Leo's Blog: Infinite Insights — Page 103
Since I'm releasing this multi-part video series about the good aspects of psychedelics, I thought it would be honest to balance that out by detailing some of the downsides. Even though I'm very positive about psychedelics overall, they do come with risks, especially when people start using them without doing proper research.
Psychedelics are very safe ONLY IF you follow proper protocol and approach them with a careful attitude. Handle them as you would handle a loaded firearm, and you should do great.
Top risks (in no particular order):
- Consuming rare, exotic, untested research chemicals
- Buying research chemicals from an unverified online chemical company
- Not using drug testing kits on every new batch of substance you buy
- Overdosing through sloppiness & not researching dosages thoroughly
- Not using an accurate milligram scale to weigh your doses
- Using the wrong route of administration (ROA) for your substance
- For example, snorting freebase or smoking salt forms of the substance
- Tripping in a loud party environment
- Getting caught by law enforcement
- Using psychedelics which cause loss of motor control (like Salvia) without a trip sitter
- Using deleriants like Datura
- Consuming unknown substances from unknown sources
- Consuming on a full-stomach
- Very rare instances of HHPD (hallucinogen persisting perception disorder)
- Very rare instances of psychosis
- Very rare instances of allergic reactions to some substances
- Depersonalization disorder
- Existential crisis, temporary deepening of depression
- Deepening of your neurosis
- Delusional thinking, misinterpretation of the psychedelic experience, delusions of grandeur
- False enlightenment, Zen devilry, Messiah complex
- Playing pranks on people with psychedelics
- Bad trips, freak out
- Vomiting
- Surfacing of past emotional traumas
- Overuse, to the point of psychological addiction or escapism
- Becoming a Hippie or New Ager
- Becoming a stoner pothead
- Loss of motivation, loss of desire for material success
- Loss of faith in humanity, society, culture, government, religion
- Seeing spirits, ghosts, aliens, trolls, gnomes, elves
- Nightmares
- Getting fired from work
- Quitting your school, college, or job
- Complications with anti-depressants (SSRIs)
- Driving while intoxicated
- Poly drug use: Combinations of substances like alcohol, mushrooms, and weed all at once
- Physical injury from tripping in an unsafe setting (like on a high balcony or by the pool)
- Mislabeling or misidentifying your substances
- Giving psychedelics to friends who cannot handle them
- Growing and selling psychedelics (AKA, becoming a drug dealer)
- Taking psychedelics under age 21 if you are too immature to handle them
- Treating psychedelics like toys, acting cocky, then getting your ass handed to you
- A distraction from real consciousness work
- Going down the rabbit hole to fantasy land (conspiracy theories about aliens, etc.)
- Starting to experiment with hard drugs like cocaine or heroine
- Using unsafe types of psychedelics like NBOMEs
- Using cheap, impure psychedelics
- Using unhealthy pseudo-psychedelics like nitrous oxide, ketamine, cough syrup, etc.
- Damaging your liver, kidneys, brain, or heart (very rare)
- Picking mushrooms in the wild
- Extracting or cooking your own psychedelics at home
- Burning yourself with a lighter, starting a fire in your house
- Yelling, making too much noise until your neighbors call the cops
- Breaking up with your spouse, gf/bf
- Dysfunctional introversion: becoming an isolated loner who hates mankind
- Tripping when you're in a foul mood, like just after a breakup
- Using psychedelics to have sex
- Becoming suicidal
- Becoming enlightened ;)
This may sound like a ton of serious risks. But keep in mind that I simply made a list here of all the risks I could possibly think of for the sake of being balanced and truthful. This is a very comprehensive list. Most human activities involve long lists of risks, if we are very honest. For example, one the risks of marriage is that your spouse might kill you. One of the risks of cooking is burning your house down. One of the risks of eating at your favorite restaurant is food poisoning. But these are very remote probabilities if you approach things with intelligence.
