[DJTetsu]

I'm once again feeling the need to discuss the unpleasantries of tripping and how to better cope with the things that initially seem like reasons enough to stop tripping.

I'm talking to many people on the chats and though I will often come across those that have never had a bad trip in their lives, I will find an equal number of people who have had bad trips and/or afraid to trip entirely.

With the recent research paper stating all these benefits about mushrooms, that paper would of have been even better with less people who have had anxiety and/or bad trips.

This is nothing new to us. We all have talked/heard about bad trips/anxieties with shrooming and many of us know first hand what that's like. Although all these advanced cultivating techniques are good to know, most of us will gradly accept only 1/10 of our yields if the mushrooms were guaranteed against bad trips/anxieties.

I first want to differentiate between two different types of buggie men that I can catagolize:


Anxiety:

I'm hearing people having anxiety on the way up and also on the way down. I personally get them usually on the way down. This is more of a general annoyed feeling. It's similar to when you're hungry and feels like something is missing, when in fact, nothing is missing (that we know of) and you are just generally grouchy like you've been without sleep. I won't go too much into combating this because i think the solution lies in something biological (you're thristy, need air, etc.)


Now good thing about just having anxiety is that they are less in magnatude compared to bad trips (or what I like to call nagging thoughts).



Nagging bad thoughts/bad trips:

The main (so-called) problem that I want to address. I want to propose several methods/explanations on how to reduce those bad thoughts that seems to keep coming back.


The first view is to view this thing that we fear as something that we are actually indulging in. I have read a zen master talk of Demons that sometimes haunt meditators and he explained that, with careful observation, we actually accelerate into that fear, as if we like it, and in many ways similar to how our thoughts accelerate into our sexual fantasies, or that rush we get out of quickly accelerating our cars. By reducing that fearful thought simply to an indulgence, in his view, we can better navigate away from it.

When I read it it made sense because I related to what he was saying. When a negative thought that I fear comes up, it likes to intensify/magnify and even if that thought is most likely not true, your brain still pursues those thoughts. That thought, I am talkin about, could be anything that gives the bad trip. "My wife is cheating on me", "I am a failure", "My cat is a demon". It's that nagging thought that haunts us in our trips. Our brain either dwells in them, or follows the thoughts (follows the consequences of those statements) that are created by them.

When I read some stuff about endorphins and how fear causes endorphin release, I made the connection, and thought that maybe it can be true what he said scientifically.

*these two paragraphs aren't mine, but are from some pages when i researched fear/pain with endorphins

"Ever hear friends say they like being scared? Whether you're watching a horror movie with your hand over your eyes or feeling a rush of wind in your hair as you plummet down a steep incline on a roller coaster, fear causes endorphin release. Why do you think extreme sports are so popular? No one wants to get hurt; it's just fun (in a twisted kind of way) to cheat death."

"Diet, exercise, and general wellbeing control the production of endorphins, but stress and pain trigger their release. Examples: eating spicy foods (your mind believes your mouth is on fire and supplies some natural morphine), having charging sex (that sudden giddy feeling, or those painless pin pricks in your brain), or stubbing your toe (pain again). Endorphins cause "runner's high", a release which occurs due to necessary pain alleviation in stressed muscles. Why would a natural analgesic occur during something as pleasurable as sex? Invigorating sex is exertion, and therefore causes the same release. Intense pleasure also relates to pain; women often have the same extroverted, and chemical, reactions in child birth as they do during sex"

Some neurologist may smack me upside the head for trying to draw conclusions when I;m far from a phD but... it can help, for some (for me it did) to reduce this thing that we are so afraid of into, just a chemical reaction your brain wants to entrain itself. Thinking this way refrains you from indulging in all the thoughts that follow your thoughts like "I see dead people" or "I'm going to hell for cheating on my taxes". You won't be as curious as what those thoughts mean if you knew why they were being produced.

Who knows if the above is true. But there is some truth that if you are able to reduce it to something simple as a craving, you can help yourself by thinking, ok, maybe it's not as serious or maybe it's not likely that this is true. The bottom line is: whether this reduction has helped you.

This alone maybe adequate, but let me also go on to explain other things in regards to our nagging friends. YOu may still feel like you are cursed and still feel frustrated and maybe asking, "why do some people never have this, and why do I have to fight these boogie men (or why do i Have to work at trying to reduce them to a craving)?" Let's just look back at those sentences and simply examine the emotional response: frustration/impatience/partial anger. WHen these thoughts pop up, it's best not to respond with any strong emotions. Now this is probably easier said than done. The best way is to replace it with a new thought that contains happiness/serenity/peace. If your brain wants to think(move) rather than just repeat those words, yOu may want to be creative at following where those words/thoughts take you (ie "what exactly does it mean to be happy?" "What does the ultimate of the ultimate joy feel like?", "what does it mean to have infinite compassion?). Either way, nothing too fast. Gracefully. Easy does it.

...But then the nagging thought comes back, and you find yourself frustrated all over again. Well now we explore a new dimension: Patience.

If you are not patient you will be frustrated and if you are patient it won't matter how long these nagging thoughts come back. Will they keep coming back? Do you fear this? Now it's time for a paradigm shift.

Mushroom Mystical experiences usually include ego detachment (detaching from our physical selves) and being with god, gods, or the universe (depending on how you want to experience it). They say this will ultimately let us feel ulitmate joy and understand what is infinite compassion, or the ultimate pinacle of everything. If you are saying "I don't like to be patient", you are still trying to hold on to the currency of time. The experienced mushroom tripper will often talk of respecting the mushroom or the trip, and that means to humble yourself. By bowing before GOD, he lets you through the gates of heaven, so to speak. So to humble yourself, it's better to say "thank you for the opportunity to test my patience" and "only by exercising patience can I become more patient"




So trippers who have nagging thoughts, you are truly blessed, for you have the opportunity to better yourself though your struggles.

Some people never have it, so they call their trips Beautiful.

But for us, it is a Beautiful Struggle. Even better.

Only through struggles will you have capacity for greater rewards (I just came up with that). It may be said that we are more sensitive, but may also mean capable of greater and wider understanding... of all things...




HAPPY TRIPPING.

BTW I wrote this a while back when i was stoned.. and right now I just edited as I'm coming down from my trip. I had a really good trip may i add.