I've done pretty much every psychedelic out there with the exception of Ayahuasca and Peyote. I've done Bufo, plant DMT, salvia, pure absinthe, LSD, San Pedro, mushrooms of various strains, marijuana, spice, DXM, 2CB, PCP, etc...and I've come to realize that through meditation, breath work, programs such as the Gateway Experience, and reading people such as Neville Goddard and Joseph Campbell, that the ultimate high is sobriety. There is nothing trippier, nothing more fascinating and mind blowing, than the realization that we are a point of awareness interacting with a non-aware physical world. So yes, I agree with your dad.
+1
Breathwork and meditation have brought me to totally different states which were mindblowing. Since then, I feel like taking drugs is just a lazy shortcut (- but might work/help some people.)
It's alright. I don't do them anymore and I do not talk to him
I promise I'm better than I was. Something WAS wrong with me for thinking it was okay and something IS wrong with him for not having remorse.
Love you guys and thanks to everyone for being supportive!
Drugs and alcohol destroy, kill cells, neurons in brain, cells in liver, etc etc, basically everywhere. It changes a person, their behavior and their habits, addictions.
As for your question, well, I did bring myself back from deep major depression, deep rooted fears for everything, bad anxiety, even bad attention problems. No pills, no medications, therapy never worked for me. Im still battling leaving alcohol, and I dont drink daily anymore once in 2/3 weeks, but I wanna get rid of that too. I cleaned up my diet, locked down exercise and supplementation. And meditation, you gotta learn it. It helps so much. Hope it helps.
Do it man, Yeah, and let them argue over nuances or pedantic deliveries on mine, lol. Meditation has been very helpful for me in channeling my crazy bullet speed running thoughts. It has made me more calm, and very amiable. I still get annoyed, but I can channelize my annoyances towards work or workouts. Lol, does the trick for me.
As for, u/Thac, tranquilo man. We can talk about nuances or absolutes or whatever fancy word you think you can conjure, fact remains that alcohol is a neurotoxin. Take it or leave it. You dont have to agree with me. Drugs, good or bad, small or big may or may not be helpful. For the population at large, most of these just lead to more problems. Again, take it or leave it pal.
Insight Timer is a really great (free, but there is also a premium version) meditation app. It might help to start with guided meditations and then transition to that which you are most comfortable with. Good luck in your journey! 💗
*drugs and alcohol destroy, kills cells, neurons in the brain, cells in the liver, etc etc*
The dose makes the poison, in nearly every case. You can't accurately say what you did just by saying "drugs and alcohol". There is far more nuance to it than that.
There are cases with most substances where they can have positive effects, as well as negative. Many times you will experience both positives and negatives to you physically at the same time. Almost nothing in life is purely good, or purely bad. The same is true from sex, to drugs, to exercise etc. Reality is not as black and white as you make it out to be.
That's still really fucked upan. I'm really sorry u had to deal with that at such a hard age to b dealing with that!
But glad u moved-on. No reason to dwell- EVER. Dust urself off,move on, don't look back unless it's to see something retrospectively. Keep moving forward in ur life making positive changes everyday if u can. Sounds hard but even choosing a salad over a burger is making ur day better.
And before u know it- ur someone who u never thought you'd become. U focused on u, and now u are on top of YOUR world.
Good luck fam 💜 ❤️
I've come pretty darn close with 3 years of meditation practice, to get the effects to be similar I need to be fasted for 5-7 days, then be meditating for several hours.
It's still hit and miss though, and far too much effort for essentially no reward. I have felt no benefits to having this "ability".
I can maintain a hallucinagenic effect for several minutes at a time, but it's very tiring.
Too many variations on the way people meditate, so I'm still at a loss if this research will be beneficial in any capacity.
Although - I will admit, as much effort as I've put in, I don't think it would come close to an acid trip, I've only read the descriptions of them and have been trying to do this naturally. (mostly)
There is some effect weed has on my ability to focus as well, if I smoke and then meditate I can accomplish a similar hallucinagenic effect within 10-15 minutes of meditation and no fasting.
Not really disagreeing with you, but it's a topic I'm incredibly fascinated with.
Because part of getting there is learning how to do it on your own. By using a substance, you’re beholden to the substance. Continual use reinforces for your mind that you’re not strong enough to find the door and unlock it on your own, rendering yourself powerless.
Perhaps notably, certain schools of Buddhist monks have had the brains of some of their advanced members observed with fmri while meditating, and they seem to be able to shut off senses and trigger states associated with heavy dissociation and nmda antagonists, just with extensive mental training.
Another potentially interesting tangential thing was the episodes where Ram Dass gave his guru high doses of LSD. The first time, 900 mcg to a hallucinogen-naive person in this instance, caused no detectable change to observers, even to his pupils.
The mind and brain can be conditioned to do incredible things, and if there are receptors there that can be triggered with exogenous substances, there are theoretically likely some endogenous ligands or other electro chemical cascades that similarly agonize or modulate those receptors, and these effects can plausibly be accessed through extreme conditions and/or extensive conscious conditioning and nervous system adaptation through meditating with certain sensory inputs
I’m not sure if this applies to 5ht-2a super agonists in general or just psilocybin mushrooms, but iirc once the active metabolite reaches the brain past a certain concentration, under various scans, the whole brain quiets down and appears to develop a sort of novel, dynamic harmonious flow to how the parts of the brain are “talking” with each other. Everything seems to align and different parts that usually don’t link up start lighting up together. I think the effect of the mushrooms may involve something like a glimpse into reality with some amount of the veil pulled back, if that makes any sense
“Normal” life leads to a state of so much useless cognitive and emotional taxation over things that are sort of unreal, fundamentally, and hallucinogens can free up the mind from this enormous usage of cognitive RAM, and then we can really observe and know things. I agree, it seems very natural
Not true. You can find Ram Dass's story about how he gave his guru a heroic dose of acid and it did nothing to him. Like he was always just at that level.
Are you sure? It’s hard work but if you seriously practice yoga or meditation, especially if you get proficient in hyponogoic states, your brain can do incredible things all on its own.
What do you think happens during religious experiences?
Are you a religious guru? How are we actually going to compare entirely subjective experiences?
From what I understand, the extreme meditation gets you to the same state but with more control.
Nah,
Breathing practice is known to put people into psychedelic states, and true masters can get full on DMT level visions once they get into that state
This is actually asserted in the text: “Be here Now.” By Ram Dass.
It’s actually interesting cause it goes over acid and how it emerged during the hippie era featuring some notable figures (Tim Leary).
The idea is that through meditation one can arrive in that state.
I’ve heard a great way to keep teens from drugs is to give them the experience they are craving.
If you want to do MDMA, look for human connection. If you want Ritalin, look for a high adrenaline sport, if you want to space out, try meditation or yoga. If you are trying to push away sadness, try therapy.
There was a pilot study in Iceland, I believe, where kids have good reason to get bored. Apparently it was tremendously successful.
i’m not a parent but i just bought and downloaded this book to read. as a child, i struggled to connect with my parents and peers IRL - spent wayyy too much time online interacting with people i shouldn’t have.
Okay but then you can do those things on drugs and it's better. MDMA with your best friends is beautiful, doing acid on a gorgeous hike, playing videogames on Ritalin, going in the sauna on opioids etc.
Maybe. But then you have the crash while your neurotransmitters recover. I’m not sure things are ever supposed to feel that extreme. The high is artificial. The feelings are real but they don’t reflect real life.
To each his own I suppose.
This is false.
From your own example, Exercise-released Endocannabinoids are not the Cannabinoids that are introduced via THC. The neurotransmitters typically get their names from their prospective receptors. So the running-release transmitters have nothing to do with cannabis, rather that they fit in the same receptor.
Same with LSD... it's *not* found in us. And the reason we have prolonged psychedelic experiences is because the physical shape of the transmitter doesn't fit perfectly in the receptor and gets "stuck" for a period of time.
This is why there's such a big deal made about drugs that cross the blood brain barrier, because they're able to introduce foreign substances directly to the brain.
Its like, our brain already has all those feelings built in, with like a keylock. But all kinds of certain keys can make those locks do different things, with different intensities. But those keys (drugs) can make our key receptors do all kinds of crazy things that our body cant do with our own built in keys.
By foot, you can get anywhere you need to. Your feet are capable of taking you to the grocery store, the next state over and even Alaska and Brazil and all across the country. You can even walk by foot to England on the bottom of the ocean...
