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Super placebo is a scientifically incorrect description. These drugs suppress activity of the default mode network of the brain, which is a sort of "conductor"

Super placebo is a scientifically incorrect description. These drugs suppress activity of the default mode network of the brain, which is a sort of "conductor" of the brain, which chooses which "instruments" to prioritize and how to allocate the train of thought. All of the different parts of your mind are able to sing out more creatively and independently, forging new paths that they are not accustomed to taking -- this is why it's great for mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, alcoholism, smoking -- it allows your mind an incredible flexibility. In my personal experiences with psychedelics, these drugs remove mental heuristics, allowing the mind to think unimpeded by usual thought patterns, simply accepting raw data as it comes in. This was striking in sensory information, if you closed your eyes or just stared at something long enough, you observed incredibly different visual input, geometric patterns, greatly strengthened colors (a strawberry was INCREDIBLY beautiful, I almost felt bad eating such a beautiful entity). There was also an incredible inter-disciplinary thought process, I felt the musical, mathematical, computational, logical, natural, all these parts of my mind mixed together wonderfully. LSD was much longer lasting, around 12 hours, whereas psilocybin was around 6 hours. Psilocybin enhanced my connection with nature, the flying bugs, a handful of berries, and the plants all around me caused an effusion of love and connection. Whereas with LSD, I felt an extremely powerful visual stimulation, the changing fall leaves were extremely vibrant and beautiful, it was akin to 12 hour, mentally-clear cannabis high. I didn't experience any "flashbacks" per se, there was a positive glow in my mood and thoughts for around 5 days, and the day after LSD I still had lingering effects...I also wonder if I will evermore look at the surface of ponds and lakes differently, they have an incredible dynamism and vitality that I appreciated even more on first trip. For anyone considering psychedelics, do it thoughtfully and methodically. Read the book mentioned in the parent, practice meditation, explore your mind, and really ensure your mindset ("set") is positive and open. Further, plan to occupy a peaceful, quiet place, hopefully lacking too many strangers/social interaction ("setting"). If set and setting are good, you're in for a wonderful time.

