Voices - Internal or External? And first breakthrough with dmt

[centipoedipus]

First post so apologies if it is tangential and very over-descriptive!

I'm wondering about voices I hear when tripping. I use this word because it's something I have experienced on LSD and 2-CB and when smoking freebase DMT. I'm going to give some background on the experiences of hearing voices with other chemicals first.

After insufflating the powder in a capsule of 2-CB I experienced a rapid come up and a brain 'pop'. This was a few years ago so the details are a little hazy now. I went to the bathroom in the top floor of an apartment block and could hear my 2 friends talking on the groundfloor about me. I believe now this was likely paranoia - it was a very rocky night and I, erm, suffered I guess.

At a festival I ingested a very potent tab of LSD (this was the first time trying LSD but I'd experienced multiple RCs previously, 25i, 2cb, 2ci, DOC, plus extensive mdma, weed, etc) and it remains a pivotal point as far as consciousness is concerned. It was, I believe, a break-through trip. I also experienced the brain 'pop' there. At some point I started hearing many many voices - it was at a festival - and I didn't know whether they were voices in my head or people at the festival / friends etc. It was a jumple of words and voices, it was hard to tell if they were familiar or not, and it was often difficult to hear what they were saying but sometimes I could hear many coherent sentences. I couldn't tell whether the music I was listening to was in my head or real. Took another tab the day after, and another the day after that (silly I know.) The inability to tell whether people talking were in my head or 'real' remained for a couple weeks after during which I pretty much was convinced I was living in the Truman show, was severely paranoid, had no idea what was real and what wasn't in very literal ways (I thought I could set off fire alarms due to a chain of mental actions, helicopters in the sky and people talking in the street were about me, it was all an illusion, etc). If I walked past houses I could hear whispering coming from them.

With DMT, until today I had only experienced sub-breakthrough doses about 2 years ago. On one of those occasions, while alone, I smoked it and had a bunch of voices sort of jump into action shouting lots of things. It felt like they sprung from my mind and then they cleared away. My conclusion was that it was unspoken sentiments of my unconscious (I mean how much language do we hold in ourselves that we do not consciously know? My guess is a lot.)

Tonight I smoked a large dose with the 2L bottle method. I'm not sure if it was due to the method, as with many chemicals I get death anxiety and find it hard to confront this, and a plastic bottle and foil is not the best way to calm that haha. It was a breakthrough experience that I don't remember everything of. I know that my attention was very much outward and very scattered and scared. I felt terror. I felt familiarity somewhat. It was very much a brutal catapult and disintegration / emanation into .......? A recurring theme in some previous bad trips with other chemicals is fear of insanity and no time, that I will feel this insanity and fear for ever and ever and there is no going back now. Or that I can choose to be anything or anywhere but will lose what/who I came in as. The fear of death and how ridiculous that is. There was only a brief moment of being able to focus inwardly - this is where I have the most, erm, fulfulling experiences I guess. The only way I can describe that is a white bindu point emanating fractal eyes/intense geometry with a little Alex Grey style and pure absolution. This is something I've had with mushrooms once and on the aforementioned LSD experience briefly.

But, my question is about the voices I hear. I heard a jumble of voices when breaking through and I'm not sure if they are linked to the fear and paranoia. Does anyone else experience this, with DMT or anything else? I think part of the fear comes from the voices symbolising the dissolution of the barrier between 'me' and 'other'/everything else. So the veil between my mental voices and everyone elses is gone, which makes a sea rather than tributaries. And I drown in it! Sometimes when sitting before meditation or yoga in a group I feel the tickles of this phenomena and believe I can feel other peoples inner voices although their exact words or sentiments are not clear. Do you think this is psychosis or something else? I'd love to know anyones thoughts on anything mentioned.

 

[Global]

It was a jumple of words and voices, it was hard to tell if they were familiar or not, and it was often difficult to hear what they were saying but sometimes I could hear many coherent sentences.

That is a pretty common thing with LSD. It is good at making sense of "noise" (visual, audio, thoughts, etc...). There have been times when I've been home alone on LSD in the shower, and the sound of the water droplets coalesce to create voices.

A recurring theme in some previous bad trips with other chemicals is fear of insanity and no time, that I will feel this insanity and fear for ever and ever and there is no going back now.

