it's a pity.
i hope you will (sooner or later) get energized.
tho (since you didn't stop posting comments on Ltbxd) i don't really complain.
i am these days (obviously) full of energy (in a manic phase) and thus i can't resist (tho it would be probably more reasonable to display a bit of self-restraint) to share my trip to Popocatépetl that occurred in the recent past (June 2020) in Eastern Bohemia.
(partly due to the SCFZ "Dreams" thread) lately, i started to record all my (noteworthy) dreams.
i made for this purpose a hard-to-find website (an equivalent of the semi-hidden "She-Doctor" website).
one of the readers suggested i also include (among the dreams) an account of a mushroom trip.
at first, i was rather reluctant to do so.
but then i changed my mind and have written down all i could remember.
because the account contains a strong reference to a Mexican film i guess it fits to this particular "haphazard travels".
Our trip started about half an hour before noon by taking 10 mushrooms both of us (me and my trip guide H.).
There were still some more mushrooms left, ready as a booster (but I didn't need to boost).
The plan was to eat them and after a while to go for a stroll to the outskirts of the village (ideally to proceed even further into the fields and experience the trip in nature).
Since I have expected the impact of the mushrooms will be “me becoming one (or in harmony) with the universe” I considered this to be a good plan (which turned out to be not — at least not for me, because the impact of mushrooms on me was different than on H.) But I am jumping too ahead.
So, after we ate mushrooms (with cheese as a side dish), within about half an hour we started to yawn and feel something (and for about next half an hour everything went very smooth).
I didn't feel nauseous at all, the whole feeling was quite weed-like, i.e. we were talkative, joking (f.e. H. was amused by my frowning eyebrows), everything seemed bright (the sky was dark actually, at the verge to give rain, but in this phase suddenly the atmosphere somewhat brightened in our gaze), everything outside was pleasing to sense.
After this mild intro, the real trippy feelings started.
I drank a bit of mineral water and it made me feel nauseous (but it was fast gone).
Then, stronger trippy feelings started to come in waves and we decided now is the right time to go out for a stroll.
But before leaving the house, H. wanted to eat some tidbit and urged me to have a snack too (especially after figuring out, I ate near to nothing since the morning).
However, I didn't feel like to eat and just seeing H. eating made me feel nauseous (ultimately, I had to stop looking at the mouth swallowing food, otherwise I would vomit).
So (ultimately, without me puking), we went out but the more we walked, the more I started to feel I would prefer not to.
From being talkative before, I went into being completely mute.
All the sensual stimuli I started to perceive as disturbing.
I didn't like I have to move forward, I didn't like I have to look at stuff, etc., etc.
H. got somewhat worried about me and said my state is strange because mushrooms are not supposed to have a sedative effect.
I trusted my guide, took some deep breaths, started to feel better and we proceeded.
But, somehow, I still felt like “going against the grain”.
Meanwhile, started to rain and we were urged to go back home (which I greeted with relief).
I felt I would like to sit in the grass, but it was already wet from rain, so we could not make any “picnic” pause.
But, now, as we walked on a path fully covered with grass with green fields on both sides (and no other stuff that would stand out, move, or differ in color) I started to perceive looking around as much less disturbing — actually almost pleasing (I felt the pleasure of the monochromatic perception).
Then, we got back home with soaked shoes from wet grass (and soaked socks from wet shoes).
We decided to stay out under pergola (being protected from rain, but being in the fresh air).
And we also decided to dry shoes and warm feet with the heater (which I brought from Prague some weeks ago, without an idea it can facilitate my upcoming trip).
But to be able to use a heater under the pergola, I had to spread the extension cord there.
However, my body was already becoming so heavy (started to petrify) that to spread this extension cord was truly a herculean task.
Somehow, I did the job.
H. later recalled me spreading this extension cord for a heater under the pergola was the most amusing part of the trip.
Unfortunately, I can't say (from my own perspective) what specifically might have been so funny about it because I was in a different dimension with a very low level of external sense perception (acting predominantly on autopilot).
When I finally could put my wet&cold feet on the heater and lean in the chair, I started to feel fine.
I closed my eyes (I became “blind and deaf”), I let the body to get truly heavy (to get fully petrified).
I felt still being inside the body, but the body was “out of the game“ (“switched off”) and all I sensed was a very neutral feeling (in the most positive sense) — like the consciousness all alone (like body sleeping, but me being awake).
And all this was great, now I didn't feel like during the stroll (like “going against the grain”).
During later deliberation about all the experience, I could clearly see my trip preconception of “becoming one with the universe” during the “high” stroll in nature was wrong.
Instead, I was supposed to switch off my body, shut off the senses (block the external stimuli), and just to feel what is left (when the body is thus shut off).
I appreciated very much my guides' presence before the peak experience (in the prologue phase) and in the phase after it (the epilogue), but during the strong impact phase, everything external (including the guide) was redundant and even disturbing.
After the effect evaporated, we had again a very pleasing conversation with H. on various subjects — f.e. I elaborated (for some unknown reason) on my recent viewing of Veit Harlan's film “Opfergang” (“The Great Sacrifice” or “Rite of Sacrifice”).
After H. left in the evening, I went inside the house, lied on the sofa, felt somewhat tired but not sleepy (tho, I had an urge to close my eyes again).
Thus relaxing (with eyes closed), I did some deliberations about the whole experience (including the aforementioned realization my trip program was just switching off the sensual stimuli and feeling what's left — strolling around being counterproductive).
