**Check out the audio readover above this image for a more in depth reading/discussion of this concept that I recorded**
“Oh, here I am again—Richard Alpert—what a drag!” -Ram Dass
If you’ve done heroic doses of psychedelics, you know exactly what this quote is referring to.
We often leaves these experiences with so much awe and revelation…a feeling that everything is going to be different from this point forward. That we will never forget what we just realized and now, finally now, everything will be different.
And then, to our dismay, the glow and the new person we were destined to become falls back into familiar thoughts and paradigms of reality.
My first exposure to psychedelics was an ayahuasca retreat when I was 30 years old. As I alluded to in becoming no one, I had a series of profound experiences during this ceremony that changed the direction of my life. Since this original exposure, I’ve explored other plant medicines as well as synthetic psychedelics such as ketamine in a therapeutic setting.
The goal of this post is to share my current perspective on their role in the pursuit of self realization or spiritual growth.
BTW let me just say that psychedelics are not for everyone. If you haven’t done them, I recommend doing them with a guide, in a safe, controlled setting. I don’t recommend doing them if you are at risk for psychosis and if you’re unsure whether you should try them, I recommend talking to a psychologist or experienced guide.
Why Do People Do Psychedelics?
If we cut to the core of the matter, people are engaging in the use of psychedelics because they want to change something about their experience (life).
This could be the presence of a mental, emotional, or behavioral condition like depression. It could be an attempt to improve a physical condition. Or even for people that are perfectly happy, they might desire to experience an altered state that brings them closer to the divine.
In all cases, people are seeking lasting change or perspective relative to their predominant experience of reality.
I like to think of psychedelics as non-specific amplifiers for things that already exist in our consciousness. These can be thought forms, beliefs, traumas, and all kinds of imprinting we may not be able to see in our day to day waking awareness. Many of these formless concepts are the core driver of our life experience and actions, yet most of the time we aren’t even aware of them due to primitive survival mechanisms in our consciousness which prioritize survival over all else.
There is unequivocally benefit to using these substances to aid with a host of emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and physical challenges. For this article, I am focusing on the use of these substances for spiritual ascent or what I call self-realization.
The Programming Around Psychedelics
Prior to doing ayahuasca for the first time, I thought that psychedelics were “bad.” This was mainly because they were lumped into the drug category which has a narrative in our culture of being dangerous, illegal, and detrimental to our health.
As detailed in many works such as How to Change Your Mind, many of these natural substances that come from the earth are far less dangerous than things we see as normal such as drinking alcohol or hitting a juul. However, there is an immense negative connotation with them due to how our main institutions like government has treated them. This prevents many people from ever experimenting with them.
After my initial experience and research, I got over this programming for a while.
And then as my spiritual journey progressed, I encountered another set of programming.
This was mainly from spiritual teachers who claimed that using exogenous substances for your spiritual growth was bad. They claimed that the more natural path which relied on modalities like meditation were a superior way to reach more permanent enlightened states.
The irony is that anyone who preaches polarity or good vs. bad, is not an enlightened being.
I now understand why a spiritual teacher might do this, but for a period of time, I bought into this dogma in the pursuit of my own self-realization.
My Personal Experience With Psychedelics
My first ayahuasca ceremony was the first time I had experienced what a direct connection to source consciousness felt like. Basically, it felt like I was having a conversation with God in my head. I could ask any question and I’d get amazing answers that seemed to come from a source beyond my thinking mind.
I also felt the love of the cosmic heart.
This feeling was probably the most potent amount of joy and bliss I’ve ever experienced in my life. The bliss lasted for entire month afterwards which made me feel like I was walking on a cloud.
To say this catalyzed a paradigm change would be an understatement.
I returned back to the normal world feeling uplifted, with renewed perspective. Everything was going to be different now!!!
But eventually a lot of the shimmer wore off and many of life’s disturbances settled back in. Ram Daas my friend, you’re so money you don’t even know it.
Naturally, I wanted to return to that special place I had touched inside myself as soon as I could again. So I jumped at the opportunity to do Ayahuasca again 3 months later.
The second time I sat with ayahuasca, I had a very intense kundalini awakening which was primarily a physical experience. It left me with an unfamiliar energy surging through my body throughout the day which is still present to this day. This weird new sensation compelled me to try and figure out what the hell was happening to me which I outlined in more detail here.
After having effectively felt like I screwed myself up and blew out my energy system, I decided to chill on the psychedelics for a while.
Reflecting on these early experiences, what psychedelics really did for me was set me on a devoted spiritual path. They were an exposure mechanism that had allowed me to touch a part of myself and reality that I never had been able to before. And in doing so it created a burning desire to seek truth and understanding.
Why are we here? What is this reality experience? How come no one told me about this sooner?
Above all else, what I really wanted was to be able to embody the magnificent states I had experienced all the time. To become pure love and rest in divine wisdom. This seemed much more pleasurable and wondrous than dealing with life’s dramas.
This was the goal.