What you need to start to do is regularly throughout the day, remind yourself that (especially in the case of DMT), you'll always be back (and more often than not, sooner than you may like). No matter how far out you get, reality always puts itself back together, and with the pace like it's trying to clean up to go make the bus. You need to repeat this to yourself throughout the day, and particularly on days you plan to smoke. By doing so, you are conditioning this thought in your head so that amidst all the confusion of a breakthrough, the thought follows reflexively to remind you that no matter how crazy it is right now, in moments, everything will be putting itself back to normal. You need to condition yourself so that the thought is involuntary and automatic, to come and reassure you when you would normally have trouble reassuring yourself.

But, my question is about the voices I hear. I heard a jumble of voices when breaking through and I'm not sure if they are linked to the fear and paranoia. Does anyone else experience this, with DMT or anything else? I think part of the fear comes from the voices symbolising the dissolution of the barrier between 'me' and 'other'/everything else. So the veil between my mental voices and everyone elses is gone, which makes a sea rather than tributaries. And I drown in it! Sometimes when sitting before meditation or yoga in a group I feel the tickles of this phenomena and believe I can feel other peoples inner voices although their exact words or sentiments are not clear. Do you think this is psychosis or something else? I'd love to know anyones thoughts on anything mentioned.

The jumble of voices you hear are only linked to paranoia so far as you are becoming paranoid about them, but I would not say that they are a product of (or caused by) paranoia. Again, even more so than with LSD, this is something that DMT does. If you smoke DMT, be prepared to hear voices and other sounds. It's a natural result of consuming the substance. Something that DMT excels at (even in the low dose range) is playing with the "afterimage" effect. This is most easily seen through vision. I think a lot of people here can probably relate to the experience of perhaps looking at your living room or bedroom or wherever you smoke, and then closing your eyes, and DMT kind of preserves that scene as an energetic construct, but it then proceeds to "play" with it, using it as a base for manipulation. This takes place with mental thoughts as well.

Here's a really simple experiment you can do. Smoke a small dose of DMT (enough to see colors), and just think the thought "hello." Say it to yourself in your head just like normal. Listen to how the thought resounds. For myself there is echoing, and a feedback loop. As it feeds back on itself more and more, it becomes distorted, and when it has acquired enough energy, that sound may become kind of sentient in its own right. Perhaps that won't happen for you, but you can run some thought experiments to see how voices become affected by your thoughts.

Then there is the whole entity phenomenon. It comes part and parcel with DMT, and they have voices, and they like to speak, so be prepared to listen. Sometimes it will be in English, sometimes in other earthly languages, and quite often in indecipherable languages/sounds that are not produceable with a human vocal aparatus. Sometimes it might just seem like rhythmic code. If they speak in a language you can understand, sometimes the grammar will be nutty, and yet sometimes the grammar will be spot on, but the message makes no sense, and then there are those blissful occasions where they tell you things with good grammar that make sense and are meaningful. There are two primary modes of communication. There is telepathy, and this is where its as if they use the "radio station"/medium that your thoughts/own internal voice usually takes place on in order to "verbally" communicate. The other is entirely auditory where the sound they produce seems physical, and is as if your ears are hearing it. Speaking for myself, I have noticed on multiple occasions how entities speaking near one of my ears will sound louder in that ear, as the same would hold true for a talking person in consensus reality. Likewise, the closer the entity is in physical space to me, the louder the voice.

Overall, I just want to stress that this whole voice thing is so highly unlikely a product of psychosis. When you're meditating in yoga and your mind is clear, you may be subtly picking up on the others' thoughts, as you all tune into a similar radio station. I find this phenomenon to also be plentiful in my life, particularly with people with whom I share strong bonds. You just have to have more faith in yourself and your own sanity. You'll be just fine.

 

[upwaysidedown]

Hi centipoedipus,

You have hit on something that has interested me very recently, After first reaching certain depths on DMT I had a voice in my head the next day, usually accompanied by a pressure around the third eye. We had some chats, and actually I cannot now recall what about - mainly philosophising I think.

I am definitely no expert on this subject, and having decided that the voice seemed to offer me no useful information I stopped paying it attention and it left.