moretai 7y ago
Is there a way to induce this feeling without the aid of psychedelics or breathwork?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- V3ritas1337 7y ago
  Through certain yogic practices and breathing techniques. But honestly nothing compares to a psychedelic trip imo.
- bordercases 7y ago
  "Here's a mechanism that brings these results" "How can I have these results without loading on the mechanism?" I can understand drug aversion but what's the aversion to breathwork, which is cheaper and shouldn't carry stigma?
- vb6sp6 7y ago
  Take a look at Kundalini Yoga
- WhompingWindows 7y ago
  Sam Harris states that you can achieve this enhanced selflessness via meditation (where we think of the "self" or "the ego" as that sort of "conductor" that the psychedelics turn off). However, while meditation is like a sailboat, psychedelics are like a rocket: both will take you places, but one much more quickly and with much more risk. In my limited experience (2 trips) there was no negative aspect to psychedelics. There were things that were already negatively valenced, like riding in a car or visiting a friend's messy house briefly, however I had no inkling of a bad trip or any scary/demonic/overwhelming sensations.
  - tacon 7y ago
    Sam Harris & Yuval Noah Harari answer a question about "peak" meditative experiences, and set them in context with psychedelic experiences in the segment starting at 1:27:20: https://samharris.org/podcasts/138-edge-humanity/ https://samharris.org/podcasts/138-edge-humanity/
- collyw 7y ago
  I just did a 10 day silent meditation retreat and there were points where the feeling had definite similarities to psychedelics. Hard work but worth it. I have a feeling that the meditation retreat went deeper than psychedelics did for me personally.
mistermann 7y ago
> In my personal experiences with psychedelics, these drugs remove mental heuristics, they allow the mind to think unimpeded by usual thought patterns, and simply accept raw data as it comes in. I like "removing mental heuristics" as a good way of describing what is happening at the physical level. Articulating (or, communicating with high fidelity) what happens at the experiential and emotional levels is much more tricky. An analogy I would draw is, imagine or recall how you may have felt during a major event (usually negative), say the death of a loved one, or the ending of an important romantic relationship, or imagine how you might feel if you are on your death bed, reviewing your choices and actions throughout your life....do you have any regrets, would you have done anything different if you had it to do all over again, etc. Imagine the feeling of clarity of thought, and deep intellectual and emotional appreciation of the gravity of the situation involved in such experiences. This is how (but only in part) I would describe my experiences with psychedelics. Of course each person experiences these things in different ways, but despite such differences, extremely deep profoundness is an extremely common takeaway. A simpler explanation, I would say that it kind of "shocks me into reality". And you may think you know what that means, but if you haven't experienced it, you really don't. Even I don't fully appreciate the meaning of what I'm saying at this very moment; I am largely going on faith, based on a very low fidelity memory of the experiences - such is the strange, ineffable nature of these medicines. Luckily, while it seems difficult to see into (remember) one's experiences in that world, the opposite is not true - when under the influence of psychedelics, my experience is that I can experience kind of a simultaneous existence of two states of mind: that of clarity of thought (normal biases due to heuristics largely removed), but also clear (if not clearer) memory of thoughts and emotions related to specific scenarios in the normal world. This seems to facilitate for a very productive self-help scneario, the so-called "five years of therapy or psychoanalysis in a few hours" effect that some people speak of. I should also note that I am speaking of experimentation in the medium dose range of psilocybin. While there are other things to be discovered at the higher doses, for my purposes medium dose trips seem to be much more beneficial. YMMV.
surfsvammel 7y ago
To me, the most stunning hallucination, during LSD, was the total confusion of my senses. A specific flower was in bloom at the time, and my mind confused it’s smell with the colour purple. It was the strangest experience. Smelling colour... There is no way to describe it in words. Even though this episode was decades ago, I still, kind of, experience the scent of that flower as the colour purple.
- meesles 7y ago
  Your experience is known as synesthesia [1], and while not common, it can be found in people naturally and under certain conditions (like drugs). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia
  - erikpukinskis 7y ago
    There is also the fact that many things we perceive as senses are actually knowledge. We may think we see a red door when in fact we just know the door is red. It’s possible your OP was noticing that a certain smell makes him know a thing is purple. Under normal circumstances he would just perceive PURPLE and think he was seeing. But on drugs he might perceive that his nose was also alerting him of PURPLE in the flower.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I haven't tried to meditate in a long time, but my understanding of the process was, setting aside mysticism and tradition, you just take a mental concept and you focus on it and every time your mind starts drifting you return to it. So, I've heard that people make a big deal about choosing a mantra, but my thinking was it can be anything, and somehow I got into the habit of visualizing a blank field of a particular color. The nice thing about focusing on a color was that if my visual imagination distracted me, I could concentrate on "seeing" the color, while if I was imagining words or sounds, I could focus on the name of the color too. So it was like having an object to focus on that had all the different angles available. I'm not sure I've never experienced synaesthesia, but I'm pretty sure I haven't been perceiving smells or sounds as having color recently.
jasonzemos 7y ago
> It was akin to 12 hour, mentally-clear cannabis high. This is the best way to describe reasonable (small) doses of LSD. It's like the purest sativa possible; as if somebody removed all of the earthiness and stoniness and then amplified the psychoactive.
- mirimir 7y ago
  I guess. Versus comparing it to alcohol, anyway. However, in my experience, psilocybin is closer to THC than to LSD. But they're really very different experiences. Alcohol does accentuate psilocybin, acceptably. But combining marijuana with either, especially LSD, can be frightening. Your short term memory drops to a few seconds, so you can forget who (or even what) you are, where you are, etc. Some people panic, and fear that they'll never be sober again.
  - W4nn4B_h4x0r 7y ago
    Is it a good idea to take any of these - alcohol, Marijuana, LSD, mushrooms - with antidepressants? That is, if you're on medication, should you stay away from all recreational drug use?
