Am I the only one who has noticed that B. caapi extract compared to B. caapi tea is much different? While B. caapi is pleasant, B. caapi extract is actually unpleasant. Indeed, even pharmaceutically pure harmine from China is unpleasant.
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Harmalas don't like to be extracted?
- Thread starter bk2492
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You're not alone, but you're a minority here on Nexus, for sure. I feel the difference between plants and extracts.
The spirit of the plant is more prominent with water extraction or tea, in my experience. You should follow your own guidance
and build relationships with plants based on your experience. It's good to hear different viewpoints, but nobody lives your life
or sees it from your perspective. Decide for yourself what works and feels holistic. This is your own journey in the end.
The spirit of the plant is more prominent with water extraction or tea, in my experience. You should follow your own guidance
and build relationships with plants based on your experience. It's good to hear different viewpoints, but nobody lives your life
or sees it from your perspective. Decide for yourself what works and feels holistic. This is your own journey in the end.
The interesting thing is that years ago, we had a lot of discussion about what is known as jungle spice, a more unrefined, less clean extract from Mimosa hostilis that was prepared using a less selective solvent. People claimed, quite strongly, that this resulted in a different kind of experience. And even now, that belief still pops up from time to time. Some people still hold on to that idea.
But then chemical analyses were done, and it turned out that even jungle spice extracts were mostly DMT. Most of the other compounds present weren’t psychoactive. Then people started doing blind tests, and it turned out that there was no noticeable difference in the effects.
I think it’s important to keep this in mind. Everyone is entitled to their own views, of course, and I actually like the idea that there’s a sort of plant teacher spirit in there that changes the experience. But realistically, I think it’s much more likely that this is just a case of self-suggestion working through the psychedelic experience. And that’s not hard to imagine, given the nature of these experiences.
I think it’s the same kind of thing with harmalas. Sure, there are some differences between harmine and harmaline, and I think I can tell them apart when I use them individually. But if I mix them up, and the ratio is something like 40/60 or 60/40, I don’t think I’d be able to distinguish the ratio anymore.
I think the main difference between clean extracts and something like a tea or a crude boiled extract that hasn’t been properly purified is that, especially when the tannins are still present, I tend to feel more discomfort. My stomach gets a bit more upset.
But then chemical analyses were done, and it turned out that even jungle spice extracts were mostly DMT. Most of the other compounds present weren’t psychoactive. Then people started doing blind tests, and it turned out that there was no noticeable difference in the effects.
I think it’s important to keep this in mind. Everyone is entitled to their own views, of course, and I actually like the idea that there’s a sort of plant teacher spirit in there that changes the experience. But realistically, I think it’s much more likely that this is just a case of self-suggestion working through the psychedelic experience. And that’s not hard to imagine, given the nature of these experiences.
I think it’s the same kind of thing with harmalas. Sure, there are some differences between harmine and harmaline, and I think I can tell them apart when I use them individually. But if I mix them up, and the ratio is something like 40/60 or 60/40, I don’t think I’d be able to distinguish the ratio anymore.
I think the main difference between clean extracts and something like a tea or a crude boiled extract that hasn’t been properly purified is that, especially when the tannins are still present, I tend to feel more discomfort. My stomach gets a bit more upset.
One more point is that teas are a full-spectrum extraction, so they don't contain just harmalas.
Placebo is a real thing, and self-suggestion combined with a psychedelic could do wonders.
I'd say keep an open mind and do what works for you
Placebo is a real thing, and self-suggestion combined with a psychedelic could do wonders.
I'd say keep an open mind and do what works for you
The plant teacher spirit belief system is quite interesting topic.
Some people believe that this teacher spirit leaves or disconnects from the plant material when some specific material is involved. It seems that plant spirits do not mind long boiling in water, even in aluminium pots or boiling on gas extracted from the underground thousands kilometers away, but do not like things like hydroxides or nonpolar solvents.
My personal view is that main plant spirit of caapi is still present in caapi extracted alkaloids, it does not appear to me that it is so picky and sensitive.
I have to say, I agree with you, Nordscape. I think we’re very much in sync, even though we might approach things from slightly different perspectives at times. In this case, though, I really feel like our thinking is very much aligned.One more point is that teas are a full-spectrum extraction, so they don't contain just harmalas.
Placebo is a real thing, and self-suggestion combined with a psychedelic could do wonders.
I'd say keep an open mind and do what works for you
I have this very old bottle of DMT, it’s probably about 20 years old now, and it’s one of those things I’ve kept as a kind of keepsake. This bottle of spice has a very strong and pungent smell. It’s discolored by now, and yet, once or maybe twice a year, I get the feeling that I need to go back. It’s from a period when I was really happy with how I was using DMT and the kinds of experiences I was having.
What tends to happen when I smoke it, is that I somehow relive those same feelings I had during the trips from two decades ago. That’s something that has really puzzled me. I normally consider myself fairly grounded in how I think about these things, but apparently, psychedelics push me into a space where I’m less grounded.
Which, in itself, isn’t that strange, but it’s still kind of strange. It’s something I’ve thought about quite a lot.
Is it just independent alkaloids stimulating receptors, or are the alkaloids the communication gateways for the plants? I'm one of the crazy people who believes in the latter.
