I need help - Spiritual psychosis or new awareness? Really weird experiences.

[billiesimon]

Hey, I have changed quite a bit in the recent 6 months. I have gone through psychotherapy last year for some childhood trauma, and I've been diagnosed as a quite healthy person, no mental health conditions except for loneliness/family trauma. I have also been doing consciousness work for 3 1/2 years, reaching several psychedelic awakenings, a nice level of sober concentration, deep emotional awareness and connection with my subconscious, and some occasional samadhi states in before-sleep meditation (I like to master my half-asleep states to find new levels of awareness). I also get lost in contemplating objects in silence and mystery quite often recently.

 

THE SYMPTOMS

Is the following psychosis or signs of spiritual growth?

- During my alone walks after dinner, I silence my mind and I very often feel in a sensory bubble floating in the empty cosmos. It's quite freaky.

- During these phenomena, my visual perceptions remain the same but they start to become "nonsense" to me. Like it's not supposed to happen. I start feeling deep mystery and nonsense about the fact that I am seeing, hearing, feeling etc.

- After some minutes of this, some fearful emotion happens and starts to tell me that I have no business in this phenomena, and starts to pull me towards some human business (please think about the laundry, about the emails, about finding a perfect gf bla bla bla). If I listen to them, the mysterious feeling disappears and my life starts to regain sense.

- Sometimes I instantaneously realize that I'm here, now, and that I am completely imagining that something is happening outside my senses. If I start to dive deep into it, I feel completely lost, and my life starts to lose quite a lot of meaning. It's not dark or nihilistic. It's just empty and silent. Then some fearful emotion brings up the same old to do lists.

- It's been 9 months since my last trip, but I've smoked some microdosing of salvia in these months, and I often get the feeling of having this really "all in my cosmic head" feeling, like this universe is inside my huge giant head. Weird. But not an actual awakening. I'm not attracted to a proper trip recently because I sense a deep fear from my ego, so I'm staying away.

THE MOST WORRYING SIGNS

- Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night, because I like to drink some water and then get back to bed, I go sit in the kitchen, zero thoughts, but strong awareness of the present. And then I feel I have quite some trouble to identify my "body": is it the floor? is it the fridge? I have memories of this flesh being my body but my awareness has trouble feeling what is "me", so everything could be me. If I start to do some daily chores, my awareness refocuses on my body-mind as always, as a normal person.

- Sometimes while I'm alone, silent and peaceful, I feel a deep desire to self-inquire on the spot. Generally what happens is that I don't understand why I have this story of being a human, of having a past (what is the past?), of having desires for the future (what is it?), and then I generally feel that these senses are made of air, of some kind of dreamy stuff. But I'm not really conscious of a dream (while this happens in psychedelic state). It's just that the senses don't seem that real anymore....

- Something has forever changed in my life. It's not a material change. Something a lot deeper has changed but I can't really get it. It feels scary but I'm attracted to it also. The deep feeling that I'm the center of the universe. Sounds quite egoic...

RELATIONSHIPS

- Interacting with people makes me lose all of the previous phenomena. The sense of other is really strong when some other person appears. All the mystery and dreamy stuff disappears. Might be related to strong emotions that people evoke in me (I'm an empath).

 

 

What do you guys think this is? Is it psychosis? My therapist always told me that I'm quite a conscious and aware person. I don't understand. Maybe @Leo Gura if he can find time to read

Thanks!

Edited June 25, 2022 by billiesimon

[puporing]

Hmm.. maybe your peak states are merging with baseline state? (But in a pretty dramatic way it seems) I've never done salvia so I don't know much about what that does... Have you tried stopping it and see what happens? 

I feel that alot of my baseline (like ability to sense and generate insights) is not that different from on psychedelics, but I am not in a permanent "samadhi" state off trips. Sounds like you have something in between going on.

Also maybe integrating things into baseline consciousness, can take some time..

Well in the end it depends on how you feel about it all.. is it disorienting or does it feel right/gives you more clarity? What about how it affects how "functional" you are? 

Edited June 25, 2022 by puporing

[JuliusCaesar]

If you find the impact Salvia is having on your baseline state of consciousness uncomfortable or undesirable. You could always stop doing Salvia altogether. That way at least, there would be a hard limit on what undesired alterations are permanent. Though I'd be more inclined to lean on the more liberal side of things and tell you to keep plunging into the unknown.

[billiesimon]

Well, it's not about Salvia Divinorum. I do the microdosing once a week, sometimes once every two weeks. I don't think it has a strong impact on my life. I also contemplate a lot in the sober state. 

[Osaid]

I have similar experiences. Whenever I have an inquiry which muddles my identity as a human ego, it gets kind of scary. I wonder how scared I'll be during a full-on awakening experience, I feel like I'm way too scared for whatever reason.

Life is just too unpredictable. I feel like I could easily get transported to some hell dimension without reason and just be stuck there forever, if I took a psychedelic or something. It doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility with all the crazy shit that the universe dreams up.

Edited June 25, 2022 by Osaid

[JuliusCaesar]

Life is nothing other than a mental trip. Threats both internal and external are as real as you want to perceive them to be. If you renege on your paranoid fears, the jungle of life becomes a safe and fun environment, such that the whole universe could become your playground.

[puporing]

1 hour ago, Osaid said:

hell dimension

Most of what I've experienced relating to that is integrating all aspects of Self as "God" - like whatever you think of the Holocaust, or otherwise "unconscious" stuff in this soup of consciousness. Can be challenging to see/face, but you can get through it because the Love you get (that is also you) will help you get through it.

But yes it should be acknowledged that tripping is not easy on your psyche in general. 

Most people I meet that do psychedelics can't do it alone because of that difficulty and I can understand that. Sometimes I wonder how some of you guys do it alone all the time too or have no one to integrate trips with after.

It can help to find a "helpful anchor" (someone you trust or a loving presence you can ground in) before attempting psychedelics.

Edited June 25, 2022 by puporing

[BipolarGrowth]

None of this sounds like psychosis at all. This is coming from someone who has been clinically diagnosed with psychosis and seen others in psychotic states. 

[VeganAwake]

@billiesimon It really does seem like a lot of people try to force-feed spiritual awakening. Often it sounds like some kind of brain washing.....not saying that's whats purposly happening there.

Just be careful & remember that the ego/sense of self, lives in a world of lack or incompleteness.

Awakening reveals that everything is already perfection....it simply cannot be gained or lost because it's all there is!!

❤ 

[TheOneReborn]

Open your crown Chakra and release all that tension and confusion 

[Michal__]

Obviously just spiritual growth.