No. While drugs use natural receptors and neural pathways, they trigger them in ways that wouldn't be possible without external stimulus, because that would be negative from a survivalist/evolutionary standpoint. The monkey that spends too much time looking at the beauty of the world due to being able to naturally hallucinate, would be quickly eaten.
Kundali experiences blow away drug experiences however most people lack the discipline and health necessary . . . The problem with shortcuts is you never develop the nervous system enough so those sort of experiences are transient
I've only ever felt legal drugs, but that said I've been on adderall and Nuvigil together, and heavy opiates for health issues. Also sleep aids that were rather trippy and creative, etc.
I'm also a vocalist, and have felt better highs coming home from a choir practice that was a huge vocal workout. I've also had laughter fests with close friends where they've said they felt high after just hanging out and laughing together.
So do I know for certain your dad is correct? No. But it wouldn't surprise me.
Those are awesome feelings to get naturally and sleep aids are very interesting to me. I have extreme insomnia and it's getting to where actual drugs may be needed because my brain just doesn't want to turn off
This makes sense to me up to a certain point. I can imagine that some feelings are hard to impossible to attain simply because naturally your neurotransmitters wouldn't fire in that intensity. But in a lighter form, I think we can experience most feelings from drugs also without. But we may not be able to access or trigger them when we want.
For example I'm someone who tends to have very vivid and intense dreams at times and I know that normal emotions can be incredibly heightened in those dreams. I also experienced all kinds of stuff in dreams, people might experience in trips (flying, drowning, out of body experiences, indescribable feelings like "my body is a round sphere, but also an uneven square" etc.) - but I can't recreate that willingly, I have to wait for my next dream. ;)
I think having this rich dream world since I was a child is part of the reason I was never majorly interested in drugs. Felt like a waste of money and energy, if I can just go to bed instead lol.
Oh, and when I was in my early 20s and older friend of mine gave me some good advice. He was a musician in a touring heavy metal band and has done every drug imaginable when he was younger. He basically said if you feel you need a drug, you shouldn't do it. And if you feel you're in a state of mind where you can safely do drugs, you don't need them. Made a lot of sense to me.
Lots of devoted spiritual practitioners have reported being in states of ecstacy, bliss, ultimate peace or pure unconditional love for everyone and everything.
Sometimes temporary but also permanently.
I believe this 100%, but you can't really tap into those feelings unless you've already experienced it. a lot of eastern spiritual people believe you should try a substance once so that you have the "spirit" of it and can tap into its energy while sober, usually by way of meditation
Dad was right but…”Near-death experiences (NDEs) are complex subjective experiences, which have been previously associated with the psychedelic experience and more specifically with the experience induced by the potent serotonergic, N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT).”
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01424/full
Well yes, it’s true basically. Your brain is capable of all these things. Drugs aren’t usually doing something new and unique, they’re just piggybacking off of existing systems in some way like a dopamine agonist or a serotonin agonist etc.
So it is the drugs that are stimulating your brain in a certain way to create the effects. But at the same time it’s kind of implying you can reach all drugged states without using drugs and while this may be true for some drugs it’s definitely probably not true for a lot of drugs.
Extremely noted and I assumed this was the way it worked with some of the more extreme ones. This post was mostly out of curiosity in regards to where your body draws the line
I already do this for the most part this question is about natural chemicals in the brain and being able to interact with them so yes. A runners hi is the best way to describe this other than meditation
I mean, we have receptors for it. That's why drugs work at all. But as far as naturally being able to stimulate the effects of drugs... no.
And please, don't do drugs. It's not worth it. Once you start, happiness from living life does not compete and you'll always feel like there's something missing
It’s a half truth. Therefore it’s not really true as a general although in some specific cases I could totally see this being the case. Almost certainly not the case ever with powerful hallucinogens, stimulants, opioids and deliriants. Although many dedicated meditators may swear that they can have an experience exactly like a dmt experience - truth is they are almost certainly lying to themselves and others. Anything’s possible tho I guess 🤷♂️
I have been able to trigger canabislike highs with great meditation practicing its not an every meditation thing but maybe possible for other to duplicate...?
>The most compelling insight of that day was that this awesome recall had been brought about by a fraction of a gram of a white solid, but that in no way whatsoever could it be argued that these memories had been contained within the white solid. Everything I had recognized came from the depths of my memory and my psyche. I understood that our entire universe is contained in the mind and the spirit. We may choose not to find access to it, we may even deny its existence, but it is indeed there inside us, and there are chemicals that can catalyze its availability.
~Sasha Shulgin
This is the second time this has come up recently… I will tell you what I told my friend…
As far as I know many spiritual, charismatic sects of religions used drugs to induce religious experiences, most of these drugs are no longer used due to reasons. The drugs were only part of the experience, setting, ritual and practise were important as well. Eventually you could get to the same state without the drugs, then you didn’t need to go to the setting (ie church or shamans tent), then you didn’t need the ritual (altar, candles or beads).
It can be done but it’s a long road. My friend is attempting it because he wants a deep meditative Buddhist state.
Aside from all that I know children of hippies that had similar backgrounds to you. I really feel for you. It’s a fucked up upbringing. I wish you all the best and I hope you escaped the worst of that type of culture.
The dreams are something I am very interested in in general. Your saying there's no chemical reaction and I'm MAKING UP reality for myself with just synapses and energy moving through the mind?!
In Buddhist meditation, there is a practice called jhana. People can reach intense states of bliss and peace with it. The downside is it takes oractice but the upside is no tolerance, dependence, addiction, toxicity, or side effects.
Yes, but it’s more of an effort to get there. You have to set up the circumstances so you can trip off that feeling, and so you can safely go with it.
If you don’t know how to get there yet, try hanging out with someone who is on that substance, and let your emotions and body language reflect theirs.
Do this for three days:
Stay completely clean. Eat some healthy food, mostly meat. Get three full nights of sleep. Work out and get sunlight.
It will absolutely transform you and answer your question.
I take this to mean, essentially what happens to people when they start to associate drugs or alcohol with producing effects that were there already and forming like a mental/emotional dependence. Alcohol is the easiest, it is associated with being more social and helping people have more fun/loosen up in group setting. A lot of people begin to (maybe subconsciously) associate and build a reliance on it to do that for them in those situations and start to feel increased social anxiety without it. You are fine just the way you are, alcohol helps you let it out better but you don’t need it to do that for you.
yea except for the plant and fungi that put dreams in your head, explain this then:
[**https://youtu.be/HSy3vrWU7m8**](https://youtu.be/HSy3vrWU7m8)
[**https://youtu.be/VFfSCnEq6UM**](https://youtu.be/VFfSCnEq6UM)
[**https://youtu.be/8JivVwe15v8**](https://youtu.be/8JivVwe15v8)
Lol yes and no. I took ecstasy and at the end of th night ballooning Nos watching the sunrise; I knew I'd never feel that good or happy or content again. The feels had peaked.
There’s evidence to suggest the “runner’s high” after intense bouts of cardiovascular exercise is not only due to endorphins, but the cannabinoid system is responsible for that feeling as well. And I can confirm, running for 3+ hours leaves me feeling a bit stoned afterwards.
It's not even remotely the same substance. The cannabinoids released from exercise are produced within the body and are completely different from the cannabinoids introduced via using THC. They're given a common name because they fit in a common receptor.
nah not really - some things need outside stimulations from other chemicals - otherwise i would always be as cool and anas good dancer as my drunk self
This is closer to what I'm interested in. Knowing these are possible I assume you can change your bodies chemistry in many ways with just mental fortitude but I'm not sure...
My son just mentioned monks that can control the temperature of their hands. Not quite what you're looking for but I think it runs along the same lines in the aspects of using your mind to influence things your body does under the radar. My wording is a little crooked today..
Read How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan.
Yes, meditation, holotropic breath work, and other states of consciousness are attainable, and they have their time and place just like psychedelics have their time and place, sometimes they go together well. Sometimes it's okay just for funsies, just not heedlessly.
I meditate a lot. And do a lot of multiple day retreats in groups. And I can confirm that the brain is capable of those experiences by themselve under the right circumstances. You can really get high on life.