But it has me thinking - and yesterday I heard a guy on the radio talking about his schizophrenia and how he is writing a book with the 3 voices in his head. I read up on some experiences of those with voices and a lot of it sounds similar to dealing with entities, handling the good and the bad.

I was also then brought to think about a couple of people who have posted on here who have been troubled with voices (or bad entities) outside of their trips and are definitely in the camp of what I imagine may be diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic.

Having read the advice on these sites and the experiences, there is it seems so many similarities - some at one level being aspects of the subjects on mind, and in other cases showing themselves to perhaps know more than the person - the same as our own ineffable mysteries.

I think it warrants a lot more research, and also a little caution for those who may have a tendancy to hear voices and find it to be a problem rather than a gift, as DMT could probably either allow you to face it down, or make it worse.

As usual I know nothing, but wanted to highlight my thoughts on related patterns.



This site also has some nice points on how to deal with them that we could all take with us.

 

[PsyNaut]

hi there.
thanks for sharing.

i often hear voices on low dose trips. the first fiew times it was a little disturbing, because i couln't understand the 'language'. then i started to work with it. or tried. i had the feeling that all of my thought (pretty clear) were kinda translated into this vibrating other language. i tryed to to understand that this is how i sound in this other language. not only words - more the whole meening of the sentence.
this is how i tryed to feel comfortable with those voices and language. i realized that i could understand it, it just sounded or looked different. then i tryed to talk these words out loud, witch was very dificult. well now it's a part of all of my dmt experiences. it's fun to play around with it. like trying to talk with a person that doesn't speek my language. lilke: tarzan - jane
makes sense? helps? i donno - maybe just try to have fun with the voices...

cheers PN

 

[skoobysnax]

I have often been "told" things on DMT and heard strange languages as well. I try to take a novel perspective on all this because the line between imagination and experience are very blurred in this state. I trust my intuition and many things I am "told" are true on an intuitive level. I have not experienced anything influencing self harm or harm of others and if that is true for you as well I have a feeling it is on par for what a lot of us experience. There is a particular entity I often seek audience with that has lovingly guided me through some difficult personal work because this one once spoke to me my ancient name and revealed that one of the dark entities I often had troubles with was actually myself.

 

[Intezam]

Best would be not to measure one's experiences by way of societies' standards (that is also a voice, a very crazy one, indeed).

= That is one (1) voices less :lol:

 

[centipoedipus]

Thanks for the replies everyone, I really appreciate the responses and suggestions

And wow, Global, what an in depth response! I think your point about reminding myself that I will be back to this ground is a good one, and something that will take some personal work to do (even without psychedelics). It also reminds me of how some people have a method of lucid dreaming where they perform little reality checks when awake so they're almost automated, then when they are performed dreaming they can proceed to do so lucidly.

upwaysidedown - schizophrenia, psychosis, hearing voices when sober etc are all incredibly interesting. Reading and thinking about these things a lot though means they're more present in my unconscious/subconscious mind though and I guess that can backfire. But then perhaps the fact we are drawn to information and experiences on certain things means... well, I don't know what, but something?

 

[KuantumKitty]

My first breakthough I too heard a pop in my head and a crackling in my ear. Last week I heard different sounds in DMT space. It was a low humming tone going on and on and on either getting slower or faster. Slow when entering and getting faster when I was dying going into the light. It sounded like what things would sound like in infinity being looped. I can't really describe it but it almost sounds like a chant or song or a tone. Also the days after a trip even months I get what I call thought streams. Its hard to make any sense out of them or be productive and document them unless I am in nature and meditating. Nature seems to really help get the most profound truths out. Its almost like a higher conscious or maybe my higher conscious is streaming new insights or dimensions on reality and I never had perspective like this before. I can also talk forever that's why I channel my thoughts in writing I wouldn't want to bother my friends and family with this stuff I don't know if they would understand. In my everyday life I experience clairaudience. Recently I have been listening to it and then asking what are you trying to tell me and my question is answered usually with a very philosophical answer the last time it happened I was at a restaurant in Mumbai and when I asked what the tone was a waiter I was talking to showed me a video about consciousness. We were talking about topics like the weather and light stuff so this really shook me up. Also this was a synchronicity along with many more leading up to the most life changing experience I had in my life with space dust. I do not know whats going on all I can do is share my experience and listen to others and compare. This is a very interesting topic indeed.