That tricky Mantis

[bedspirit]

This seems like an interesting site. I'm so glad that I stumbled upon it. Lately, I've been very interested in the nature of consciousness and I'm hoping I might some answers here. On one side neuroscientists like Patricia Churchland or Michael Graziano theorize that your brain creates consciousness while others think that it is non local and your brain receives it like an antenna. I've always felt like psychedelics could help scientists solve the mystery.

A little background on myself: Almost all of my psychedelic experiences took place about twenty years ago. I spent a few years cultivating mushrooms. Then I met my wife, closed up shop, and never took another trip again (until recently).

It seems like a lot of people sharing trip reports on this site think that the experiences they have on DMT are real. I never felt like anything I experienced was anything other than my imagination. That opinion didn't change until one of my last trips. I won't go into great detail, but it involved getting probed by a giant praying mantis. He was tricky about it too. Had me fooled for a little while. That was the first (and last) time that I suspected that perhaps I wasn't exploring my own personal inner space but maybe I had been exploring a public outer space the whole time.

A few years later I was reading a trip report on Erowid (which, at the time, was a new site) and some guy reported a similar experience of being probed by a mantis. That's when I realized that maybe these things are real. I remember trying to find everything I could on the subject, but, at the time, there just wasn't a lot of resources available on the internet.

A few months ago, I was watching some crazy UFO show and they were talking about all the different aliens that we know about and the mantisses were mentioned. So I thought maybe now was a good time start the search again. Not necessarily a search for mantisses. I'm more interested in what their existence would imply about our minds, about telepathy, and our consciousness.

cheers

 

[Global]

Run a search on "mantis" on this site, and you'll come across a couple threads you should find interesting.

 

[endlessness]

Welcome to the Nexus!

I think psychedelics will bring up more questions than answers, but I think it´s understndable for you to try to explore these questions you have through the use of these substances.

Regarding ´reality´ of the experience, here are two links that might be of your interest:

A pragmatic approach: What is "real", and when is it actually useful to ask this? - Philosophy - Welcome to the DMT-Nexus

The Improbability of Hyperspace - Philosophy - Welcome to the DMT-Nexus

See you around!

 

[bedspirit]

Thanks for the links. This forum can be a little dense so you save me some browsing time. I recently read Strassman's last two books about DMT and I got the impression that he was open to the idea that some of the entities his patients described were real. I see that topic has been covered on this forums as well.

When reading about other people's experiences, one can't help but to but to be skeptical of the authors ability to differentiate what's real and imaginary. For instance, the first issue of the Nexian opens with an epic trip report from Hyperspace Fool where he interacts with a variety of entities in all kinds of exotic locale and ends with him chatting with some enormous Godlike being who occupied the entire sky. He seemed to feel like it was all real.

That trip report is not unlike some of my own with the exception that I didn't feel like it was real. I felt like my interactions were teaching me how to be a better person. Unlike him, I wasn't left with any delusions of grandeur.

My mantis story happened in the middle of a typical trip. I had been all over hyperspace and made a brief stop at a playground where I was a child again and I was talking to someone I used to know. The conversation was getting weird and personal. I wanted to leave but I felt like I couldn't. At no point did I think this person was real until something she said became abnormally audible. It was like when you're in the middle of a dream and someone speaks to you and their words get incorporated into the dream. It was startling. I took a closer look at her and didn't feel like she was really there. I opened my eyes and tried to focus on the dark room I was in to see if there was anyone there. I could feel a presence but I didn't see anyone so I closed my eyes again. That same girl on the playground was there. I was suspicious. "who are you exactly, and how do we know each other?" I asked. I focused in on her. When I focused, the whole world disintegrated. It was like when you try to focus in on the geometrical patterns that texture your surroundings on the onset of a trip. The real world kind of disappears. Then this goddamn praying mantis comes into focus right in my face. He's kind of pissed and makes a high pitched clicking sound and turns away and is gone. I tried to get him back. I looked for him, but I lost him.

Of all the entities I've interacted with, that manits was the only one that felt real, but I still doubted my ability to differentiate real from imaginary under the influence, so I didn't think much about it until later when I read other similar encounters.

Honestly, I don't want to experience anything like that again. I felt a little foolish, like I was tricked. I only take psychedelics for medical purposes now. As an old guy, I find that some of the aches and pains I've learned to ignore disappear for a few weeks following a trip.

 

[Anarkid]

I too am fascinated by the idea that consciousness does not originate in the human body. This idea drives me mad. I stay up at night thinking about the endless possibilities. I am consumed by it. It started rather recently (though I have known about the theory for quite some time). I began having feelings that I am not at home. I dream about familiar places that I have never seen. I have extremely complex ideas and theories come to my mind as if placed there by something. I say all this at the risk of sounding insane. This idea will not leave me. The thoughts will not depart from my side. Sadly, the likelihood of figuring any of this out at any time during the duration of a human lifetime is slim at best. Only in death will we understand completely (if then).

 

[۩]

Welcome here!

We are definitely not the only ones using hyperspace, or the only ones being used by it.

Thanks for sharing, that was a good read.

 

[bedspirit]

It's difficult for me to wrap my mind around how non local consciousness works. I'm not sure we have sufficient vocabulary to describe it. Our inability to properly define it might be part of why science hasn't been able to explain it. We don't really even know what we're looking for.

When I was taking psychedelics as a teenager, one of the answers I wanted to know was what happens to us when we die (This was before I read Timothy Leary's version of the Tibetan Book of the Dead). I remember being very disappointed with the answer I came up. I felt like we rejoin a single entity. We continue to be but not as individuals. I prefer the christian version of the afterlife where we continue to be individuals and can still interact with all of our old friends and family. Regardless, I trust my own psychedelic intuition that the answer I got while shroomin was closer to the truth.

So when I think about consciousness, I try to connect it to my own view of the afterlife. To me, consciousness is like a wave that's all around us and our brain is a finely tuned antenna that only accesses the parts we need. Same would be true for every living thing whether it be an insect or a blue whale. So when we die, our experience becomes part of that wave.

I just came up with that a few weeks ago and after some googling, I found other people had come up with variations of the same basic concept. This idea is what inspired me to join this forum. I was looking for other people who were using psychedelics to explore consciousness and I was curious if they were coming up with the same ideas.

 

[Anarkid]

It's difficult for me to wrap my mind around how non local consciousness works. I'm not sure we have sufficient vocabulary to describe it. Our inability to properly define it might be part of why science hasn't been able to explain it. We don't really even know what we're looking for.

This is how I feel. I don't think our human minds really have the capacity to fully understand how it works. It is almost futile to try.

 

[۩]

It may appear to be ineffable
but that doesn't mean there isn't so much that needs to be brought back.

We must try.

 

[Anarkid]

It may appear to be ineffable
but that doesn't mean there isn't so much that needs to be brought back.

We must try.

I wholly agree. One day we may very well understand that which was previously thought impossible. Better to try and prove yourself wrong than to try to prove yourself right. If you look hard enough, you can prove yourself right on anything you want to believe and become saturated with delusion.