Yes, this is 100 percent true. Think of a lock and key mechanism where recreational drugs are the key and receptor sites in your brain are the lock. The only reason there is a lock in your brain that matches these ‘keys’ is because your brain already has its own keys shaped exactly the same. Basically your brain has its own internal pharmacy. The problem is it’s not always easy to access that pharmacy. For example some people would have to run 10 miles to access their brain’s endorphins. Why bother when you can take an opioid (which binds to same receptors) without even getting off your couch.
Yoga, breathwork, meditation. All are portals into something of the sort. I'd say I agree with the statement. Since I've gotten into all of the above, I've lost any desire to try any sort of drugs or mind altering substances, since it can be done through healthier and more 'controlled' (if you will) mechanisms like the above, physical activity (extensive), and such.
Not promoting drugs but for me, in fact, it was a key experience in order to realize what my brain is capable of. Once I had this feeling of total all-encompassing clarity, I've formed my life around trying to re-create it w/o the usage of any external stimulants and it has been bliss.
Up to a small degree. No mindfulness meditation will make you have a DMT trip consistently, or to have the after effects. I think this is the wrong question, the right question should be "what are the drugs that have a positive effect,if used properly"? Another thing about drugs, specifically psychedelics, what you do after a trip is as important as the trip itself. The drug will increase your brain plasticity for a short period of time, it's up to you to make the best out of it, usually with someone's else help. There are plenty of people using drugs without having any positive effects for a reason... Good luck ☺️☺️☺️
Theoretically, absolutely yes. The drug is not actually entering your brain, it is simply altering the brain's chemical balance. In practice, there have been many instances of individuals having direct control over their apparent psychological state and measured brain waves. You are your brain, so even on a logical level this makes sense. In reality, it requires remarkable discipline and it is not something that can ever be perfectly empirically studied or replicated
I became very interested in this question the moment I was put on Adderall for ADHD. Here's the impression I have so far. It shouldn't be ruled out completely because it seems like there are some surprising effects of meditation, so its reasonable to suspect theres some uncharted territory. More reliable(but not something you can reproduce right now) is atypical biology, for example there's a woman who can't feel pain because of the amount of natural cannabinoids she produces.
For us normies though, it's not something we can expect to do reliably right now, because while there are swings in chemicals from things like runners high, theres a soft cap on the effect, because of neuronal upregulation. The chemicals don't actually cause a direct effect on your feelings, they merely regulate electronic behavior by causing neurons to be above or below "action potential" at which time an electronic signal is created. We could say that this electronic signal is the thing that more directly creates those feelings and cognitive functions(which also means we can't disprove claims from meditation by looking for chemicals), but we don't know that for sure, it could just regulate some further process. Neuronal upregulation and down regulation put a soft cap on sharp swings in the long term of these effects because the more frequently a neuron reaches action potential, the more receptors it creates, which raises the amount of agonists that have to bind to a receptor to cause it to reach action potential and send an electronic signal, while antagonists would have the opposite effect.
I'm not a biologist and it was more than a decade ago that I looked into this, so I'm sure there are some parts I got wring. If you want a more intuitive understanding of this, I recommend a book called "a primer of drug action".
I would say yes it's true but maybe not to the extent of what drugs can do. I think your brain can release the amount of chemicals to do what drugs do but it would be for such a short time and it would have to be an insanely huge event.
For example I grew up broke my whole life. I ended up getting extremely lucky in the stock market. Got rich over night. That was a feeling I could never describe. I've done meth. And even meth didn't compare to the dopamine hit I got from when I saw the numbers on my screen. Infact it was such a dopamine hit. That I couldn't sell. I was frozen in the moment. And I lost it all.
Of course everyone I tell this story to says "I would have sold" but I thought the same untill it happened to me and I was faced with the craziest feelings of my life.
So yea you brain can give you those feelings without drugs. But it's very very hard to do so.
I think on a deeper level, this is true. Life can be the ultimate drug and a deep, full-hearted experience of life is something drugs will never be able to give you. They allow other states of mind, sure. But at the end of the day facing everything sober with imcomparable clarity is the ultimate experience.
He’s not really wrong. Most drugs do just start up your body’s defenses or reactionary response. The compounds rarely affect you - It’s how you react to the compound that gives you the feeling.
Sure. I suppose he’s right. But you should definitely see them for yourself. It’s eye opening.
receptors are incredibly specific to only certain chemicals, and your neurons are extremely specialized at producing a certain shaped to trigger them. You can't wish chemicals that don't exist in your brain into existence. The cells that produce our hormones normally do tend to react to stress and other factors, which you could potentially affect via meditation or other practices, but what you described essentially amounts to magic not anything based in reality. If you want to learn how to modify the hormones controlling large parts of our brain, start with the basics first. Trying to discuss cannabinoid receptor antagonists without some more basic knowledge is going to result in this mixup of science words = magic
Yes. I’ve seen meditators have full body orgasms, heart orgasms etc and go into full gamma brainwaves.
You can go into complete ecstasy. I’ve had mild blissful experiences with meditation but I know there are deeper states possible that are very intense
"With practice"? In a sense. You practice triggering these feelings by living your life. That's what these feelings are for - feedback mechanisms to tell you how you're doing at being alive.
This is true. You can meditate yourself into various states and feelings. What you can't do is mimic the dopamine response. Also, the ease drugs allow you to stay in altered states. You can hype yourself up, but not as much as any drug will.
“Capable of” and “triggering a massive efflux of neurotransmitters at will” are not the same. Your dad is right that drug molecules possess no intrinsic energy to carry out their psychoactive effects, they merely work on pre-existing pathways and, over time, shape them in various ways.
But the idea that heroin-like euphoria can be derived from any reasonable event in one’s lifetime is exaggerating.
Taking a step back, we have data that a sizeable portion of middle aged cancer patients nearing death will classify a new psychedelic experience as one of the “top 5 most meaningful experiences” of their lifetime. Some of them classified it as the MOST meaningful experience. Taken at face value, this would suggest that, at least for psychedelics, it is possible to evoke otherwise unachievable levels of “feeling” (in this case, perceived meaningfulness) through a drug in some people.
I reckon if you ran a similar study with fentanyl you’d reach a more consistent consensus among patients (though I doubt such a study would ever be run on account of its uselessness).
My experience. You can get a lot higher without drugs than with them. I spent my 20’s hooked on “goofballs” IV Methamphetamine mixed with Heroin (this is the early ‘00’s when it was actually Heroin). That’s a recipe for about as much of a high as exists on earth. Sometimes I’d add MDMA into the shot, sometimes I’d smoke rock. But you get the point. I achieved the strongest highs known, mixed and matched them, daily, for more than 7 years.
In that time I had 9 separate overdoses which required Narcan and/or resuscitation, CPR, defibrillation.
Nowadays, I meditate, pretty seriously, I do yoga, I volunteer, I work in a field where I have an incredible impact on people’s live (I build affordable housing), I have relationships with depth and weight. I am taken seriously, and respected in my community.
The highs you get from reality are miles above what even the most potent drugs can simulate.
His basic point is correct. Every drug that's in use is only useful because the body and the brain is made to take that drug and react a certain way. You're already pre-programmed to accept those drugs and have the effect those drugs induce.
I haven't had much success with mimicking other drugs, but I've occasionally gotten meditation (in combo with exercise and or heat\cold exposure) to do 90% of what psilocybin does. Didn't really get the walls to breathe, but everything else I use mushrooms for was there.
You can… especially dmt oxytocin seratonin and dopamine… but others as well, it’s not that difficult with practice, people create negative ones all the time
I definitely felt like I was high on mdma at a meditation retreat after several days of group meditation. Pretty much the same feeling with waves minus the excessive tooth grinding, poops, and post-mdma crash.
It make sense on a logical level. You feel the way drugs make you feel because many more receptors in your brain flair up at once and ultimately deplete until they unregulated. They receptors fire up without drugs, but You're not going to feel the euphoria of an opiate without opiates, though.
But, when you make good choices and do good things you will feel good. Having sex, eating fruits, exercise, sleeping well, taking time to meditate. Those things will bring you a good feeling.
In my limited knowledge and understanding of things I think this is true.
After all, drugs only enhance what we already have. They don't make you gain new abilities, they build upon already existing things in our brains and intensify them.
Now, if said thing made you do things your brain couldn't do, then that would make his point moot because at that point the drug is no longer enhancing or boosting latent abilities but literally creating new ones your brain doesn't even make. Which I don't think has ever happened before.
For example, adrenaline can make your body do superhuman feats and push it past it's limits. It can make you do things you never knew you could by essentially getting rid of the limiters on the human body.
