Plants that change our consciousness • Hacker News Board

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#21

Post by filoeleven » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 10:23 PM UTC

_st6d wrote: post #17

throwaway284534 wrote: post #9

I would love to hear what you all think about addiction, or at least a lack of addiction. I’ve always seemed to have a very low pain tolerance, and over the counter meds just don’t do much for me. On a few occasions I’ve been given stronger drugs like oxytocin and codeine — and the first thing people say is to watch out for their addictive properties. I…don’t seem to crave them, or anything else for that matter. Don’…

I am a counselor who works with a lot of people suffering from chronic substance/behavior misuse (i.e. addiction). check out the work of Dr Gabor Maté. addiction is much less an intrinsic property of a substance and has much more to do with a combination of personal factors like upbringing, ACEs (adverse/traumatic childhood events), modeling, and some genetics. it is not uncommon at all for someone to try an “addicti…

Do you have insights/opinions on the difference between physical and psychological addictions? Everything I’ve read draws a distinction between the two, though not any hard-and-fast rules.

I’m especially curious about your take on things like nicotine or caffeine, which are generally considered to have more physically-addictive properties, whereas cocaine in my readings lies more in the mentally-addictive space (strong sense of motivation and empowerment and maybe invulnerability) up to a certain point.

Anything from shopping to SCUBA to hoarding can be psychologically addictive, so it seems like a much broader range of activities that is more affected by personal factors, whereas a physical addition is a craving/habit of the body. But I have no personal experience of viewing these in lots of people or from a trained counselor’s perspective.

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#22

Post by filoeleven » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 10:27 PM UTC

_st6d wrote: post #18

fallingfrog wrote: post #13

I tried salvia divinorum a few times, and the biggest insight I got from it was that the human brain is a machine, and is designed to do a specific thing, but if you throw a bunch of chemicals into it you can convert it into a machine for doing other random things like generate visual garbage and noise. I felt like my working memory had been reduced to only persisting for a half second, and my thoughts were reflected…

did you consume this via smoking or sublingual administration? your experience sounds like that which can happen when salvia divinorum is smoked. the traditional method of consumption by the Mazatec people (who have used this plant medicine in ritual for thousands of years) is sublingual. creates an incredibly different effect than smoking it. tends to be much more pleasant and easier to integrate. I do know several…

From what I’ve read, the dissociative effects are much greater from smoking it than from the sublingual route. A minority of people enjoy dissociative effects, so your report makes sense.

I’m curious about what makes certain people enjoy dissociatives, since most people find them very uncomfortable.

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#23

Post by fallingfrog » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 10:47 PM UTC

_st6d wrote: post #18

fallingfrog wrote: post #13

I tried salvia divinorum a few times, and the biggest insight I got from it was that the human brain is a machine, and is designed to do a specific thing, but if you throw a bunch of chemicals into it you can convert it into a machine for doing other random things like generate visual garbage and noise. I felt like my working memory had been reduced to only persisting for a half second, and my thoughts were reflected…

did you consume this via smoking or sublingual administration? your experience sounds like that which can happen when salvia divinorum is smoked. the traditional method of consumption by the Mazatec people (who have used this plant medicine in ritual for thousands of years) is sublingual. creates an incredibly different effect than smoking it. tends to be much more pleasant and easier to integrate. I do know several…

Smoked. Never tried it sublingually.

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#24

Post by Jarwain » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 11:16 PM UTC

motohagiography wrote: post #8

The speculative stuff around this is super fun. Proceed at your own risk. How does an animal stumble on the existence of geometry? Impaired sensory input creates feedback loops that yield periodic patterns. How does it begin apprehend the scope of something greater than its senses? Impairing those senses and seeing the edges. How do ancient people hear supposedly divine messages? Inhaling smoke from burning plants th…

One of the things I've always found interesting is that the idea of spirits, of being haunted by ghosts, etc. are likely just metaphors for psychological trauma, and rituals are just treatments for resolving these traumas or obtaining closure

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#25

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 2:45 AM UTC

filoeleven wrote: post #22

_st6d wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

did you consume this via smoking or sublingual administration? your experience sounds like that which can happen when salvia divinorum is smoked. the traditional method of consumption by the Mazatec people (who have used this plant medicine in ritual for thousands of years) is sublingual. creates an incredibly different effect than smoking it. tends to be much more pleasant and easier to integrate. I do know several…

From what I’ve read, the dissociative effects are much greater from smoking it than from the sublingual route. A minority of people enjoy dissociative effects, so your report makes sense. I’m curious about what makes certain people enjoy dissociatives, since most people find them very uncomfortable.

