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A Psychedelic Renaissance

philanthropy.com

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Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#21

Post by katzgrau »

grawprog wrote: post #8
GreaterFool wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, psychedelics make you face your inner demons. Perhaps not right away because the wonders of the experience can be captivating, for a while. But sooner or later they will. Many people I talked to tried something like LSD once or twice and while they enjoyed the fun part they didn't like what they've seen once the party was over and they were left alone with their own thoughts. This is where the benefits are but…

>Just imagine something like cannabis lounge where you could take mushrooms in safe setting and if you feel overwhelmed you could talk to a trained staff member. Not necessarily a psychologist, just someone who can guide you through the experience. I really believe it could unleash incredible well-being for the society. I like idea of this, but I don't think I'd like to do mushrooms in a place like that. I tend to al…

Yeah and I don't think talking to a stranger, trained staff or not, is going to be anyone's cup of tea when they're on mushrooms. It should be an experience for friends whose company you truly enjoy - and trust to keep you cool if you get anxious.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#22

Post by all2 »

GreaterFool wrote: post #6
GreaterFool wrote: post #5

When did we forgo > Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness ? "Modern" mentality seems to be that everything is illegal unless government specifically approves. Any substance that emerges and becomes popular enough gets banned immediately (unless there's a huge backlash; I can only recall one case like that, kratom. Don't know much about that substance though). Meanwhile invasive questionable medical treatments an…

Also, psychedelics make you face your inner demons. Perhaps not right away because the wonders of the experience can be captivating, for a while. But sooner or later they will. Many people I talked to tried something like LSD once or twice and while they enjoyed the fun part they didn't like what they've seen once the party was over and they were left alone with their own thoughts. This is where the benefits are but…

> But then who'd gobble up those anxiety or depression or ADHD or sleeping^` pills?

Could you expand on the ADHD bit? That sounds interesting as its not something I've heard a lot about.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#23

Post by vlan0 »

GreaterFool wrote: post #6
GreaterFool wrote: post #5

When did we forgo > Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness ? "Modern" mentality seems to be that everything is illegal unless government specifically approves. Any substance that emerges and becomes popular enough gets banned immediately (unless there's a huge backlash; I can only recall one case like that, kratom. Don't know much about that substance though). Meanwhile invasive questionable medical treatments an…

Also, psychedelics make you face your inner demons. Perhaps not right away because the wonders of the experience can be captivating, for a while. But sooner or later they will. Many people I talked to tried something like LSD once or twice and while they enjoyed the fun part they didn't like what they've seen once the party was over and they were left alone with their own thoughts. This is where the benefits are but…

>Just imagine something like cannabis lounge where you could take mushrooms in safe setting and if you feel overwhelmed you could talk to a trained staff member. Not necessarily a psychologist, just someone who can guide you through the experience. I really believe it could unleash incredible well-being for the society.

I believe the type of person you are referring to has historically been referred to as shaman.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#24

Post by nazgulnarsil »

sharkweek wrote: post #20

I would love to try a psychedelic trip with a trained therapist guiding me toward facing my fears. I’m generally a pretty anxious person (diagnosed with OCD, managed with ERP therapy), and I feel pretty confident that it would force me to face that part of me. I have no doubt that it’d be a beneficial experience. Buuuuut... part of me is super nervous about what I might also find. It’s like part of my mind wants to e…

There are a few therapy modalities that can help, check them out and see if any resonate with you: core transformation (my fave), feeding your demons (buddhist), internal family systems, focusing (eugene gendlin), coherence therapy. All are predicated around the same few core concepts of having different parts of yourself that view the world in different ways, acknowledging and accepting that each of those parts has some positive contribution to our well being even though they get into conflicts with each other about their proper 'domains' of applicability sometimes. In this case, it sounds like one part is worried that you'll label it as bad and try to change it without acknowledging the ways in which it might be protecting or helping you. If you read the wikipedia page on coherence therapy for instance you'll see the steps around needing to address those parts needs before they're willing to compromise.

Happy travels.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#25

Post by h2odragon »

sharkweek wrote: post #20

I would love to try a psychedelic trip with a trained therapist guiding me toward facing my fears. I’m generally a pretty anxious person (diagnosed with OCD, managed with ERP therapy), and I feel pretty confident that it would force me to face that part of me. I have no doubt that it’d be a beneficial experience. Buuuuut... part of me is super nervous about what I might also find. It’s like part of my mind wants to e…

Trained therapist? Nah. Good, trusted friend. Someone who will be willing to clean up embarrassing bodily functions for you type of friend.