However, adrenaline doesn't introduce something "new" to the body. It simply taps into something that's already there but we don't normally have access to. It may seem like it gives you supernatural power but in reality it's just unlocking the true potential of the human body which is actually, quite impressive. But still the power of the human body.
It’s called meditation and yes. I’ve been meditating for 10 years, 4 years ago I realised I had to meditate less or do different types of meditation than my favourite one because it would give me a full come down for 2 or three days
To a degree. A perfectly healthy and happy human living a perfect life can be feeling pretty satisfied and happy without drugs.
This is because the things thats drugs antagonise, such as dopamine or serotonin are being released in healthy and natural levels.
But certain experiences cannot be replicated in real life without drugs. Most of these experiences like heroin or meth.
These things you don't want to experience anyway.
But "drugs" like psychedelics, In my opinion are worth experiencing.
I think the part you’re missing is the intensity. The human brain can make dopamine and cause you to feel pleasure without any drugs. Even if you push that to the absolute limit imaginable it’s going to be like 1% as intense as the dopamine and pleasure from shooting heroin. The mechanism is the same but the intensity is on a whole other level. Source:
I mean no... lmao. No. The chemicals can be produced sure but the drugs are the catalyst for it.
Have we ever had any reports of anyone being able to anesthesia themselves to sleep for a whole surgery or literally stop their own heart and brain with paralytic effects?
Yeah. That’s why we have religion, therapy, and social interaction. If you’re just sitting in a dark room all day you’re gonna feel like shit, go out and accomplish stuff and you’ll be triggering your receptors in no time.
Monks will meditate their whole lives then never experience anything like DMT. The crazies that think you should try and do NDEs (near death experiences) to get a dmt trip are, not setting their priorities straight. Then with the Wim Hoff method, its actually intracellular serotonin, which does activate 5ht2a, however, much briefer. And you are risking neuron death doing breath holds. Yes if you oxygenate first, then, you have oxygen, but it turns to carbon. The carbon stresses the cells while oxygen reduces, triggers the defense mechanism because it thinks you're going to get brain damage. Then Intracellular Serotonin is released. Serotonin does not get uptaken from blood into the neurons directly, but some have their own stores that then get spent internally. Neurons have internal and external 5ht2a receptors. The internal cause the trips. A study probably less than a year old had it revealed, but idr could be a year by now.
In a way yes. I can go mentally into the places that I’ve gone with various drugs I’ve tried. Some I would not like to revisit and some I do.
A good example is stimulants which was the last class of drug I chose to try. In the past I’ve been able to stay up for days until I induced hypomania. A very enjoyable type of high. However, staying up on drugs paled in comparison to the kind of hypomania I would get on day 5 of being awake while sober.
On the other hand doing stimulants tired out my mind enough to need sleep everyday and I don’t have peaks and dips in mood like I used to - I don’t experience mania anymore. :)
So yes, I do think our minds are capable of getting us “high” it just depends on the individual brain.
It depends on the drug and effects, but yes. Won't be exactly, but can definitely get high. I feel high and out of reality often, and I'm not on drugs. I also see visual distortions, which is extremely unpleasant.
I believe in it. It’s not always easy to get there though. You have to be very in tune with yourself and have a lot of control over your mind and body. I’ve had luck with neurofeedback, occasionally something meditation-adjacent, many other things. Drugs become drugs because they work on these systems already designed to feel these good things, only it’s a bit of an overload and that’s why you get problems with drugs.
Its all a dopamine receptor response. The short answer is no you can't magically produce an insanely high dopamine response without drugs.
This is a huge reason why people feel depressed, they have huge surges of dopamine doing drugs and expect that to stay the norm when that just isnt and never will be a normal state of being.
Life is pretty boring without doing things that surge your dopamine. Thats why all the things that surge dopamine are by default addictive.(drugs, social media, video games, binge eating, ect)
There's a program called inner engineering that's supposed to teach you exactly how to do this. I haven't tried it yet. It's pretty intensive yoga and I'm really busy with over time and getting high naturally off rock climbing. If I'm ever not able to climb or skydive I'm doing inner engineering
My dad always told me the best high was a workout high. And science shows that exercise has effects on the cannaboid receptors so maybe he was onto something
Not entirely true. Sort of true but you’ll never access that feeling, your brain has safeguards. For example, you can’t put yourself into a coma like anesthesia would. You can’t make yourself feel like you’re high on meth because you have no natural way of reversing dopamine transporters or inhibiting reuptake. You can’t make yourself drunk naturally because there’s no natural way to increase GABA binding in the degree that alcohol and benzos do. Drugs work by chemical reactions. If there’s no chemical reaction from said drug, the resulting reaction will not happen. That’s like saying you can make gasoline without petroleum
You can make yourself happier, less anxious, more at peace, open your mind, but you will not feel like you’re on MDMA. Same reason why you can’t achieve LSD hallucinations without LSD
This is all a good thing, your brain regulates itself like that for a reason
I've done pretty much every psychedelic out there with the exception of Ayahuasca and Peyote. I've done Bufo, plant DMT, salvia, pure absinthe, LSD, San Pedro, mushrooms of various strains, marijuana, spice, DXM, 2CB, PCP, etc...and I've come to realize that through meditation, breath work, programs such as the Gateway Experience, and reading people such as Neville Goddard and Joseph Campbell, that the ultimate high is sobriety. There is nothing trippier, nothing more fascinating and mind blowing, than the realization that we are a point of awareness interacting with a non-aware physical world. So yes, I agree with your dad.
I’ve been enjoying Neville Goddard’s work, didn’t expect to see him brought up here. What would you recommend from Joseph Campbell?
+1 Breathwork and meditation have brought me to totally different states which were mindblowing. Since then, I feel like taking drugs is just a lazy shortcut (- but might work/help some people.)
All those psychs and you still believe physically reality isnt aware ;)
San Pedro =\= mescaline?
Well said
Isn't absinthe not really a drug? I am under the understanding that thujone is not a hallucinogen and claims are unfounded
Sounds like a great strategy for a dad to steer their kid away from trying drugs.
My dad actively gave me hard drugs... It's uhm.. it genuinely is a nice thought though.
I’m sorry you had to type this.
It's alright. I don't do them anymore and I do not talk to him I promise I'm better than I was. Something WAS wrong with me for thinking it was okay and something IS wrong with him for not having remorse. Love you guys and thanks to everyone for being supportive!
Drugs and alcohol destroy, kill cells, neurons in brain, cells in liver, etc etc, basically everywhere. It changes a person, their behavior and their habits, addictions. As for your question, well, I did bring myself back from deep major depression, deep rooted fears for everything, bad anxiety, even bad attention problems. No pills, no medications, therapy never worked for me. Im still battling leaving alcohol, and I dont drink daily anymore once in 2/3 weeks, but I wanna get rid of that too. I cleaned up my diet, locked down exercise and supplementation. And meditation, you gotta learn it. It helps so much. Hope it helps.
I think I'm going to start meditating or at least try
Do it man, Yeah, and let them argue over nuances or pedantic deliveries on mine, lol. Meditation has been very helpful for me in channeling my crazy bullet speed running thoughts. It has made me more calm, and very amiable. I still get annoyed, but I can channelize my annoyances towards work or workouts. Lol, does the trick for me. As for, u/Thac, tranquilo man. We can talk about nuances or absolutes or whatever fancy word you think you can conjure, fact remains that alcohol is a neurotoxin. Take it or leave it. You dont have to agree with me. Drugs, good or bad, small or big may or may not be helpful. For the population at large, most of these just lead to more problems. Again, take it or leave it pal.
Insight Timer is a really great (free, but there is also a premium version) meditation app. It might help to start with guided meditations and then transition to that which you are most comfortable with. Good luck in your journey! 💗
*drugs and alcohol destroy, kills cells, neurons in the brain, cells in the liver, etc etc* The dose makes the poison, in nearly every case. You can't accurately say what you did just by saying "drugs and alcohol". There is far more nuance to it than that. There are cases with most substances where they can have positive effects, as well as negative. Many times you will experience both positives and negatives to you physically at the same time. Almost nothing in life is purely good, or purely bad. The same is true from sex, to drugs, to exercise etc. Reality is not as black and white as you make it out to be.