    - tastyfreeze 7y ago
      The effects of serotonergic psychedelics(LSD, psilocybin, DMT) are reduced by SSRI medications.
      - mirimir 7y ago
        Yeah. I had stopped using LSD before using SSRIs. Later, I used to vacation in Amsterdam for the shrooms. But I'd go off the SSRI maybe a week or so before the trip.
    - sibeliuss 7y ago
      It is imperative that you do not combine psychedelics with antidepressants! This can lead to dangerous side effects / behaviors! If you take a combination of drugs this is even more important to heed. The proper path is to wean yourself off of the antidepressants for the experience, and then only undertake the experience with an experienced sitter or guide.
diminoten 7y ago
The point is they do something, but for that something to be most likely good/positive, you also need therapy, which if you want, you can interpret as a "trip sitter" or whatever the phrase is. Y'all aren't disagreeing.
- mistermann 7y ago
  > but for that something to be most likely good/positive, you also need therapy I hear ideas like this (and "In other words, you would need to use the drugs in combination with therapy to obtain good results") repeated all the time, but I'm curious where they come from. If one spends any time whatsoever in enthusiast communities, the overwhelming sentiment is that these compounds are incredibly helpful even when used alone. This is not to say that individual results wouldn't be even better with therapy, or that there aren't some people who have negative experiences, but these being true also in no ways logically implies that significant benefits cannot be realized by independent usage. The precise answer to these and other questions, at this current point in time, is: we don't know, with extremely high certainty. But this doesn't mean we don't know anything. Reality is independent of man's understanding (peer reviewed studies) of it - a tree falling in the forest does not require the presence of a scientist. While it's always a good idea to exercise caution, I suspect advice like "do not use these substances except under professional guidance" is likely more harmful than helpful. It will be years if not decades before formal treatments are available, for many people that may be too late, not to mention the exorbitant price tags these treatments come at. I am more of the mind that people educate themselves on the topic, proceed with caution, work with those who have experience, and proceed slowly and with caution, starting with low dosages and working your way up over time. There is very little trustworthy evidence that I know of indicating there is any kind of substantial risk, and even then that has to be weighed against not just the benefits, but also the risk of doing nothing.
  - diminoten 7y ago
    Enthusiast communities are probably not the most objective group of folks, so I'd take what they have to say with a grain of salt.
oh-4-fucks-sake 7y ago
Your comment really resonates with me and wholeheartedly mirrors my own experiences with psychedelics. Of the lysergamides, I've taken LSD, 1P-LSD, LSA, AL-LAD, and my favorite: ALD-52--IMHO, the Cadillac of psychedelic drugs. It's a close analog of LSD with fewer "body load" effects, almost zero nausea, and a less scatterbrained headspace--sparkling clear with beautiful visuals and an uncanny tool for productive introspection. Set has so much to do with the experience--though I've had fun with it out with friends at a bar in dark of winter, its true power is sorely wasted unless I'm in nature, especially when my wife and I are taking it together. I know with zero uncertainty that it acts as almost a forceful, powerful therapy with even a modest amount of mental input--it's as if your brain is forced into a state of deep meditation where you can't help but improve your mental station (barring the notably rare "bad trip"--though I've taken it with so many people, I do believe it happens less frequently with ALD-52 on account of its mental clarity). Some of the best days of my life have been while tripping on ALD-52, wandering wild goat trails, exploring the vibrant innards of canyons, weaving among mountain pines. RE your experiences with water, I've had the same experiences. One of the most memorable moments of my life was returning from a short high desert hike, to sink to the bottom of a salt water pool, look skyward, and watch the desert sun dance and play with colors on the water's surface. I've never looked at water the same since. I'm cheerfully captivated with its beauty in a way I probably haven't since I was a child. Which brings me to my final observation. The effects of psychedelics, perhaps owning to their serotonergic effects or their disabling of the default mode network re-imbue you with a wonder in the world around you that has slowly, inconspicuously eroded little-by-ever-so-little each year into adulthood. Year by year, the world becomes more bland, less exciting, less, well, full of wonder. Remember those magical memories of childhood? Perhaps running towards the ocean, arriving at summer camp, having a picnic in the park, diving to the bottom of the pool, playing with a new toy on Christmas, the excited anticipation before a sleepover, your first crush? The magnitude of those feelings are often so muted or jaded as an adult. The right psychedelics can bring those feelings rushing back, unfettered, unadulterated, pure. Suddenly you realize how much of that you've lost, while simultaneously getting to feel them again in full force. Some of that stays with you during sober times, which is lovely. Dosing periodically keeps that magic alive in you--what a joy, a gift. Humans have taken psychedelics as part of daily lives for tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of years. The shaman is little more than an elder trip-sitter and therapist. Our highly complex brains have evolved alongside such chemicals and experiences to help define meaning and seek happiness and it's a crying shame that waves of prohibition have stifled that nigh fundamental human experience. It makes me happy to watch that damage slowly be undone with news like this.
wufufufu 7y ago
> and really ensure your mindset ("set") is positive and open Everyone says this and it's little more than bro science. So if you have a bad experience from the drugs, it was because you weren't in a positive headspace? Sounds like No True Scotsman.
- filoleg 7y ago
  >So if you have a bad experience from the drugs, it was because you weren't in a positive headspace? You can always test out this hypothesis by doing a tab of LSD from the same batch twice while controlling for your headspace. One day, you do it with a positive headspace, and another day you do it with a negative one. If you had a great experience the first time and a bad experience the second time, clearly the headspace alignment made the difference. Yes, this kind of testing isn't as rigorous as it would have been for a legitimate scientific trial (which I bet we will see in the future as the research into the area accelerates), but imo it is more than just a No True Scotsman backed by broscience. And of course, no one says that a negative headspace is the only reason for someone to have a bad experience, there are others for sure. For example, certain people with predisposition for schizophrenia probably should abstain as well. AFAIK psychedelics won't cause a schizophrenia in an otherwise healthy person, but I heard it might kick off an early onset if you were going to get a schizophrenia in a few years without any psychedelics anyways.
