Jodistrict

ceremony + others = group healing

That was a good talk. I would only add that he was talking about the problem with neo-advaita. Your post title said "vedanta". Traditional vedanta doesn't fall into the silliness traps of neo-advaita. Just my view.

Here is an interesting article. Can Drug Dogs Smell Mushrooms? https://doggysaurus.com/can-drug-dogs-smell-mushrooms/ The article suggests that dogs could be trained to detect mushrooms, and in addition differentiate them from magic mushrooms, but it is unlikely they will be trained by the authorities. But here is a caveat: "Alternatively, there is some evidence that police dogs are trained to alert when they smell something unusual. I watched a documentary on the Discovery Channel that said dogs are trained to alert on anything they smell out of the ordinary." "Whilst most probably aren’t trained to sniff out mushrooms, that doesn’t mean they won’t smell them, given how some can also alert on unusual odors." I don't know what "unusual" means, but that would suggest that the dogs can be trained to detect a broad number of different materials or a whole category of materials, in addition to the high resolution to single out a specific substance.

His appeal for unity won't work. One of the attributes of dogma based religions is that you have to believe that your dogma is the ultimate truth and everyone else is deceived. If the conservative Christians and Muslims ever did unite then as a consequence they would become liberal.

They train dogs to sniff for cocaine. But since cocaine and mushrooms both have alkaloids, and the alkaloid contributes to the smell, could there be an overlap of the smell spectrums, so the cocaine trained dog would trigger when smelling mushrooms?

Psychedelics are low priority for customs. But, cocaine is an alkaloid. So, if the dog was trained to detect alkaloids, wouldn't it also detect the alkaloids in hallucinogenic mushrooms? I don't know the answer.

Shinzen also use to teach people with conditions like AIDS, how to live with pain. He also taught strong determination sitting, where we would sit until the pain was unbearable and there was a breakthrough from pain to only feeling sensations and movements. Shinzen got interested in Indian Spirituality and he actually did a sun dance with a North American tribe, where you dance in the sun for several days and at the end they put two knives in your breasts and hang you from a tree. I haven't heard any other teachers talk about pain. Pain is the strongest signal that convinces us that the illusion of reality is true. Have these other teachers reached the level where they can turn pain into feelings of sensations and movement, where there is no suffering ?

When I was studying with him years ago, he called it Vipassana.

When Shinzen was in Los Angeles, he practiced with Rinzai Zen master Joshu Sasaki Roshi. He is also a monk in the Shingon tradition, which is a Vajrayana sect in Japan. The meditation technique that he teaches is based on Vipassana. He is primarily a meditation teacher for advanced students. When the Dalai Lama came to visit Sasaki Roshi, Shinzen was their translator, since he speaks Japanese and had deep knowledge of both Vajrayana and Zen. Two enlightened masters chose Shinzen to be their translator.

Shinen was my meditation instructor. I had a chance to observe him over a long period of time. Shinzen is the real deal. That's the difference.

I am planning a trip to the jungle to follow a dieta de plantas. I will be in the amazon - no roads, no electricity, no internet, no phones, no books. I will listen to the shaman and the plant teachers. I see this as a valuable opportunity to heal and learn in another world completely outside the consensus reality of modern civilization.

I finally picked up a copy of Ralston's "The Book of Not Knowing", and so far I haven't found anything that I disagree with and nothing that invalidates the use of "psychedelic" medicines. In fact, they seem complementary. I find it puzzling why he and his followers don't apply "not knowing" to something of which they have a limited understanding.

Think of when you were a child. You would go up to a strange girl and it was fun and exciting. If you now see this as something scary, then you have been traumatized on the way to becoming an adult. You now know what your blocks are and what to work on. You don't have to learn "game", you have to unlearn your false assumptions.

Windows is becoming worse and more unreliable with every new version. Today, I just got introduced to the pink screen of death.

There are many ways you could approach it. One approach is the Buddhist 8 fold path, where the first steps are ethics and rules like maintaining proper speech. This is to stabilize the mind and prepare it for the later steps of concentration and meditation. One metaphor is that of comparing the mind to a pond of water and enlightenment would be a perfectly still pond where one could see to the bottom. The first step would be to root out all unethical behavior because any such behavior causes large waves in the pond. Then healing would stabilize the mind even more because trauma creates ongoing conflicts which create ongoing waves. Clearing trauma allows more stabilization. Meditation quiets the remaining subtle movements. In this metaphor there is no separation between healing and enlightenment. You could find other metaphors to illustrate the unity.

When I was younger I had a girlfriend who was a former contestant in the Miss USA contest. It gave me insight into how a beautiful woman lives. Guys would act ridiculous around her and there were men who would follow her home in their cars and knock on her door. She got a job at a school teaching children so she wouldn’t have to be around men, which frequently created problems for her. Your best shot with a woman is to treat her like everyone else. She has probably had bad experiences in the past and may misinterpret your nervous behavior.

Separating them is a conceptual convenience. There is one mind and there are paths to purification and liberation.

These commenters always focus on “enlightenment” and thus never talk about whether “psychedelics” can assist in healing. When we focus with a flashlight, we only see what is in the small circle of light and miss what is outside of it. In the shamanic path, they are medicines to heal the mind and body. And if you are being liberated from the traumas of the past, how can that not directly affect your state of consciousness?

You are applying reason to come to that conclusion. But wars are started through irrational forces.

The last world war wasn’t that long ago and we are about due. It will happen because the world is run by psychopaths. Due to wind patterns, the radiation could be confined to the Northern Hemisphere where the war will occur. There are still uncontacted tribes in South America who are self sufficient and know how to survive without civilization.

I vape Bufo Alvarius regularly and end up in a space of peace and love. The medicine always feels pure: no body load and even the smell and taste is divine. Those videos you see are mostly like the result of an impure mixture or too high a dose. Some fake facilitators mix in DMT or even Datura to create entertainment. That’s why it is important to find a shamanic guide who is high consciousness and with serious intent.

Those are just symbols of a mind confused by hyper abstraction.

No I adjust the dose of the Bufo so it is the equivalent of 2 mg 5-meo.

Jordan Peterson’s core area of competence is clinical psychology. However, his lectures are all based on Jungian psychology, which the mainstream empirically driven psychology of his own field considers irrelevant. He became famous by filling a niche in the culture wars. He comes across to me as being someone who is deeply unhappy and full of repressed rage. His vast clinical knowledge doesn’t help his own situation. The takeaway for me is that Western psychotherapy is impotent (something I already figured out for myself) and it is best to look elsewhere for answers.