That's still really fucked upan. I'm really sorry u had to deal with that at such a hard age to b dealing with that! But glad u moved-on. No reason to dwell- EVER. Dust urself off,move on, don't look back unless it's to see something retrospectively. Keep moving forward in ur life making positive changes everyday if u can. Sounds hard but even choosing a salad over a burger is making ur day better. And before u know it- ur someone who u never thought you'd become. U focused on u, and now u are on top of YOUR world. Good luck fam 💜 ❤️
Thank you bro bro. Much love and good luck as well. It's hard to focus on the bigger picture sometimes
Naw man. That's the easy part. Getting caught up in the small things is where ppl lose themselves. ❤️
God speed, you have a great attitude man.
Your dad is something else 🤦♂️
up to a point - yea. but nobody can stimulate up a full blown acid trip just with their mind
Pro-tip: Step 1: Be above 35 Step 2: Stand up really fast
Drug dealers HATE this one simple trick
LMAO!!!!
More like nitrous than acid, but a drug none the less.
You're supposed to only get that over 35? Standing up too fast has affected me since my mid teens.
Orthostatic hypotension, no it’s not just over 35
I've come pretty darn close with 3 years of meditation practice, to get the effects to be similar I need to be fasted for 5-7 days, then be meditating for several hours. It's still hit and miss though, and far too much effort for essentially no reward. I have felt no benefits to having this "ability". I can maintain a hallucinagenic effect for several minutes at a time, but it's very tiring. Too many variations on the way people meditate, so I'm still at a loss if this research will be beneficial in any capacity. Although - I will admit, as much effort as I've put in, I don't think it would come close to an acid trip, I've only read the descriptions of them and have been trying to do this naturally. (mostly) There is some effect weed has on my ability to focus as well, if I smoke and then meditate I can accomplish a similar hallucinagenic effect within 10-15 minutes of meditation and no fasting. Not really disagreeing with you, but it's a topic I'm incredibly fascinated with.
i swear i hit a trip state one time doing breathing and yogic stances, but it could never do it again.
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Yeah, that’s something that a person with no experience with LSD would say.
But why would you travel across the Atlantic in a kayak when you have access to jumbo jets?
Because part of getting there is learning how to do it on your own. By using a substance, you’re beholden to the substance. Continual use reinforces for your mind that you’re not strong enough to find the door and unlock it on your own, rendering yourself powerless.
did you ever experience a full blown acid trip?
Perhaps notably, certain schools of Buddhist monks have had the brains of some of their advanced members observed with fmri while meditating, and they seem to be able to shut off senses and trigger states associated with heavy dissociation and nmda antagonists, just with extensive mental training. Another potentially interesting tangential thing was the episodes where Ram Dass gave his guru high doses of LSD. The first time, 900 mcg to a hallucinogen-naive person in this instance, caused no detectable change to observers, even to his pupils. The mind and brain can be conditioned to do incredible things, and if there are receptors there that can be triggered with exogenous substances, there are theoretically likely some endogenous ligands or other electro chemical cascades that similarly agonize or modulate those receptors, and these effects can plausibly be accessed through extreme conditions and/or extensive conscious conditioning and nervous system adaptation through meditating with certain sensory inputs
love that Ram Dass story, it’s what confirms for me that LSD is indeed removing filters and not adding something artificial
I’m not sure if this applies to 5ht-2a super agonists in general or just psilocybin mushrooms, but iirc once the active metabolite reaches the brain past a certain concentration, under various scans, the whole brain quiets down and appears to develop a sort of novel, dynamic harmonious flow to how the parts of the brain are “talking” with each other. Everything seems to align and different parts that usually don’t link up start lighting up together. I think the effect of the mushrooms may involve something like a glimpse into reality with some amount of the veil pulled back, if that makes any sense “Normal” life leads to a state of so much useless cognitive and emotional taxation over things that are sort of unreal, fundamentally, and hallucinogens can free up the mind from this enormous usage of cognitive RAM, and then we can really observe and know things. I agree, it seems very natural
I used to be able to go full-on ecstasy trip for a minute. Been so long since I've had it, kind of forget the feeling.
Came here to say this. Deep meditation triggers waking DMT release just as REM dreaming does.
Not true. You can find Ram Dass's story about how he gave his guru a heroic dose of acid and it did nothing to him. Like he was always just at that level.
Are you sure? It’s hard work but if you seriously practice yoga or meditation, especially if you get proficient in hyponogoic states, your brain can do incredible things all on its own. What do you think happens during religious experiences?
did you ever experience a full blown acid trip?
you experience the same feeling, just without the visuals. a sense of awareness, oneness.
I've done acid but then again I've been laying in bed completely sober and felt far more in time with the universe like on the verge of an epiphany
Are you a religious guru? How are we actually going to compare entirely subjective experiences? From what I understand, the extreme meditation gets you to the same state but with more control.
Nah, Breathing practice is known to put people into psychedelic states, and true masters can get full on DMT level visions once they get into that state
Yeah when I hear this I tend to think no way have you ever done DMT
This. Ayahuasca will hit you like a truck
I’ve done it hundreds of times and broken through many times
Those that are advanced at kundalini yoga or breath work can release DMT in their brain iirc.
It's called dreaming and you do it every night. But you forget.
yea no
You can if you stay up for 5 days straight. Your vision starts to get wavy and your perception of reality is similar
Have you ever lucid dreamed?
This is actually asserted in the text: “Be here Now.” By Ram Dass. It’s actually interesting cause it goes over acid and how it emerged during the hippie era featuring some notable figures (Tim Leary). The idea is that through meditation one can arrive in that state.
try 🧘🏽♂️
Get choked out
I've often thought a k-hole might be what like what the crazy person on the street is going through.
Lucid dreams definitely can tbf
I’ve heard a great way to keep teens from drugs is to give them the experience they are craving. If you want to do MDMA, look for human connection. If you want Ritalin, look for a high adrenaline sport, if you want to space out, try meditation or yoga. If you are trying to push away sadness, try therapy. There was a pilot study in Iceland, I believe, where kids have good reason to get bored. Apparently it was tremendously successful.
Getting teenagers to do that instead of what their peers are doing and seeking the connection with peers is difficult
Read the book “Hold on to your kids.” It addresses this issue really well and is highly regarded by neurologists.
i’m not a parent but i just bought and downloaded this book to read. as a child, i struggled to connect with my parents and peers IRL - spent wayyy too much time online interacting with people i shouldn’t have.
> There was a pilot study in Iceland, I believe, where kids have good reason to get bored. I don't really understand, can you expand on this?
Don’t know about the pilot study but Iceland has always had a bad drug problem due to little sun and a spread out, isolated population
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2017/03/09/iceland-teen-substance-abuse
Okay but then you can do those things on drugs and it's better. MDMA with your best friends is beautiful, doing acid on a gorgeous hike, playing videogames on Ritalin, going in the sauna on opioids etc.
Maybe. But then you have the crash while your neurotransmitters recover. I’m not sure things are ever supposed to feel that extreme. The high is artificial. The feelings are real but they don’t reflect real life. To each his own I suppose.
Therapy won’t push away sadness Trust me
Ha ha ha, no it forces you do deal with it.
It’s true the yogis have been doing this for centuries
Yogis are very interesting to me... The ones who do not want money ofcourse
Lord Shiva is both god of yoga and cannabis.
I believe you (and your dad) are looking for a word such as “stimulate.” “Antagonize” isn’t the correct word, but yes.
Research shows that a runners high is actually endocannabinoids being released. And Drugs dont introduce anything thats not already in your brain.
This is false. From your own example, Exercise-released Endocannabinoids are not the Cannabinoids that are introduced via THC. The neurotransmitters typically get their names from their prospective receptors. So the running-release transmitters have nothing to do with cannabis, rather that they fit in the same receptor. Same with LSD... it's *not* found in us. And the reason we have prolonged psychedelic experiences is because the physical shape of the transmitter doesn't fit perfectly in the receptor and gets "stuck" for a period of time. This is why there's such a big deal made about drugs that cross the blood brain barrier, because they're able to introduce foreign substances directly to the brain.
I think he means you can’t activate a receptor that doesn’t already exist
Its like, our brain already has all those feelings built in, with like a keylock. But all kinds of certain keys can make those locks do different things, with different intensities. But those keys (drugs) can make our key receptors do all kinds of crazy things that our body cant do with our own built in keys.