  - wufufufu 7y ago
    "headspace" doesn't mean anything
    - AnthonBerg 7y ago
      You don’t understand anything when you read or hear the word?
    - Analog24 7y ago
      Yes, it does. It's quite literally in the dictionary: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/headspace https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/headspace
wefarrell 7y ago
Set and setting are paramount. A depressant can behave as a stimulant in a particular setting and vice versa (for example alcohol at a sporting event). In certain settings psychedelic experiences are even possible without any chemical ingestion. For example on meditation retreats and ultramarathons. So I don't think it's incorrect to call psychedelics a super placebo. The mental states they bring you to are entirely achievable without their use, albeit with far greater effort.
- jandrese 7y ago
  I'm not sure that's alcohol acting as a stimulant so much as alcohol removing mental barriers that prevent people from acting in a certain way. The depressant effect in fact helps to moderate the worst impulses for most people. Which is why drinks like Four Loco that combine a stimulant with alcohol end up being more dangerous than expected. Not only do you lose your "that's a dumb idea, I shouldn't do it" part of your brain, but you also have the energy to act on the impulse.
- dwaltrip 7y ago
  Psilocybin has known physiological affects on the body and on the brain. We see very clearly differences in how the brain functions on psilocybin. It's absolutely not a placebo. That, or the definition of the word is being stretched such that all meaning is lost.
  - wefarrell 7y ago
    Placebos also have known physiological effects on the brain and there are clear differences when taking a pink placebo vs a blue one: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(72)90996-8/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... This is not to downplay the effects of psychadelics - I've taken plenty and of course the psychoactive effects are undeniable. But the effects are from far more than just the chemicals. For example smoked DMT hallucinations are very different than Ayahuasca, despite the two being the same chemical.
    - 7y ago
corporate_shi11 7y ago
I took a strong psychedelic once, and a high dose at that. I tripped for over 12 hours, and by the end of the trip I was seriously considering changing my life in significant ways. For days after the trip I was considering making these changes. My thought patterns and assumptions had made a complete jump from one train of thought to another. This experience made me realize how much of our outlook on things is dominated by whatever mode of thinking we happen to be in, and that mode is more shaped by custom and habit than anything approaching logic and reason.
- pell 7y ago
  I know it's a very private question, but would you be able to describe the trip and the long lasting effects more?
  - flattone 7y ago
    There is a spectrum of retrospectives. Re trip description. Most people tend to just say it's cool, you see stuff/colors brighter and emotionally impactful etc. My key story for last is laying in a bed in close proximity to a freeway. I could not choose to unhear/see with my eyes closed as a car drove down the freeway cylinders/rods and combustion. . I on extremely rare occasion hear this type of story from other peeps. Long lasting effect ... In the immediately following week I had the most significant behavior shift I can think of... Had been smoking since 11 years old... The LSD was approx 9th grade ..solidly solidly stopped for about a year. Pot. Everything. I'm back. I'm an idiot at heart give or take.. but what a beautiful year.
- filoeleven 7y ago
  > My thought patterns and assumptions had made a complete jump from one train of thought to another. William James uses the analogy that our set of habits are like an irregular polyhedron resting on one of its faces. Everyday experiences may rock it up onto an edge, but it will usually come to rest where it was, or perhaps on a neighboring face. A more singular, meaningful experience has more “push” to it, overcoming the force of habit in a way that no amount of daily prodding would, rolling the whole thing onto a new face that would take ages to land on otherwise. He was writing about religious conversions at the time, but there seems to be a lot of overlap with the effects of a psychedelic experience.
perl4ever 7y ago
"These drugs suppress activity of the default mode network of the brain, which is a sort of "conductor" of the brain, which chooses which "instruments" to prioritize and how to allocate the train of thought" That's interesting, but it sounds like a plausible description of how schizophrenia works too, maybe even one that I've read before, and yet my impression is that "natural" psychosis is different.
- luckydata 7y ago
  that's pretty much it, except if you're on LSD at some point it will stop.
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    It's pretty common to have one or two episodes of psychosis and then not again. Selection bias and all that. Anyone that doesn't have a severe chronic problem, you're not going to be aware of, but it's reasonable to assume there are more mild cases than severe cases of almost any condition. For that matter, it's a definitional issue - people can appear crazy temporarily for almost infinite reasons, and if it doesn't reoccur, even doctors aren't going to call it schizophrenia. You go into a hospital appearing to be stark raving mad, they are going to test you for drugs and call it "schizophreniform" if they can't find any.
- dwaltrip 7y ago
  Meditation also affects the activity of the default mode network. This is a fundamental network that plays a huge role is much of our brain's activities, so saying 2 different things have an affect on the network doesn't mean that those impacts are necessarily similar.
sizzle 7y ago
Thank you for the thoughtful response, this really is encouraging for those on the fence about trying. Might take a trip to Amsterdam soon....
eprparadox 7y ago
Your personal experiences sound very interesting and I don't mean to detract at all from the effect they've had on you and many other people. However, I was a neuro Phd student and did many 'default mode network' studies using fMRI and it is -very- early to be making claims about the nature and/or purpose of this network, or how it's perturbed by any experience: psychedelic or not. The level of temporal and spatial resolution of data gathering of this and other brain networks is entirely too coarse to make legitimate inferences. At this point in the literature it is a very good story with a few compelling examples but not nearly complete enough to make real claims.