You can't pay somebody to discover you, you're going to have to do that yourself. Having a companion is just to help keep things from getting messy.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#26

Post by philwelch »

all2 wrote: post #22
GreaterFool wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, psychedelics make you face your inner demons. Perhaps not right away because the wonders of the experience can be captivating, for a while. But sooner or later they will. Many people I talked to tried something like LSD once or twice and while they enjoyed the fun part they didn't like what they've seen once the party was over and they were left alone with their own thoughts. This is where the benefits are but…

> But then who'd gobble up those anxiety or depression or ADHD or sleeping^` pills? Could you expand on the ADHD bit? That sounds interesting as its not something I've heard a lot about.

It's just generic anti-psych talking points, tbh.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#27

Post by heed »

GreaterFool wrote: post #5

When did we forgo > Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness ? "Modern" mentality seems to be that everything is illegal unless government specifically approves. Any substance that emerges and becomes popular enough gets banned immediately (unless there's a huge backlash; I can only recall one case like that, kratom. Don't know much about that substance though). Meanwhile invasive questionable medical treatments an…

Another argument for legalizing psychedelics is that they might actually be useful for treating illness. For example there is some evidence that ibogaine [0] can help reduce or even reverse some symptoms of Parkinson's disease [1].

There were some formal studies done on ibogaine in the early 90's, I believe, but were shut down after the cardiotoxicity of the compound came into question at certain dosages.

Now I have no idea if ibogaine is truly a useful treatment for disease and I'm not promoting it as such, but the point is no one does. And as long as it remains a scheduled substance we won't be able to gain any formal answer to the question of it's usefulness.

Further, how many other scheduled substances have medical properties beyond more well known use cases (ie, psychotherapy, addiction treatment)? We don't know and we may never know, sadly.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibogaine

[1] https://www.ibogainealliance.org/ibogaine/therapy/parkinsons...

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#28

Post by llamataboot »

h2odragon wrote: post #25
sharkweek wrote: post #20

I would love to try a psychedelic trip with a trained therapist guiding me toward facing my fears. I’m generally a pretty anxious person (diagnosed with OCD, managed with ERP therapy), and I feel pretty confident that it would force me to face that part of me. I have no doubt that it’d be a beneficial experience. Buuuuut... part of me is super nervous about what I might also find. It’s like part of my mind wants to e…

Trained therapist? Nah. Good, trusted friend. Someone who will be willing to clean up embarrassing bodily functions for you type of friend. You can't pay somebody to discover you, you're going to have to do that yourself. Having a companion is just to help keep things from getting messy.

Different roles. Having some good friends to help prop you up, tell you when you're being an ass, wipe your tears, etc - good and nec.

Definitely not the same as a trained therapist who actually knows how to hold the mirror for you to see yourself in a different way.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#29

Post by eurticket »

vlan0 wrote: post #23
GreaterFool wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, psychedelics make you face your inner demons. Perhaps not right away because the wonders of the experience can be captivating, for a while. But sooner or later they will. Many people I talked to tried something like LSD once or twice and while they enjoyed the fun part they didn't like what they've seen once the party was over and they were left alone with their own thoughts. This is where the benefits are but…

>Just imagine something like cannabis lounge where you could take mushrooms in safe setting and if you feel overwhelmed you could talk to a trained staff member. Not necessarily a psychologist, just someone who can guide you through the experience. I really believe it could unleash incredible well-being for the society. I believe the type of person you are referring to has historically been referred to as shaman.

I'm glad someone brought this up, more than anything - and before anything we need shamans and sitters. Without these people basically dedicating their time to making sure that people are safe and feel safe.

Re: A Psychedelic Renaissance

#30

Post by fwip »

njarboe wrote: post #18
zasz wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's ahistorical and just wrong. The government saw an opportunity to selectively target its most dissident elements during the 60s and it went for it: https://www.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-rich... "You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And…

It's too bad this quote was published by Dan Baum in Harper's 22 years after Ehrlichman might have said it and after Ehrlichman was not alive to confirm. I would say the quotes around the text are not really appropriate for this most important of historical memories. It is not like something recorded on the Nixon tapes. From the same CNN article we have the Ehrlichman children saying: "The 1994 alleged 'quote' we saw…

"Our dad couldn't have implemented racist policies because we're not racist."
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