Problem solving, perspective and psychedelics

[Vodsel]

Tonight, after a couple weeks of not smoking any cannabis, I felt like having a little bit. It's been a pretty active weekend for me. A lot of things to think about. No special big concerns, but lately my mind is above average busy.

While smoking, one of those vertiginous weed chain-of-thoughts hit me. I'm sure it's something a lot of you have thought about.

I realized it's become rare for me to use weed for escapism. Of course I can still enjoy hedonistic, contemplative or creative activities while high, but I realized I'm systematically using weed for practical problem solving, even subconsciously. It's like I'm deciding to wear the cannabis glasses and take a second look at things, because even if I haven't planned to do it, I end up doing it. Then again, I might not have any illuminations whatsoever while high, but back to sobriety things look easier to approach.

Now, weed is only an example, an excuse to talk about this same ritual in classic psychedelics. I don't know if/when I'll get to the point of systematically doing specific, practical problem-solving work with psychedelics (so far, I'm too fascinated about the experience itself to seriously ponder about anything else) but I was wondering about you people.

Do you often use entheogens for figuring out problems? Or does the problem solving routine happen spontaneously? How do you face an experience when you intend it to help do that kind of job?

And just to clarify, I'm not referring to metaphysical, philosophical problems here. I'm talking about problems in your everyday life.

 

[proto-pax]

yes, looking at my life and observing things that go on in it has helped me solve problems. its not even a conscious decision on my part, it happens automatically.

 

[The Day Tripper]

Personally, i find its more of a mind thing, and if you know when to add the catalyst if needed, its a very useful way to use cannabis and psychadelics.

But more and more, since i've been taking a break from psych's, i notice that i've been having answers to these questions floating around in my head just pop into view. Like i was putting some roma tomatoes on the shelf where i work, and half way through the box, i had this realization about how i was misunderstanding why i disliked hunting wild game after doing so for years, and stopping a few years back.

I thought, i don't like the idea of going out and killing animals, but they are happier than the ones on the other side of the store produced industrially. They were free and lived a happy life. Which made me think of a wendell berry quote about how if he wants to eat the flesh of another animal, he wants it to live a happy life. He was refering to treatment of animals on a farm, but it applies to wild game as well.

It made me re-examine why i had an aversion to hunting, and i can't say i disagree with people that do, and the ones that eat their game i can respect alot.

Then i remembered the grouse i saw flopping on the side of the road when i was riding my bike in the woods one day, and it sickened me. He was all shot up, and most likely the hunter never found him. I tried to catch him before he went off the edge of the road and onto steep terrain, but i couldn't. I just wanted to put him out of his pain.

After thinking back on this later that week, while i was vaporizing some cannabis, i came to the conclusion it was a far better way to take game than buying the crap at the store. Sure you get wounded animals that slowly die a painful death, but thats nature. The psychological damage done to animals on industrial farms is far more despicable in my mind.

It was a sobering realization about how hunters are more in tune with how people are supposed to harvest game than industrial solutions. But at the same time its raw, and can be messy, just like all other predator/prey encounters in nature. It really struck a chord about how we are so detached from our role in nature. But since technically all we do is natural, thats illogical. I rationalize that as a evolutionary mutation gone wrong, that will lead to a correction in good time (my belief we are detached or trying to become, from nature).

 

[Metanoia]

I had a serious problem with cannabis for a while, so I don't indulge much anymore. But the last time I did, it was definitely more of a psychedelic experience than the escapist ones I used to have. It did give me a different perspective on some things that have been troubling me, and allowed me to think of solutions in a way I might not have done otherwise. I realized that this is the way cannabis should probably be used, rather than the way most people use/abuse it. It can be used as a medicine, as a healing agent, as a tool of self-reflection. This is a concept that previously eluded me. The only times I had those sorts of experiences was when I was already under the influence of another psychedelic and then smoked or ate some cannabis.

 

[Vodsel]

Thanks for the comments.

since i've been taking a break from psych's, i notice that i've been having answers to these questions floating around in my head just pop into view.

(...)

After thinking back on this later that week, while i was vaporizing some cannabis, i came to the conclusion it was a far better way to take game than buying the crap at the store.

You bring up a reasoning for this, having to do with the amount of suffering. That does make lots of sense to mostly everyone, and the exceptions are either people who are in denial and will not equal the suffering in animals to the suffering in humans, or psychopaths.

But maybe these thoughts are activated by something else other than empathy. We know that feelings of love, interconnection and respect are common with cannabis/psychedelics, but what you say reminds me of something else, also often awakened by psychs, that doesn't come through reasoning even if you can make sense out of it once it hits you - and that's the idea of taking responsibility.

It's almost a supra-ethical fact. We don't take responsibility in order to alleviate pain or to improve the world around us, these are rather a consequence of being responsible. We take responsibility because if there's anything we are in charge of, is ourselves.

I keep finding that idea when reflecting, and psychs have proved to be an unexpectedly efficient catalyst for seeing it, crystal clear. We can often solve problems (or at least face them) more easily because we stop denying our responsibility and we accept it as a fact. We cannot ignore it. Even when we are pragmatic, we realize that the result of ignoring our responsibility is much worse than the efforts needed for fulfilling it.

But again, it's not pragmatic or rational. It's a deep solid fact, and it seems to be quite common to find within the change of perspective of psychs.

I realized that this is the way cannabis should probably be used, rather than the way most people use/abuse it. It can be used as a medicine, as a healing agent, as a tool of self-reflection. This is a concept that previously eluded me.

Yes, that was exactly my feeling. But it seems to like to surprise you, that's why I was wondering about how does people manage to get specific answers instead of just listening to whatever it wants to tell you.

 

[hixidom]

And just to clarify, I'm not referring to metaphysical, philosophical problems here. I'm talking about problems in your everyday life.

Metaphysical, philosophical problems are pretty much the only type of problems I have. I sometimes do have questions that I want answers to, and sometimes I get those answers during a psychedelic experience, but only after I've experienced a realization of what life, consciousness, and reality really are. After that, all of my previous questions and concerns seem inconsequential. Then I spend the next few weeks/months/years picking through and restoring the faded remnants of my long-lost psychedelic realization until I have reconstructed what then becomes my entire worldview. I then look for ways to apply and express this worldview in my art, academic interests, relationships, etc. Then, after taking enough time off of psychedelics that I become thoroughly paranoid that my worldview has no ontological basis, I mentally compose a list of questions, use psychedelics again, and the entire process repeats.

So, you see, I have no problems external to my psychedelic experiences. Furthermore, I would say that the process above is completely guided by psychedelics. I only use psychedelics when psychedelics beckon me, and my realizations belong to the psychedelics if not to reality itself. I am merely a tool that reality uses for self-experience. The problems I perceive as my own are actually reality's problems. For example, reality has not yet decided what to make of the concept of infinity or the nature of time, and so much of my trips center around such concepts.

I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore.

I would say that, more than anything, "I" use psychedelics to recalibrate my mind. Much of life is spent learning how to act and what to be, and it is necessary to shed these ingrained misconceptions every once in a while in order to remain truly conscious.