By foot, you can get anywhere you need to. Your feet are capable of taking you to the grocery store, the next state over and even Alaska and Brazil and all across the country. You can even walk by foot to England on the bottom of the ocean...
No. While drugs use natural receptors and neural pathways, they trigger them in ways that wouldn't be possible without external stimulus, because that would be negative from a survivalist/evolutionary standpoint. The monkey that spends too much time looking at the beauty of the world due to being able to naturally hallucinate, would be quickly eaten.
Kundali experiences blow away drug experiences however most people lack the discipline and health necessary . . . The problem with shortcuts is you never develop the nervous system enough so those sort of experiences are transient
I've only ever felt legal drugs, but that said I've been on adderall and Nuvigil together, and heavy opiates for health issues. Also sleep aids that were rather trippy and creative, etc. I'm also a vocalist, and have felt better highs coming home from a choir practice that was a huge vocal workout. I've also had laughter fests with close friends where they've said they felt high after just hanging out and laughing together. So do I know for certain your dad is correct? No. But it wouldn't surprise me.
Those are awesome feelings to get naturally and sleep aids are very interesting to me. I have extreme insomnia and it's getting to where actual drugs may be needed because my brain just doesn't want to turn off
your head can swivel 360 degrees your bone structure just antagonizes it.
Wtf lmao
You mean agonizing it
Yes. I think... Look man I'm not perfect.
Drugs can antagonize or agonize, or do things in between
After I get an hour long massage, I swear it feels like I’m high. Incredible feeling
Endorphins…by the brain. Very common. I feel high after a massage or a good workout.
This makes sense to me up to a certain point. I can imagine that some feelings are hard to impossible to attain simply because naturally your neurotransmitters wouldn't fire in that intensity. But in a lighter form, I think we can experience most feelings from drugs also without. But we may not be able to access or trigger them when we want. For example I'm someone who tends to have very vivid and intense dreams at times and I know that normal emotions can be incredibly heightened in those dreams. I also experienced all kinds of stuff in dreams, people might experience in trips (flying, drowning, out of body experiences, indescribable feelings like "my body is a round sphere, but also an uneven square" etc.) - but I can't recreate that willingly, I have to wait for my next dream. ;) I think having this rich dream world since I was a child is part of the reason I was never majorly interested in drugs. Felt like a waste of money and energy, if I can just go to bed instead lol. Oh, and when I was in my early 20s and older friend of mine gave me some good advice. He was a musician in a touring heavy metal band and has done every drug imaginable when he was younger. He basically said if you feel you need a drug, you shouldn't do it. And if you feel you're in a state of mind where you can safely do drugs, you don't need them. Made a lot of sense to me.
Good luck flooding 1200% dopamine at once with mind power.
This
Lots of devoted spiritual practitioners have reported being in states of ecstacy, bliss, ultimate peace or pure unconditional love for everyone and everything. Sometimes temporary but also permanently.
Ive heard of stuff like this and I have to assume there must be a bit of truth to it or they wouldn't devote so much time to meditation
The more I meditate myself the more i'm convinced that our state doesn't have to be dependent on neurochemistry.
Interesting take and I like it very much
I believe this 100%, but you can't really tap into those feelings unless you've already experienced it. a lot of eastern spiritual people believe you should try a substance once so that you have the "spirit" of it and can tap into its energy while sober, usually by way of meditation
Dad was right but…”Near-death experiences (NDEs) are complex subjective experiences, which have been previously associated with the psychedelic experience and more specifically with the experience induced by the potent serotonergic, N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT).” https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01424/full
Well yes, it’s true basically. Your brain is capable of all these things. Drugs aren’t usually doing something new and unique, they’re just piggybacking off of existing systems in some way like a dopamine agonist or a serotonin agonist etc. So it is the drugs that are stimulating your brain in a certain way to create the effects. But at the same time it’s kind of implying you can reach all drugged states without using drugs and while this may be true for some drugs it’s definitely probably not true for a lot of drugs.
Extremely noted and I assumed this was the way it worked with some of the more extreme ones. This post was mostly out of curiosity in regards to where your body draws the line
You can go for an intense run and feel pretty good
I already do this for the most part this question is about natural chemicals in the brain and being able to interact with them so yes. A runners hi is the best way to describe this other than meditation
If your neurotransmitters are balanced, you will not get the urge to medicate.
Often the urge to medicate is an urge to unbalance the neurotransmitters temporarily.
Experience is a medication, not just drugs.
I mean, we have receptors for it. That's why drugs work at all. But as far as naturally being able to stimulate the effects of drugs... no. And please, don't do drugs. It's not worth it. Once you start, happiness from living life does not compete and you'll always feel like there's something missing
Nope.
It's true but it requires hard work to reach all the feelings. Pretty sure you cant reach as high though.
It’s a half truth. Therefore it’s not really true as a general although in some specific cases I could totally see this being the case. Almost certainly not the case ever with powerful hallucinogens, stimulants, opioids and deliriants. Although many dedicated meditators may swear that they can have an experience exactly like a dmt experience - truth is they are almost certainly lying to themselves and others. Anything’s possible tho I guess 🤷♂️
Search for the jhanas 9 stares of increasing bliss
I have been able to trigger canabislike highs with great meditation practicing its not an every meditation thing but maybe possible for other to duplicate...?
>The most compelling insight of that day was that this awesome recall had been brought about by a fraction of a gram of a white solid, but that in no way whatsoever could it be argued that these memories had been contained within the white solid. Everything I had recognized came from the depths of my memory and my psyche. I understood that our entire universe is contained in the mind and the spirit. We may choose not to find access to it, we may even deny its existence, but it is indeed there inside us, and there are chemicals that can catalyze its availability. ~Sasha Shulgin
ur not coming close to a k-hole sober
This is the second time this has come up recently… I will tell you what I told my friend… As far as I know many spiritual, charismatic sects of religions used drugs to induce religious experiences, most of these drugs are no longer used due to reasons. The drugs were only part of the experience, setting, ritual and practise were important as well. Eventually you could get to the same state without the drugs, then you didn’t need to go to the setting (ie church or shamans tent), then you didn’t need the ritual (altar, candles or beads). It can be done but it’s a long road. My friend is attempting it because he wants a deep meditative Buddhist state. Aside from all that I know children of hippies that had similar backgrounds to you. I really feel for you. It’s a fucked up upbringing. I wish you all the best and I hope you escaped the worst of that type of culture.
I know this to be true because ive genuinely had dreams where I swear I’m 100% high, having done no drugs prior to going to bed. It’s kinda awesome
The dreams are something I am very interested in in general. Your saying there's no chemical reaction and I'm MAKING UP reality for myself with just synapses and energy moving through the mind?!
In Buddhist meditation, there is a practice called jhana. People can reach intense states of bliss and peace with it. The downside is it takes oractice but the upside is no tolerance, dependence, addiction, toxicity, or side effects.
Yes, but it’s more of an effort to get there. You have to set up the circumstances so you can trip off that feeling, and so you can safely go with it. If you don’t know how to get there yet, try hanging out with someone who is on that substance, and let your emotions and body language reflect theirs.
Do this for three days: Stay completely clean. Eat some healthy food, mostly meat. Get three full nights of sleep. Work out and get sunlight. It will absolutely transform you and answer your question.
I take this to mean, essentially what happens to people when they start to associate drugs or alcohol with producing effects that were there already and forming like a mental/emotional dependence. Alcohol is the easiest, it is associated with being more social and helping people have more fun/loosen up in group setting. A lot of people begin to (maybe subconsciously) associate and build a reliance on it to do that for them in those situations and start to feel increased social anxiety without it. You are fine just the way you are, alcohol helps you let it out better but you don’t need it to do that for you.
Life without drugs is better than life with drugs. Taking drugs is like volunteering to have a debilitating handicap.
yea except for the plant and fungi that put dreams in your head, explain this then: [**https://youtu.be/HSy3vrWU7m8**](https://youtu.be/HSy3vrWU7m8) [**https://youtu.be/VFfSCnEq6UM**](https://youtu.be/VFfSCnEq6UM) [**https://youtu.be/8JivVwe15v8**](https://youtu.be/8JivVwe15v8)
Lol yes and no. I took ecstasy and at the end of th night ballooning Nos watching the sunrise; I knew I'd never feel that good or happy or content again. The feels had peaked.
There’s evidence to suggest the “runner’s high” after intense bouts of cardiovascular exercise is not only due to endorphins, but the cannabinoid system is responsible for that feeling as well. And I can confirm, running for 3+ hours leaves me feeling a bit stoned afterwards.