It's a very different cosmology one finds oneself in when one only works with live plants and fresh material vs imported and stored material. The difference in experience is highly qualitative and cannot be explained with just higher concentrations of the mainstream alkaloids. Life energy is very perceivable for those who have open senses. Many will not believe in the concept until it is able to be objectively measured with a device and accepted by the institution of science. I believe that day will come, in our lifetimes or later.
About the resulting quality of a medicine; it's a very complex matter and every different way that it is prepared has a different result. We don't have to talk about "what the plant spirit likes" if that sounds too woo woo. It's about how pure and wholesome we experience the medicine to be.
It's a very different cosmology one finds oneself in when one only works with live plants and fresh material vs imported and stored material. The difference in experience is highly qualitative and cannot be explained with just higher concentrations of the mainstream alkaloids. Life energy is very perceivable for those who have open senses. Many will not believe in the concept until it is able to be objectively measured with a device and accepted by the institution of science. I believe that day will come, in our lifetimes or later.
About the resulting quality of a medicine; it's a very complex matter and every different way that it is prepared has a different result. We don't have to talk about "what the plant spirit likes" if that sounds too woo woo. It's about how pure and wholesome we experience the medicine to be.
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You should do a blind test, and see if you can still feel there’s any difference between the two, self suggestion is hard to beat even for someone who knows it’s power.
This is such a tired old topic of discussion, and tbh if your that hung up on the details at this point you might have missed the point. Believing one or the other does not you or your experience more spiritual(imo). It’s what you do with the experience..and you either had it or you didn’t. Spirit doesn’t care how pure or impure your extract was. Did it happen? Or not?
Hmm, interesting discussion.
Few notes. The power of suggestion is a real phenomenon. If one has a bias or proclivity for plants over molecules, this can color the experience of them both.
At the same time, the plant tea may have non-psychoactive components that lend themselves to an entourage effect that augment the psychoactive aspects of the experiences. It only takes a little bit of something to do this.
Finally, there's the idea of both of the above being at play.
At the end of the day, one could view an extract as having just as much plant spirit as the full vine since it was the vine that biosynthesized the extract.
One love
Few notes. The power of suggestion is a real phenomenon. If one has a bias or proclivity for plants over molecules, this can color the experience of them both.
At the same time, the plant tea may have non-psychoactive components that lend themselves to an entourage effect that augment the psychoactive aspects of the experiences. It only takes a little bit of something to do this.
Finally, there's the idea of both of the above being at play.
At the end of the day, one could view an extract as having just as much plant spirit as the full vine since it was the vine that biosynthesized the extract.
One love
I think some kind of telepathic communication does happen between humans and plants and the environment. I just think it happens on 200 mic’s of lsd just as it does on ayahuasca. Why does psilocetin put me in connection the same way mushrooms do, just with less cramping? It’s about neurotransmission. It’s about the psychedelic.
I don’t see a way around it. Psychedelics work. Without them these plants would be like echinacea or goldenseal or any other herb and this whole culture would never have existed.
I don’t see a way around it. Psychedelics work. Without them these plants would be like echinacea or goldenseal or any other herb and this whole culture would never have existed.
One thing I will say about the teas is that I believe the tannins and other components affect our digestive system/microbiome and it is this which could affect the psychedelic experience via the gut-brain axis. I never experience digestive affects in the same ways with harmalas as I do with teas, such as gut sensitivities for a few days afterward, which seems correlated to a lingering kind of experience. A lot of people don't think these digestive affects are that desireable and they don't directly affect the psychedelicness of the experience necessarily but do to the healing properties of the tea imo. Not better or worse, just different. You do not always want or need a purge, and for some with certain health conditions this wouldn't be a good idea regardless, but it is an aspect of the experience I cherish. Sometimes only after the fact lol.
Maybe I just haven't taken enough pharmahuasca but harmalas themselves feel different to Caapi/rue tea.
I also agree with the idea that, at least for some aspects of the properties of psychedelics and their healing potential, it is not so much about the route as the destination, some might use mescaline some might use Ayahuasca, others 2cb or extracted harmalas/DMT, other still use drumming/chanting and others again extreme fasting and isolation. All of these open one up "psychically" even if the flavour of the journey is different, the connection which results is fundamentally to the same place imo/ime.
Maybe I just haven't taken enough pharmahuasca but harmalas themselves feel different to Caapi/rue tea.
I also agree with the idea that, at least for some aspects of the properties of psychedelics and their healing potential, it is not so much about the route as the destination, some might use mescaline some might use Ayahuasca, others 2cb or extracted harmalas/DMT, other still use drumming/chanting and others again extreme fasting and isolation. All of these open one up "psychically" even if the flavour of the journey is different, the connection which results is fundamentally to the same place imo/ime.
The Sofa Traveler
Traveling without moving
This reminds me the story of Albert Hofmann's meeting with Maria Sabina, at the end of which Maria told Albert that she had detected no difference between the mushrooms and the psilocybin synthesized by Hofmann, that they were identical.
We don't need a popular curandero's opinion to know that Chacruna tea is different to extracted DMT when drank in Ayahuasca.
You can have very deep, profound, strong etc experiences with extracts. That doesn't mean that there is no difference between whole preparations and extracts. And also fresh plant material is different to material that was stored.
You can have very deep, profound, strong etc experiences with extracts. That doesn't mean that there is no difference between whole preparations and extracts. And also fresh plant material is different to material that was stored.
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