moretai 7y ago

Is there a way to induce this feeling without the aid of psychedelics or breathwork?

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
V3ritas1337 7y ago
Through certain yogic practices and breathing techniques. But honestly nothing compares to a psychedelic trip imo.
bordercases 7y ago
"Here's a mechanism that brings these results" "How can I have these results without loading on the mechanism?" I can understand drug aversion but what's the aversion to breathwork, which is cheaper and shouldn't carry stigma?
vb6sp6 7y ago
Take a look at Kundalini Yoga
WhompingWindows 7y ago
Sam Harris states that you can achieve this enhanced selflessness via meditation (where we think of the "self" or "the ego" as that sort of "conductor" that the psychedelics turn off). However, while meditation is like a sailboat, psychedelics are like a rocket: both will take you places, but one much more quickly and with much more risk. In my limited experience (2 trips) there was no negative aspect to psychedelics. There were things that were already negatively valenced, like riding in a car or visiting a friend's messy house briefly, however I had no inkling of a bad trip or any scary/demonic/overwhelming sensations.
- tacon 7y ago
  Sam Harris & Yuval Noah Harari answer a question about "peak" meditative experiences, and set them in context with psychedelic experiences in the segment starting at 1:27:20: https://samharris.org/podcasts/138-edge-humanity/ https://samharris.org/podcasts/138-edge-humanity/
collyw 7y ago
I just did a 10 day silent meditation retreat and there were points where the feeling had definite similarities to psychedelics. Hard work but worth it. I have a feeling that the meditation retreat went deeper than psychedelics did for me personally.

mistermann 7y ago

> In my personal experiences with psychedelics, these drugs remove mental heuristics, they allow the mind to think unimpeded by usual thought patterns, and simply accept raw data as it comes in. I like "removing mental heuristics" as a good way of describing what is happening at the physical level. Articulating (or, communicating with high fidelity) what happens at the experiential and emotional levels is much more tricky. An analogy I would draw is, imagine or recall how you may have felt during a major event (usually negative), say the death of a loved one, or the ending of an important romantic relationship, or imagine how you might feel if you are on your death bed, reviewing your choices and actions throughout your life....do you have any regrets, would you have done anything different if you had it to do all over again, etc. Imagine the feeling of clarity of thought, and deep intellectual and emotional appreciation of the gravity of the situation involved in such experiences. This is how (but only in part) I would describe my experiences with psychedelics. Of course each person experiences these things in different ways, but despite such differences, extremely deep profoundness is an extremely common takeaway. A simpler explanation, I would say that it kind of "shocks me into reality". And you may think you know what that means, but if you haven't experienced it, you really don't. Even I don't fully appreciate the meaning of what I'm saying at this very moment; I am largely going on faith, based on a very low fidelity memory of the experiences - such is the strange, ineffable nature of these medicines. Luckily, while it seems difficult to see into (remember) one's experiences in that world, the opposite is not true - when under the influence of psychedelics, my experience is that I can experience kind of a simultaneous existence of two states of mind: that of clarity of thought (normal biases due to heuristics largely removed), but also clear (if not clearer) memory of thoughts and emotions related to specific scenarios in the normal world. This seems to facilitate for a very productive self-help scneario, the so-called "five years of therapy or psychoanalysis in a few hours" effect that some people speak of. I should also note that I am speaking of experimentation in the medium dose range of psilocybin. While there are other things to be discovered at the higher doses, for my purposes medium dose trips seem to be much more beneficial. YMMV.