95% of the risks above can be easily avoided just by having a serious, respectful attitude towards these substances, as you would for a strong prescription medication, a sharp knife, or a frying pan with hot oil.
Nearly all the dangers above stem from underestimating the incredible power of consciousness. If nothing else, psychedelics will teach you humility.
Be careful with Ecstasy pills (MDMA, Molly) because they're notoriously dirty.
Here's a great article proving the point.
If you aren't experiencing at least a handful of moments per year where you look back on something you said or did and think to yourself, "OMG! That was so embarrassing, so cringe-worthy", you aren't really growing.
When you're really growing, this will happen even with things you said or did just 1 month ago. You will look back on it and recoil in discomfort at your own stupidity, arrogance, cruelty, or lack of perspective.
Rapid growth means rapid obsolescence, with shorter and shorter intervals between old and new models. Look at a picture of an iPhone from 10 years ago. Or a laptop from 20 years ago. "Ewwwww...." is right! Because the rate of growth in these technologies has been astronomic.
As each month passes, I can hardly look at my own videos any more. They are so embarrassingly ignorant and crude compared to what I know today. And today will just become the next yesterday.
If you're starting to see this manifest in your own life, don't get discouraged by it. Although it feels icky and embarrassing, the good news is, it's a clear sign of growth. Our aim in this work isn't achieving a state of perfection, but constantly growing a bit each week. It's really not your fault. The reality is, we're all just way too ignorant to be perfect. Many cringey mistakes will be made. The more cringe you get out of your system, the less there will be to bog you down.
Judge yourself by the delta between your past and current work, not by your past work itself. Although I feel bad about the videos I released 2-3 years ago, I feel good about having grown so much.
What should really alarm you is if you look back on your work from 1 year ago and think, "Wow! Such great stuff!"
Of course, don't take this as license to be stupid on purpose.
"The wise seek wisdom, a fool has found it."
-- British proverb
My friend Joseph Rubano is hosting his annual Enlightenment Intensive in the San Diego area on October 19-23rd 2017.
An Enlightenment Intensive is a hardcore 3 day retreat where you do nothing but self-inquiry exercises all day long, for 3 solid days! Good meals and housing is provided.
If you're serious about enlightenment, this is one of the best ways to make a lot of progress quickly.
If you're near San Diego, or even want to fly in for the weekend, it's worth the trip, even if you have to fly cross-country. Joseph is a master with decades of experience guiding people. I've attended his intensive in the past.
It's a very intimate, small group setting. 10 spots left out of the maximum 16. The pricing is very reasonable and flexible. This is not a commercial operation, and this is not an advertisement. I get no money from this. I just wanted to share this opportunity with you.
To learn more about it contact Joseph Rubano at his website.
The only absolute reference frame is that there are no absolute reference frames.
Ta-da!
With anything you're angry about — and I do mean ANYTHING — you can stop and ask yourself, "What aren't I understanding about this situation? What is the bigger picture that I'm missing?" and I guarantee that you can find a bigger picture which makes you go, "Oh, of course... This is exactly as it must be. Reality is functioning perfectly so there's nothing to be angry about."
You could be getting nailed to a cross, and still find this understanding.
Now... whether you actually find this big picture, and how quickly you find it, is another matter. That will depend on your level of knowledge of the world, your level of personal development, and how much consciousness work you've done. Don't expect to always find it if you're a newbie to this work. But it is there to be found all the same. Which is nice to know. It's easier to solve a puzzle when you're sure it has a solution.
One way to see anger is as the result of too narrow of a perspective. The whole problem is, the mechanics of reality are so ingenious and epic, they dwarf the human mind. If you saw the mechanism in its entirety, you'd melt into a puddle of goo.
And don't forget, if you're unable to find the wider perspective, that's also part of the mechanism.
It's safe to start assuming that reality is perfect. The only imperfections are how you relate to it. And even those imperfections are perfect.