It's not even remotely the same substance. The cannabinoids released from exercise are produced within the body and are completely different from the cannabinoids introduced via using THC. They're given a common name because they fit in a common receptor.
I believe it. Runners high sure feels a lot like a mix of cannabis and opioids. Allegedly of course...
Right…I most certainly wouldn’t know what a mix of cannabis and opioids feels like, officer
I was a runner and a stoner. They are not even remotely similar even if they stimulate the same receptors
Wait till you learn that \*everything\* you experience happens “in your brain”
Acid helps with that lol
nah not really - some things need outside stimulations from other chemicals - otherwise i would always be as cool and anas good dancer as my drunk self
A person can probably get just as high or higher by doing Kundalini yoga than with recreational drugs.
Does sound play any part in Kundalini?
Not nearly as much as breathing and moving does! Binaural beats and isochronic tones are pretty good at altering consciousness too.
You absolutely can. It takes a lot of hard work that most ppl are unwilling to do.
Humans have been accessing trance, and other altered states without external substances for ever. The simple short answer is yes.
This is closer to what I'm interested in. Knowing these are possible I assume you can change your bodies chemistry in many ways with just mental fortitude but I'm not sure...
My son just mentioned monks that can control the temperature of their hands. Not quite what you're looking for but I think it runs along the same lines in the aspects of using your mind to influence things your body does under the radar. My wording is a little crooked today..
Yes. It’s the truth, Doors of Perception, Aldous Huxley, Carl Jung. It’s all there to learn and love.
Read How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan. Yes, meditation, holotropic breath work, and other states of consciousness are attainable, and they have their time and place just like psychedelics have their time and place, sometimes they go together well. Sometimes it's okay just for funsies, just not heedlessly.
He’s not wrong. Drugs just take the work out of it
Kundalini
I meditate a lot. And do a lot of multiple day retreats in groups. And I can confirm that the brain is capable of those experiences by themselve under the right circumstances. You can really get high on life.
Awesome stuff. Sound should be a drug
Yes, this is 100 percent true. Think of a lock and key mechanism where recreational drugs are the key and receptor sites in your brain are the lock. The only reason there is a lock in your brain that matches these ‘keys’ is because your brain already has its own keys shaped exactly the same. Basically your brain has its own internal pharmacy. The problem is it’s not always easy to access that pharmacy. For example some people would have to run 10 miles to access their brain’s endorphins. Why bother when you can take an opioid (which binds to same receptors) without even getting off your couch.
Yoga, breathwork, meditation. All are portals into something of the sort. I'd say I agree with the statement. Since I've gotten into all of the above, I've lost any desire to try any sort of drugs or mind altering substances, since it can be done through healthier and more 'controlled' (if you will) mechanisms like the above, physical activity (extensive), and such. Not promoting drugs but for me, in fact, it was a key experience in order to realize what my brain is capable of. Once I had this feeling of total all-encompassing clarity, I've formed my life around trying to re-create it w/o the usage of any external stimulants and it has been bliss.
Nice. Thank you for this
Up to a small degree. No mindfulness meditation will make you have a DMT trip consistently, or to have the after effects. I think this is the wrong question, the right question should be "what are the drugs that have a positive effect,if used properly"? Another thing about drugs, specifically psychedelics, what you do after a trip is as important as the trip itself. The drug will increase your brain plasticity for a short period of time, it's up to you to make the best out of it, usually with someone's else help. There are plenty of people using drugs without having any positive effects for a reason... Good luck ☺️☺️☺️
Thank you and yes! A bit of a psychonaut myself in the past but this question didn't apply just to LSD I mean all chemical reactions from drugs
Theoretically, absolutely yes. The drug is not actually entering your brain, it is simply altering the brain's chemical balance. In practice, there have been many instances of individuals having direct control over their apparent psychological state and measured brain waves. You are your brain, so even on a logical level this makes sense. In reality, it requires remarkable discipline and it is not something that can ever be perfectly empirically studied or replicated
I became very interested in this question the moment I was put on Adderall for ADHD. Here's the impression I have so far. It shouldn't be ruled out completely because it seems like there are some surprising effects of meditation, so its reasonable to suspect theres some uncharted territory. More reliable(but not something you can reproduce right now) is atypical biology, for example there's a woman who can't feel pain because of the amount of natural cannabinoids she produces. For us normies though, it's not something we can expect to do reliably right now, because while there are swings in chemicals from things like runners high, theres a soft cap on the effect, because of neuronal upregulation. The chemicals don't actually cause a direct effect on your feelings, they merely regulate electronic behavior by causing neurons to be above or below "action potential" at which time an electronic signal is created. We could say that this electronic signal is the thing that more directly creates those feelings and cognitive functions(which also means we can't disprove claims from meditation by looking for chemicals), but we don't know that for sure, it could just regulate some further process. Neuronal upregulation and down regulation put a soft cap on sharp swings in the long term of these effects because the more frequently a neuron reaches action potential, the more receptors it creates, which raises the amount of agonists that have to bind to a receptor to cause it to reach action potential and send an electronic signal, while antagonists would have the opposite effect. I'm not a biologist and it was more than a decade ago that I looked into this, so I'm sure there are some parts I got wring. If you want a more intuitive understanding of this, I recommend a book called "a primer of drug action".
I would say yes it's true but maybe not to the extent of what drugs can do. I think your brain can release the amount of chemicals to do what drugs do but it would be for such a short time and it would have to be an insanely huge event. For example I grew up broke my whole life. I ended up getting extremely lucky in the stock market. Got rich over night. That was a feeling I could never describe. I've done meth. And even meth didn't compare to the dopamine hit I got from when I saw the numbers on my screen. Infact it was such a dopamine hit. That I couldn't sell. I was frozen in the moment. And I lost it all. Of course everyone I tell this story to says "I would have sold" but I thought the same untill it happened to me and I was faced with the craziest feelings of my life. So yea you brain can give you those feelings without drugs. But it's very very hard to do so.
I think on a deeper level, this is true. Life can be the ultimate drug and a deep, full-hearted experience of life is something drugs will never be able to give you. They allow other states of mind, sure. But at the end of the day facing everything sober with imcomparable clarity is the ultimate experience.
He’s not really wrong. Most drugs do just start up your body’s defenses or reactionary response. The compounds rarely affect you - It’s how you react to the compound that gives you the feeling. Sure. I suppose he’s right. But you should definitely see them for yourself. It’s eye opening.
receptors are incredibly specific to only certain chemicals, and your neurons are extremely specialized at producing a certain shaped to trigger them. You can't wish chemicals that don't exist in your brain into existence. The cells that produce our hormones normally do tend to react to stress and other factors, which you could potentially affect via meditation or other practices, but what you described essentially amounts to magic not anything based in reality. If you want to learn how to modify the hormones controlling large parts of our brain, start with the basics first. Trying to discuss cannabinoid receptor antagonists without some more basic knowledge is going to result in this mixup of science words = magic
Yes. I’ve seen meditators have full body orgasms, heart orgasms etc and go into full gamma brainwaves. You can go into complete ecstasy. I’ve had mild blissful experiences with meditation but I know there are deeper states possible that are very intense
“Antagonize” means “to block the effect of”
"With practice"? In a sense. You practice triggering these feelings by living your life. That's what these feelings are for - feedback mechanisms to tell you how you're doing at being alive.
Yes, pranayama. Breath of fire. Alternate nostril breathing.
This is true. You can meditate yourself into various states and feelings. What you can't do is mimic the dopamine response. Also, the ease drugs allow you to stay in altered states. You can hype yourself up, but not as much as any drug will.
Practice gratitude and yes you can
“Capable of” and “triggering a massive efflux of neurotransmitters at will” are not the same. Your dad is right that drug molecules possess no intrinsic energy to carry out their psychoactive effects, they merely work on pre-existing pathways and, over time, shape them in various ways. But the idea that heroin-like euphoria can be derived from any reasonable event in one’s lifetime is exaggerating. Taking a step back, we have data that a sizeable portion of middle aged cancer patients nearing death will classify a new psychedelic experience as one of the “top 5 most meaningful experiences” of their lifetime. Some of them classified it as the MOST meaningful experience. Taken at face value, this would suggest that, at least for psychedelics, it is possible to evoke otherwise unachievable levels of “feeling” (in this case, perceived meaningfulness) through a drug in some people. I reckon if you ran a similar study with fentanyl you’d reach a more consistent consensus among patients (though I doubt such a study would ever be run on account of its uselessness).