surfsvammel 7y ago

To me, the most stunning hallucination, during LSD, was the total confusion of my senses. A specific flower was in bloom at the time, and my mind confused it’s smell with the colour purple. It was the strangest experience. Smelling colour... There is no way to describe it in words. Even though this episode was decades ago, I still, kind of, experience the scent of that flower as the colour purple.

meesles 7y ago
Your experience is known as synesthesia [1], and while not common, it can be found in people naturally and under certain conditions (like drugs). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia
- erikpukinskis 7y ago
  There is also the fact that many things we perceive as senses are actually knowledge. We may think we see a red door when in fact we just know the door is red. It’s possible your OP was noticing that a certain smell makes him know a thing is purple. Under normal circumstances he would just perceive PURPLE and think he was seeing. But on drugs he might perceive that his nose was also alerting him of PURPLE in the flower.
perl4ever 7y ago
I haven't tried to meditate in a long time, but my understanding of the process was, setting aside mysticism and tradition, you just take a mental concept and you focus on it and every time your mind starts drifting you return to it. So, I've heard that people make a big deal about choosing a mantra, but my thinking was it can be anything, and somehow I got into the habit of visualizing a blank field of a particular color. The nice thing about focusing on a color was that if my visual imagination distracted me, I could concentrate on "seeing" the color, while if I was imagining words or sounds, I could focus on the name of the color too. So it was like having an object to focus on that had all the different angles available. I'm not sure I've never experienced synaesthesia, but I'm pretty sure I haven't been perceiving smells or sounds as having color recently.

jasonzemos 7y ago

> It was akin to 12 hour, mentally-clear cannabis high. This is the best way to describe reasonable (small) doses of LSD. It's like the purest sativa possible; as if somebody removed all of the earthiness and stoniness and then amplified the psychoactive.

mirimir 7y ago
I guess. Versus comparing it to alcohol, anyway. However, in my experience, psilocybin is closer to THC than to LSD. But they're really very different experiences. Alcohol does accentuate psilocybin, acceptably. But combining marijuana with either, especially LSD, can be frightening. Your short term memory drops to a few seconds, so you can forget who (or even what) you are, where you are, etc. Some people panic, and fear that they'll never be sober again.
- W4nn4B_h4x0r 7y ago
  Is it a good idea to take any of these - alcohol, Marijuana, LSD, mushrooms - with antidepressants? That is, if you're on medication, should you stay away from all recreational drug use?
  - tastyfreeze 7y ago
    The effects of serotonergic psychedelics(LSD, psilocybin, DMT) are reduced by SSRI medications.
    - mirimir 7y ago
      Yeah. I had stopped using LSD before using SSRIs. Later, I used to vacation in Amsterdam for the shrooms. But I'd go off the SSRI maybe a week or so before the trip.
  - sibeliuss 7y ago
    It is imperative that you do not combine psychedelics with antidepressants! This can lead to dangerous side effects / behaviors! If you take a combination of drugs this is even more important to heed. The proper path is to wean yourself off of the antidepressants for the experience, and then only undertake the experience with an experienced sitter or guide.

diminoten 7y ago

The point is they do something, but for that something to be most likely good/positive, you also need therapy, which if you want, you can interpret as a "trip sitter" or whatever the phrase is. Y'all aren't disagreeing.

mistermann 7y ago
> but for that something to be most likely good/positive, you also need therapy I hear ideas like this (and "In other words, you would need to use the drugs in combination with therapy to obtain good results") repeated all the time, but I'm curious where they come from. If one spends any time whatsoever in enthusiast communities, the overwhelming sentiment is that these compounds are incredibly helpful even when used alone. This is not to say that individual results wouldn't be even better with therapy, or that there aren't some people who have negative experiences, but these being true also in no ways logically implies that significant benefits cannot be realized by independent usage. The precise answer to these and other questions, at this current point in time, is: we don't know, with extremely high certainty. But this doesn't mean we don't know anything. Reality is independent of man's understanding (peer reviewed studies) of it - a tree falling in the forest does not require the presence of a scientist. While it's always a good idea to exercise caution, I suspect advice like "do not use these substances except under professional guidance" is likely more harmful than helpful. It will be years if not decades before formal treatments are available, for many people that may be too late, not to mention the exorbitant price tags these treatments come at. I am more of the mind that people educate themselves on the topic, proceed with caution, work with those who have experience, and proceed slowly and with caution, starting with low dosages and working your way up over time. There is very little trustworthy evidence that I know of indicating there is any kind of substantial risk, and even then that has to be weighed against not just the benefits, but also the risk of doing nothing.
- diminoten 7y ago
  Enthusiast communities are probably not the most objective group of folks, so I'd take what they have to say with a grain of salt.