[deleted]

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#26

Post by _st6d » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 3:40 AM UTC

filoeleven wrote: post #22

_st6d wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

did you consume this via smoking or sublingual administration? your experience sounds like that which can happen when salvia divinorum is smoked. the traditional method of consumption by the Mazatec people (who have used this plant medicine in ritual for thousands of years) is sublingual. creates an incredibly different effect than smoking it. tends to be much more pleasant and easier to integrate. I do know several…

From what I’ve read, the dissociative effects are much greater from smoking it than from the sublingual route. A minority of people enjoy dissociative effects, so your report makes sense. I’m curious about what makes certain people enjoy dissociatives, since most people find them very uncomfortable.

It's all about the dose!

Sublingual can be just as dissociative - perhaps even more - than smoking. Sublingual can give a much longer experience, and so there's a lot more time spent in that space (30-45+ minutes compared to 5-10).

What makes you say that most people find dissociatives uncomfortable?

Consider ketamine - a powerful dissociative that has widespread recreational use.

When used in a therapeutic, safe setting, the dissociative properties of medicines like salvia, ketamine, iboga, and 5-MeO-DMT are used to facilitate profound personal healing and transformation. These experiences are not necessarily pleasant, and that's also not the point. I'm most familiar with usage in this context, where the aspect of "enjoyment" is essentially orthogonal to the reason for consumption.

In fact, consciously exploring any discomfort that arises is what can facilitate efficacy.

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#27

Post by _st6d » Mon, Jul 05, 2021, 4:00 AM UTC

filoeleven wrote: post #21

_st6d wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a counselor who works with a lot of people suffering from chronic substance/behavior misuse (i.e. addiction). check out the work of Dr Gabor Maté. addiction is much less an intrinsic property of a substance and has much more to do with a combination of personal factors like upbringing, ACEs (adverse/traumatic childhood events), modeling, and some genetics. it is not uncommon at all for someone to try an “addicti…

Do you have insights/opinions on the difference between physical and psychological addictions? Everything I’ve read draws a distinction between the two, though not any hard-and-fast rules. I’m especially curious about your take on things like nicotine or caffeine, which are generally considered to have more physically-addictive properties, whereas cocaine in my readings lies more in the mentally-addictive space (stro…

The line you describe is quite blurred. A person without the "causes and conditions" for addictive behaviors can take a substance that is highly physically addictive, like nicotine, and still never have an urge to use it again. Most people know quite a few folks who have tried cigarettes once and only once.

An addictive pattern originates as a survival resource - it starts out as a helpful coping mechanism: "X makes me feel better, helps me to get through life". It doesn't matter what it is - heroin, shopping, gambling, nicotine, etc.

When someone starts taking the steps in their lives to learn new behaviors and break this cycle, the physically addictive properties of a substance are definitely relevant and need to be taken into consideration (consider things like alcohol or benzodiazepines which can have lethal withdrawal symptoms, depending on intensity / history of use, and will thus require medical support).

Otherwise, the underlying treatment model will be identical.

Also, consider that psychological symptoms can and will manifest as physical symptoms, and vice versa. I've witnessed incredible physical withdrawal symptoms as a result of unwinding "psychologically" addictive patterns like gambling or sex (night sweating, panic attacks, insomnia, GI issues, to name a few).

Re: Plants that change our consciousness

#28

Post by filoeleven » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:20 PM UTC

_st6d wrote: post #26

filoeleven wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I’ve read, the dissociative effects are much greater from smoking it than from the sublingual route. A minority of people enjoy dissociative effects, so your report makes sense. I’m curious about what makes certain people enjoy dissociatives, since most people find them very uncomfortable.

It's all about the dose! Sublingual can be just as dissociative - perhaps even more - than smoking. Sublingual can give a much longer experience, and so there's a lot more time spent in that space (30-45+ minutes compared to 5-10). What makes you say that most people find dissociatives uncomfortable? Consider ketamine - a powerful dissociative that has widespread recreational use. When used in a therapeutic, safe set…

> What makes you say that most people find dissociatives uncomfortable?

Anecdotal evidence from people who have tried them, as well as reading lots of experience reports. It’s hard to discern from all of that who/how many were taking them therapeutically vs recreationally. Your grain of salt is quite justified.