>The mind’s potential for suffering is immense. The scale doesn’t go nearly as far in the other direction. I cannot imagine any possible pleasure within many or

>The mind’s potential for suffering is immense. The scale doesn’t go nearly as far in the other direction. I cannot imagine any possible pleasure within many orders of magnitude. I've meditated a lot, which brain scans show the brain lights up in a near identical way to magic mushrooms, except when meditating you get to control how deep the state is, so if you bump into something you can't handle you can come out of the state or reduce the state as little or as much as you want. This gives the ability to "trip" without the risk of a bad trip. I know it's a bit apples and oranges, but from meditation I've passed out from pleasure before, so I can say it gets very extreme. Neurologists and psychologists have been finding for a while that the average person's suffering is 3x that of equivalent pleasure for an equal event. They recorded day traders making a profitable traid and a losing trade and recorded their responses to get this rough baseline. Facts, while valuable, never the less, can seem cold hearted in the face of painful emotions. I hope I'm not coming off that way. Understanding and knowledge gives power over what you know, and with the power of knowledge it is possible to conquer suffering. Those who struggle with death have a baseline suffering that has been happening for so long they often don't even notice it. Identity is one of the three big causes for suffering. By understanding how the ego works, and what really happened there, one of the causes of many pain points throughout your life goes away. From that benefit it is imho worth knowing about. Tripping is a bit of a trial by fire. Those who shed their ego comfortably gain the option to learn how it works, and from that they gain power over it, including suffering. This is why an ego death is touted as the single best thing that has happened to some while simultaneously touted as a horrible experience for others. The problem, imho, with the tripping community is it's easy to bump into an ego death, where in meditation circles it's walked up to and only experienced once one has removed (or at least reduced) all of the kinds of suffering before it guaranteeing a pleasant experience.