oh-4-fucks-sake 7y ago

Your comment really resonates with me and wholeheartedly mirrors my own experiences with psychedelics. Of the lysergamides, I've taken LSD, 1P-LSD, LSA, AL-LAD, and my favorite: ALD-52--IMHO, the Cadillac of psychedelic drugs. It's a close analog of LSD with fewer "body load" effects, almost zero nausea, and a less scatterbrained headspace--sparkling clear with beautiful visuals and an uncanny tool for productive introspection. Set has so much to do with the experience--though I've had fun with it out with friends at a bar in dark of winter, its true power is sorely wasted unless I'm in nature, especially when my wife and I are taking it together. I know with zero uncertainty that it acts as almost a forceful, powerful therapy with even a modest amount of mental input--it's as if your brain is forced into a state of deep meditation where you can't help but improve your mental station (barring the notably rare "bad trip"--though I've taken it with so many people, I do believe it happens less frequently with ALD-52 on account of its mental clarity). Some of the best days of my life have been while tripping on ALD-52, wandering wild goat trails, exploring the vibrant innards of canyons, weaving among mountain pines. RE your experiences with water, I've had the same experiences. One of the most memorable moments of my life was returning from a short high desert hike, to sink to the bottom of a salt water pool, look skyward, and watch the desert sun dance and play with colors on the water's surface. I've never looked at water the same since. I'm cheerfully captivated with its beauty in a way I probably haven't since I was a child. Which brings me to my final observation. The effects of psychedelics, perhaps owning to their serotonergic effects or their disabling of the default mode network re-imbue you with a wonder in the world around you that has slowly, inconspicuously eroded little-by-ever-so-little each year into adulthood. Year by year, the world becomes more bland, less exciting, less, well, full of wonder. Remember those magical memories of childhood? Perhaps running towards the ocean, arriving at summer camp, having a picnic in the park, diving to the bottom of the pool, playing with a new toy on Christmas, the excited anticipation before a sleepover, your first crush? The magnitude of those feelings are often so muted or jaded as an adult. The right psychedelics can bring those feelings rushing back, unfettered, unadulterated, pure. Suddenly you realize how much of that you've lost, while simultaneously getting to feel them again in full force. Some of that stays with you during sober times, which is lovely. Dosing periodically keeps that magic alive in you--what a joy, a gift. Humans have taken psychedelics as part of daily lives for tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of years. The shaman is little more than an elder trip-sitter and therapist. Our highly complex brains have evolved alongside such chemicals and experiences to help define meaning and seek happiness and it's a crying shame that waves of prohibition have stifled that nigh fundamental human experience. It makes me happy to watch that damage slowly be undone with news like this.

wufufufu 7y ago

> and really ensure your mindset ("set") is positive and open Everyone says this and it's little more than bro science. So if you have a bad experience from the drugs, it was because you weren't in a positive headspace? Sounds like No True Scotsman.

filoleg 7y ago
>So if you have a bad experience from the drugs, it was because you weren't in a positive headspace? You can always test out this hypothesis by doing a tab of LSD from the same batch twice while controlling for your headspace. One day, you do it with a positive headspace, and another day you do it with a negative one. If you had a great experience the first time and a bad experience the second time, clearly the headspace alignment made the difference. Yes, this kind of testing isn't as rigorous as it would have been for a legitimate scientific trial (which I bet we will see in the future as the research into the area accelerates), but imo it is more than just a No True Scotsman backed by broscience. And of course, no one says that a negative headspace is the only reason for someone to have a bad experience, there are others for sure. For example, certain people with predisposition for schizophrenia probably should abstain as well. AFAIK psychedelics won't cause a schizophrenia in an otherwise healthy person, but I heard it might kick off an early onset if you were going to get a schizophrenia in a few years without any psychedelics anyways.
- wufufufu 7y ago
  "headspace" doesn't mean anything
  - AnthonBerg 7y ago
    You don’t understand anything when you read or hear the word?
  - Analog24 7y ago
    Yes, it does. It's quite literally in the dictionary: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/headspace https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/headspace

wefarrell 7y ago

Set and setting are paramount. A depressant can behave as a stimulant in a particular setting and vice versa (for example alcohol at a sporting event). In certain settings psychedelic experiences are even possible without any chemical ingestion. For example on meditation retreats and ultramarathons. So I don't think it's incorrect to call psychedelics a super placebo. The mental states they bring you to are entirely achievable without their use, albeit with far greater effort.

