leo says DMT doesn't give him visuals and I have no reason to disbelieve this, although he has never made clear his dosage range/ preferred ROA/number of inhalations taken; for the overwhelming majority of NN DMT users, the experience is a riot of visual content and thus, IMO, almost the antithesis of meditation.

What do you mean/understand by the term "consciousness"? Without being clear about this, your question lacks precision. Often people can muddle up "consciousness" (which they have not defined sufficiently to guide their enquiry) with "sentience". The two terms are distinct.

I could answer this in several ways- and these too would be distinctions. If I was minded to be "non-dual", "I" could say "Nothing" or "That" or "Consciousness". I could also say the perceptive apparatus which is another distinction. Or I could admit that I don't know. Nevertheless, whichever of the 3 options suggested, consciousness is not separate from any of them. These bloody distinctions are the whole of what is experienced- there is no escape….

I think the autostereogram is quite handy for considering concept vs distinction and is pretty apt for this thread. Concept- visualizing a 3D illusion from a 2D image - but be alert to the fact that this concept is "composed of a series" of distinctions. Distinction- to precede the Concept, look at the following and get it. If you don't get it then the concept remains a concept; if you do get it then the distinction is "created" in your experience.

This thread is getting hilarious. Let me add to it. Those bloody British oppressed and humiliated the beauty of Indias glorious Hindu tradition by preventing widow-immolation, which, as all truly enlightened Hindu traditionalists would agree, misses the point because the flesh and the fire are One, and were never separate. (all said with extreme sarcasm, so forgive me). More seriously, don't others see the impassioned labelling and judging going on here- from all sides? Shift the thread to the politics section because it seems more to fit there.

The tentacles of culture enwrap you, binding you to a position,; the winning culture erases the others underpinnings and determines a narrative until it too is displaced. Nazi-ism is not hard to understand as an arising when a proud nation which reveres itself and its history undergoes the humiliation of losing a world war and the woes it suffers to its image and its material state. Kind of like an ego-backlash with overshoot. This oscillation is evident throughout all aspects of history with its changing fortunes, and any era is always dependant on what precedes and also surrounds it. Non-duality in action.

@tsuki Thanks.

@tsuki -could I ask you to clarify this? Could you elaborate on what is meant by physically?(3rd line). How does that relate to "manifest form"? (4th line). Is the table a table if it is not seen (ie before the distinction is made?).

Thanks for putting my unfounded suspicions to rest.

Could it be as simple as them identifying on some level with their Hindu identity and their unrecognised approval of Trump who after all seems to have an affinity for the BJP, the somewhat extreme HINDU outfit in charge of their home nation?

I have only experienced the whiteout via vaporization. ROA is important to consider ie I refer to this mode only and cannot speak about whiteouts via plugging/snorting. The whiteout is definitely too much to really "appreciate" the non-dual gift 5 MeO offers in all its majesty. Martin Ball would concur with what I say but he too is one who vapes the stuff. 8mg via vaporization can be as much/little as one needs and for vaping is the dose I would recommend starting at, and working up in 0.5mg aliquots till ones sweet spot is reached.

Perhaps try reducing the dose a little. Whiteouts IME are suggestive of overshooting.

This is a real headfuck of an enquiry, IMO. Could it be that reality is perspectival, and that from the perspective of "behind the eyes" the eyes and any mechanism of vision are not seen, eg seeing becomes direct? Hence, the mechanism of vision is only observed from a perspective outside of the "personal", and conceptualised as explaining vision through a range of what remain visual experiences (in the observer thus placed) eg light hitting cones etc, allowing a workable appearance of vision (as neural correlates) to be gleaned?

How can "you" be unaware of your thoughts? Awareness doesn't need thoughts, but thoughts and awareness of them is a package deal. Its just that you, as you take yourself to be, is not the one who is "doing the awareness".

As well as being a true family man, Charles Manson made an album of music which, I think, suggests he knew a thing or two.

Have you ever considered becoming a senior executive in the UKs NHS? You could cut down the waiting list dramatically, but you might have a few complaints to deal with.