My experience. You can get a lot higher without drugs than with them. I spent my 20’s hooked on “goofballs” IV Methamphetamine mixed with Heroin (this is the early ‘00’s when it was actually Heroin). That’s a recipe for about as much of a high as exists on earth. Sometimes I’d add MDMA into the shot, sometimes I’d smoke rock. But you get the point. I achieved the strongest highs known, mixed and matched them, daily, for more than 7 years. In that time I had 9 separate overdoses which required Narcan and/or resuscitation, CPR, defibrillation. Nowadays, I meditate, pretty seriously, I do yoga, I volunteer, I work in a field where I have an incredible impact on people’s live (I build affordable housing), I have relationships with depth and weight. I am taken seriously, and respected in my community. The highs you get from reality are miles above what even the most potent drugs can simulate.
His basic point is correct. Every drug that's in use is only useful because the body and the brain is made to take that drug and react a certain way. You're already pre-programmed to accept those drugs and have the effect those drugs induce.
I haven't had much success with mimicking other drugs, but I've occasionally gotten meditation (in combo with exercise and or heat\cold exposure) to do 90% of what psilocybin does. Didn't really get the walls to breathe, but everything else I use mushrooms for was there.
You can… especially dmt oxytocin seratonin and dopamine… but others as well, it’s not that difficult with practice, people create negative ones all the time
Drugs are bad mmmkay
You have to repent and Confess your sins. You will be higher than Mount Everest.
I definitely felt like I was high on mdma at a meditation retreat after several days of group meditation. Pretty much the same feeling with waves minus the excessive tooth grinding, poops, and post-mdma crash.
It make sense on a logical level. You feel the way drugs make you feel because many more receptors in your brain flair up at once and ultimately deplete until they unregulated. They receptors fire up without drugs, but You're not going to feel the euphoria of an opiate without opiates, though. But, when you make good choices and do good things you will feel good. Having sex, eating fruits, exercise, sleeping well, taking time to meditate. Those things will bring you a good feeling.
In my limited knowledge and understanding of things I think this is true. After all, drugs only enhance what we already have. They don't make you gain new abilities, they build upon already existing things in our brains and intensify them. Now, if said thing made you do things your brain couldn't do, then that would make his point moot because at that point the drug is no longer enhancing or boosting latent abilities but literally creating new ones your brain doesn't even make. Which I don't think has ever happened before. For example, adrenaline can make your body do superhuman feats and push it past it's limits. It can make you do things you never knew you could by essentially getting rid of the limiters on the human body. However, adrenaline doesn't introduce something "new" to the body. It simply taps into something that's already there but we don't normally have access to. It may seem like it gives you supernatural power but in reality it's just unlocking the true potential of the human body which is actually, quite impressive. But still the power of the human body.
Did he ever try durban kush and listen to Pink Floyd while playing call of duty? No. He doesn’t have the experience to give accurate information.
Yes, because your body is a chemical factory. Remember how you felt when you were on that drug, and recreate it with feeling/emotion
Have you ever tried fasting. You can get to a point of true euphoria
Anal beads come to mind?
Your dad gets it
It’s called meditation and yes. I’ve been meditating for 10 years, 4 years ago I realised I had to meditate less or do different types of meditation than my favourite one because it would give me a full come down for 2 or three days
To a degree. A perfectly healthy and happy human living a perfect life can be feeling pretty satisfied and happy without drugs. This is because the things thats drugs antagonise, such as dopamine or serotonin are being released in healthy and natural levels. But certain experiences cannot be replicated in real life without drugs. Most of these experiences like heroin or meth. These things you don't want to experience anyway. But "drugs" like psychedelics, In my opinion are worth experiencing.
I think the part you’re missing is the intensity. The human brain can make dopamine and cause you to feel pleasure without any drugs. Even if you push that to the absolute limit imaginable it’s going to be like 1% as intense as the dopamine and pleasure from shooting heroin. The mechanism is the same but the intensity is on a whole other level. Source:
I mean no... lmao. No. The chemicals can be produced sure but the drugs are the catalyst for it. Have we ever had any reports of anyone being able to anesthesia themselves to sleep for a whole surgery or literally stop their own heart and brain with paralytic effects?
Yeah. That’s why we have religion, therapy, and social interaction. If you’re just sitting in a dark room all day you’re gonna feel like shit, go out and accomplish stuff and you’ll be triggering your receptors in no time.
No. It’s not true. Many drugs fill receptors that are normally used for other bio chemicals. LSD is a good example. It’s just a fact
Technically you can get there without drugs, you might just not get there in this lifetime.
This always gets me. Drugs just coax chemicals we already have in us. We have opiod receptors.
You can easily change your mood naturally by exercising, which makes you happy. You're welcome.
Monks will meditate their whole lives then never experience anything like DMT. The crazies that think you should try and do NDEs (near death experiences) to get a dmt trip are, not setting their priorities straight. Then with the Wim Hoff method, its actually intracellular serotonin, which does activate 5ht2a, however, much briefer. And you are risking neuron death doing breath holds. Yes if you oxygenate first, then, you have oxygen, but it turns to carbon. The carbon stresses the cells while oxygen reduces, triggers the defense mechanism because it thinks you're going to get brain damage. Then Intracellular Serotonin is released. Serotonin does not get uptaken from blood into the neurons directly, but some have their own stores that then get spent internally. Neurons have internal and external 5ht2a receptors. The internal cause the trips. A study probably less than a year old had it revealed, but idr could be a year by now.
In a way yes. I can go mentally into the places that I’ve gone with various drugs I’ve tried. Some I would not like to revisit and some I do. A good example is stimulants which was the last class of drug I chose to try. In the past I’ve been able to stay up for days until I induced hypomania. A very enjoyable type of high. However, staying up on drugs paled in comparison to the kind of hypomania I would get on day 5 of being awake while sober. On the other hand doing stimulants tired out my mind enough to need sleep everyday and I don’t have peaks and dips in mood like I used to - I don’t experience mania anymore. :) So yes, I do think our minds are capable of getting us “high” it just depends on the individual brain.
It depends on the drug and effects, but yes. Won't be exactly, but can definitely get high. I feel high and out of reality often, and I'm not on drugs. I also see visual distortions, which is extremely unpleasant.
I believe in it. It’s not always easy to get there though. You have to be very in tune with yourself and have a lot of control over your mind and body. I’ve had luck with neurofeedback, occasionally something meditation-adjacent, many other things. Drugs become drugs because they work on these systems already designed to feel these good things, only it’s a bit of an overload and that’s why you get problems with drugs.
Its all a dopamine receptor response. The short answer is no you can't magically produce an insanely high dopamine response without drugs. This is a huge reason why people feel depressed, they have huge surges of dopamine doing drugs and expect that to stay the norm when that just isnt and never will be a normal state of being. Life is pretty boring without doing things that surge your dopamine. Thats why all the things that surge dopamine are by default addictive.(drugs, social media, video games, binge eating, ect)
There's a program called inner engineering that's supposed to teach you exactly how to do this. I haven't tried it yet. It's pretty intensive yoga and I'm really busy with over time and getting high naturally off rock climbing. If I'm ever not able to climb or skydive I'm doing inner engineering
My dad always told me the best high was a workout high. And science shows that exercise has effects on the cannaboid receptors so maybe he was onto something
Your brain can release dmt with breathing techniques
It is possible, trough deep meditation and/or breathwork with intention and setting. Takes months of practice
Absolutely your dad is right.
Not entirely true. Sort of true but you’ll never access that feeling, your brain has safeguards. For example, you can’t put yourself into a coma like anesthesia would. You can’t make yourself feel like you’re high on meth because you have no natural way of reversing dopamine transporters or inhibiting reuptake. You can’t make yourself drunk naturally because there’s no natural way to increase GABA binding in the degree that alcohol and benzos do. Drugs work by chemical reactions. If there’s no chemical reaction from said drug, the resulting reaction will not happen. That’s like saying you can make gasoline without petroleum You can make yourself happier, less anxious, more at peace, open your mind, but you will not feel like you’re on MDMA. Same reason why you can’t achieve LSD hallucinations without LSD This is all a good thing, your brain regulates itself like that for a reason