jandrese 7y ago
I'm not sure that's alcohol acting as a stimulant so much as alcohol removing mental barriers that prevent people from acting in a certain way. The depressant effect in fact helps to moderate the worst impulses for most people. Which is why drinks like Four Loco that combine a stimulant with alcohol end up being more dangerous than expected. Not only do you lose your "that's a dumb idea, I shouldn't do it" part of your brain, but you also have the energy to act on the impulse.
dwaltrip 7y ago
Psilocybin has known physiological affects on the body and on the brain. We see very clearly differences in how the brain functions on psilocybin. It's absolutely not a placebo. That, or the definition of the word is being stretched such that all meaning is lost.
- wefarrell 7y ago
  Placebos also have known physiological effects on the brain and there are clear differences when taking a pink placebo vs a blue one: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(72)90996-8/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... This is not to downplay the effects of psychadelics - I've taken plenty and of course the psychoactive effects are undeniable. But the effects are from far more than just the chemicals. For example smoked DMT hallucinations are very different than Ayahuasca, despite the two being the same chemical.
  - 7y ago

corporate_shi11 7y ago

I took a strong psychedelic once, and a high dose at that. I tripped for over 12 hours, and by the end of the trip I was seriously considering changing my life in significant ways. For days after the trip I was considering making these changes. My thought patterns and assumptions had made a complete jump from one train of thought to another. This experience made me realize how much of our outlook on things is dominated by whatever mode of thinking we happen to be in, and that mode is more shaped by custom and habit than anything approaching logic and reason.

pell 7y ago
I know it's a very private question, but would you be able to describe the trip and the long lasting effects more?
- flattone 7y ago
  There is a spectrum of retrospectives. Re trip description. Most people tend to just say it's cool, you see stuff/colors brighter and emotionally impactful etc. My key story for last is laying in a bed in close proximity to a freeway. I could not choose to unhear/see with my eyes closed as a car drove down the freeway cylinders/rods and combustion. . I on extremely rare occasion hear this type of story from other peeps. Long lasting effect ... In the immediately following week I had the most significant behavior shift I can think of... Had been smoking since 11 years old... The LSD was approx 9th grade ..solidly solidly stopped for about a year. Pot. Everything. I'm back. I'm an idiot at heart give or take.. but what a beautiful year.
filoeleven 7y ago
> My thought patterns and assumptions had made a complete jump from one train of thought to another. William James uses the analogy that our set of habits are like an irregular polyhedron resting on one of its faces. Everyday experiences may rock it up onto an edge, but it will usually come to rest where it was, or perhaps on a neighboring face. A more singular, meaningful experience has more “push” to it, overcoming the force of habit in a way that no amount of daily prodding would, rolling the whole thing onto a new face that would take ages to land on otherwise. He was writing about religious conversions at the time, but there seems to be a lot of overlap with the effects of a psychedelic experience.

perl4ever 7y ago

"These drugs suppress activity of the default mode network of the brain, which is a sort of "conductor" of the brain, which chooses which "instruments" to prioritize and how to allocate the train of thought" That's interesting, but it sounds like a plausible description of how schizophrenia works too, maybe even one that I've read before, and yet my impression is that "natural" psychosis is different.

luckydata 7y ago
that's pretty much it, except if you're on LSD at some point it will stop.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  It's pretty common to have one or two episodes of psychosis and then not again. Selection bias and all that. Anyone that doesn't have a severe chronic problem, you're not going to be aware of, but it's reasonable to assume there are more mild cases than severe cases of almost any condition. For that matter, it's a definitional issue - people can appear crazy temporarily for almost infinite reasons, and if it doesn't reoccur, even doctors aren't going to call it schizophrenia. You go into a hospital appearing to be stark raving mad, they are going to test you for drugs and call it "schizophreniform" if they can't find any.
dwaltrip 7y ago
Meditation also affects the activity of the default mode network. This is a fundamental network that plays a huge role is much of our brain's activities, so saying 2 different things have an affect on the network doesn't mean that those impacts are necessarily similar.

sizzle 7y ago

Thank you for the thoughtful response, this really is encouraging for those on the fence about trying. Might take a trip to Amsterdam soon....

eprparadox 7y ago

Your personal experiences sound very interesting and I don't mean to detract at all from the effect they've had on you and many other people. However, I was a neuro Phd student and did many 'default mode network' studies using fMRI and it is -very- early to be making claims about the nature and/or purpose of this network, or how it's perturbed by any experience: psychedelic or not. The level of temporal and spatial resolution of data gathering of this and other brain networks is entirely too coarse to make legitimate inferences. At this point in the literature it is a very good story with a few compelling examples but not nearly complete enough to make real claims.