"Reliable scientific results" is a mandatory addendum but all prevailing scientific results which inform practise are regarded as reliable- until they are not. But I understand your point. Knowledge always changes, and academics know that, but remain constrained by the current state of this changing landscape and the giants upon whose shoulders they stand have no skin in the game requiring them to turn about-face. To view things from a radical new direction is something science finds hard to do; it has some in-built methodological flaws in which building on what has come before seems the easier option. I would say the process of acquiring a doctorate in anything would, if anything, present a barrier to personal enlightenment as the process of "self-construction" it entails means more deconstructing to do. Such academic achievements mean nothing to enlightening anyone else, as you rightly say.

All genetic and environmental factors? That is a gross assumption; much remains unknown. Burnout is real and stems in part from knowing that you are unable to do your job to the best of your ability due to time constraints and pressures of workload. If one is happy consciously doing a bullshit job and can sleep at night in light of these limiting factors you will stave off/avoid burnout more successfully. Healthcare jobs in the current times are not what people imagine, and cause many casualties amongst those who have given much of their life, efforts and attention to trying to ease the woes of the populace. (DOI- I am a doctor).

To reach the "vaulted" position of academic in a university you need to largely tether yourself into the limitation of a paradigm of what is accepted amongst the faculty and be able to parrot it with verve. Open-mindedness and a willingness to expand ones outlook are more often than not detrimental to the progression of ones career- which ultimately is what pays the bills and becomes the foremost consideration.

This is what we should all take from Leo, for despite his attempts to describe what he has experienced he is unable to do so. The honesty here is refreshing and perhaps he should take his own advice and stop attempting to do what he has admitted he is incapable of doing. Do the work and clarity will come although in fits and starts.

Tripping is very nuanced, and there are so many variables as mentioned here^ above. The OP refers to undeveloped people, the reply quoted mentions immature people but these are judgements which overlook the key fact that how the tripper holds themselves to be is just as relevant. What is their hedonic tone ie what has life been like for them in the days up to the trip, and its effect on their underlying state of ease/disquiet? What does "a spiritual experience" mean to them at their current level of understanding, and are they open to not allowing these notions to shape how they interpret what they experience whilst tripping? The setting, including "Ayahuasca retreats" with mature experienced people will also have an effect on the trip which again relates to the trippers pre-conceived notions and ability to relinquish or simply exchange them for the beliefs of those present and "providing the flavour" of the setting. Psychedelics work on what you bring to the table, and how tightly (or otherwise) this is held on to; they also produce a condition of such openness that manipulation (which can be intended or not) can readily be produced. This manipulation is less of an issue if one trips alone but the paradox/rub is that tripping alone is very risky for the inexperienced, and in order to get the experience required to navigate successfully one has to learn to trip with others present, and become cognizant of how the presence of others affects the trip.

A little discussed topic here is the phenomenon of the 5 MeO DMT "reactivation"; this is pretty well documented elsewhere and "I experienced" one for the first time several days ago. This was in the setting of being 2.5 hours into a 100mcg 1p-LSD trip and was utterly remarkable insofar as it was complete from having the taste of vaporization and full propulsion into the non-dual state. On emergence the duration had been several minutes with the full-bodied effects one sees/feels (for want of a better term), the familiar recognition of "How could it be otherwise?", and a sense of getting there by simply forgetting to forget "who" I actually am. Moreover, for the subsequent 3 hours I experienced a novel state of synaesthesia in which the words which made up thoughts evoked their own particular tastes (known as lexical-gustatory synaesthesia), along with an enduring sense of loss of the subject-object relationship which has remained in which all is experienced as a flow, including thoughts which are evident as a part of this, akin to the 6th sense gateway. The subject-object interpretation remains accessible, but naturally and effortlessly seems no more compelling than the state of flow currently experienced, and both are held as valid without requiring maintenance through active cognition. One has not displaced the other but it seems more like an expansion of perspective which incorporates both with no tension between them. It would also seem that we as human beings are like a locus of feeling/experiencing which automatically convert these into language-representations to ourselves in order to give a form or sense to what is experiential, and ultimately this is not bound to these interpretations, nor to anything else. We imprison ourselves within these, and yet freedom is not elsewhere. 5 MeO DMT reactivations are anecdotally more common around the time of falling asleep and can occur within clear consciousness ie no other psychedelics on board; I would imagine that these could be profoundly disorientating because what happened in my case ie effectively indistinguishable from 12+mg vaporized, occurring unexpectedly would be a cause to question ones mental well-being. 5 MeO DMT is no joke, and this stuff can utterly destabilize ones perceptual/cognitive foundations. This is something all users should consider carefully.