Maybe the right thing to do would be strolling in the early phase, during the peak experience just to lie in the grass with eyes closed (instead of “walking forward” rather “to let the body move towards the switching off”), and proceed with the stroll in the epilogue phase.
Next time I might try this, tho it's a question if the “plots” of the trips repeat?!
I might do this, but maybe there will be again the feeling of “going against the grain” (because mushrooms will conceive some other schedule).
In any case, I will (somehow) try to go forward to switching off (the external stimuli) next time.
During this later deliberation, it also came to my mind (based on my fresh trip experience) that the general claim that “people should not die alone” might not be completely true (or might be true at the condition that the presence of others is not prominent). I can imagine that people who are not afraid of death (who are not panicking), can maybe pass away more easily if nobody is giving them diverse (diverting) external stimuli.
When my mom was coming closer to death, my sisters during their visits in hospital tended to speak to her about all kinds of details related to family (and alike), but I always felt strange to do so.
Once, I remember I was saying something (of this kind) to her, she was listening, looking at me, but besides she had a hard time to breath, at times obviously felt some pain (based on her grimace), and was becoming more and more exhausted. So, I told her, if she feels tired she can just close eyes, I will not go away, I will keep holding her hand, will stay being there (despite being mute). She nodded her head in agreement and closed her eyes. And within a very short time, she had a very serene expression on her face, was breathing steadily, she looked very calm (no signs of pain anymore).
After the trip, I recalled this and it seemed to be similar to the proceedings of my trip (at first “going against the grain” while keeping the body and senses activated by external stimuli, then “going the right way” by letting the body and senses to switch off).
I had some more afterthoughts during the post-trip deliberations (f.e. about the relation of eros and thanatos), but after a while, my mind got calmer, I just relaxed without analyzing the trip anymore and soon I could even start to read a book (i was reading a biography of the photographer František Drtikol called "A History of Light" by Jan Němec, borrowed from H.).
Then I fell asleep.
Last but not least, one more peculiar detail happened during the trip.
Shortly after we swallowed the mushrooms, my phone started to ring and the person who was calling me was D. who was sitting right next to me half of the elementary school and the whole secondary school. As teens, we were close friends, but later he moved to Britain, got quite business-oriented which I can hardly relate to and thus we somewhat alienated to each other. But still once in about 2 years, we meet (whenever he comes to visit his sister who lives in Prague). I saw him last time about one and a half year ago. Since there is the internet, we were always arranging our meetings via e-mails, or via chat. When he called me by phone last time, it's more than 10 years ago. So, when I saw on the phone, he is calling me, for a moment I thought it is already some strange mushroom hallucination. But it was real. And the funny detail is that he was the guy with whom I was for the first time taking weed. And this very guy who was present during my first weed experience called me out of the blue during my first mushroom experience that he's in Prague and we can meet.
additional note:
After coming back to Prague, we met with D., his wife, and their infants (they were all heading in a caravan to Italy).
I also searched the web thereafter and discovered the terms “peak experience” and “body load”.
Some count “body load” as one of the unwanted side effects of mushroom eating (giving advices on how to minimize it), but to me “body load” was something desirable (a prerequisite to the feelings beyond sensory perception).
I also (subsequently) watched a film called “María Sabina, Mujer espíritu” (1978, directed by Nicolás Echevarría) and it was reassuring to what I felt, because (according to the film) curandera Maria Sabina always conducted her mushroom healing sessions during the night time and at one point the voiceover even says, “There is a moment during the ritual when the candles are put out. Darkness serves as a background for the visions. It is not necessary to close the eyes. It is enough just to look in the infinite depth of darkness.“ Hearing this was so much appealing. Next time, I wish to eat mushrooms in darkness too.
In my post-trip readings, I was also focusing on the subject of eating/non-eating before and during the trip (because I had obviously some issue with food during the trip). Now, I believe fasting (not too long) before the trip might be beneficial. Eating cheese as a side dish to mushrooms was fine (this I would repeat). During the high phase of the (possible next) trip, I expect to abstain from eating anything (and will even abstain from looking at anybody else eating). And in the epilogue phase, it might be okay to eat some raw food because I didn't feel like eating anything we had at hand which was cooked but I was fine eating small red European radishes. It was a bit funny to read later that the taste of psychedelic mushrooms can be compared to the taste of those radishes (one of the opinions I encountered in the expert mycological literature) — another amusing little coincidence.
additional note:
At the end of October (i.e. few months after the trip), I watched a film called "White on White" (2020, directed by Viera Čákanyová) which is a video diary from her stay in Antarctica and at one point she says, “This landscape works like a drug. Pure, concentrated, monochromatic drug.“ I can strongly relate to this claim and can recall vividly the feeling while going home in rain during the trip and being surrounded by all-around green, or being already at home and with closed eyes seeing "all-around" intense red on the screen of my inner eyelids. I guess I would feel fine staying inside the dark (pitch-black) chamber for a while.
MARÍA SABINA, WOMAN OF THE SPIRIT (Nicolás Echevarría, 1978)
https://letterboxd.com/film/maria-sabin ... -espiritu/
There is a moment during the ritual when the candles are put out.
Darkness serves as a background for the visions.
It is not necessary to close the eyes.
It is enough just to look in the infinite depth of darkness.
https://youtu.be/y5YVe09C9NU