Effects - Can Bad Trips Spread?

[beatnickmanduder]

Swim has heard of a quote from some old hippies which basically says there's no such thing as a bad trip, and in the words of Mckenna, "you learn more from the bad ones than you do the good ones..." Swim had a complete trainwreck a few months back on a high dose of lsd mixed with some high quality shrooms made into chocolate bars (swim has a suspicion they come from amsterdam, but not too sure - they come in a really professional looking wrappers and look like Hershey's milk chocolate bars). What swim noticed about the trip though, was that one of swim's friends began having a bad trip and split off from the group, than swim himself began having a bad trip which was then followed by another member of the group. This past weekend, swim tripped on a dose of those mushroom bar things and was completely fine (he has tripped a few times since the big bad trip, and is somewhat experienced with lsd and shrooms), but swim's companions were kind of fading in and out of a bad trip which began with one person once again and "spread." Swim tried to guide his friends out of the bad trip and did so with some moderate success. So out of these experiences and listening to and reading shitloads of Mckenna, swim has this idea: When psychedelics are ingested, they heighten sensory perception. What this also means is that the third eye's sensory percetpion could be heightened, which would give way to a little more "paranormal" types of activities (i.e. heightened psychic ability, premonition, etc.). So in this theory, when on psychedelic drugs, perhaps when one bad trip emerges, others not so familiar with the drugs "pick up" on it and begin experiencing those effects as well without knowing. After all, the brain is supposedly like a radio receiver...Swim was just wondering if anyone had any trip reports to corroborate/dissuade this argument or just some informational input.

Reputation Comments on this post:

this is one of the more interesting aspects of psychedelic use :)

[JDreaming]

When a group takes the same entheogen together, everyone has a unique experience and yet all the experiences are merged into a greater whole. The heightened empathic awareness provided by many of these types of substances causes the group to think together in a hive-like mentality and see each other's emotions palpably manifest. This is why it is so important to have reliable and quality people to accompany one on such an experience. It would be hard to have entirely positive feelings about one's altered state while a friend is freaking out and throwing a fit in the same room.

Reputation Comments on this post:

very nicely put ;)

[augentier]

JDreaming is right...and I think people generally underestimate a human's natural tendency to pick up on others' emotions..you know when someone is having a shitty day and walks in the room, the mood just seems to shift? So putting oneself in a state of heightened awareness as JD said, expands this empathic (is that the word?) quality so I think it's easier and more likely to feed off of everyone else's energy - whether it's positive or negative.

When swiy was tripping with friends - did any of them SAY they were starting to feel uncomfortable or anything? Sometimes it just takes one person to simply say outloud that he/she is not having a good time that makes everyone else start to worry about themselves and question if they're starting to feel bad or not ..

[beatnickmanduder]

Originally Posted by augentier

When swiy was tripping with friends - did any of them SAY they were starting to feel uncomfortable or anything? Sometimes it just takes one person to simply say outloud that he/she is not having a good time that makes everyone else start to worry about themselves and question if they're starting to feel bad or not ..

Swim really appreciates the feedback. Swim thinks that perhaps he got a little ahead of himself on the terms used, but feels JD clarified things quite nicely. But swim is glad you asked this question, because when swim had his epic bad trip, no one really gave off any bad vibes...the only thing that was really said was that his friend (the one who first started tripping out) said he had a stomach ache and he then retired to his apt. across the hall. It was only after this did swim start feeling completely alienated by the rest of the group and then started thinking all sorts of crazy crap, but swim let on very little that he was having a bad trip; in fact, swim's friends had no clue until they found swim and his friend looking as if they were in complete disarray. But your question is applicable to the second trip...swim's friend literally did say out loud that he thought he was having a bad trip, which swim knows is a total no-no in tripping. But contrarily, swim stayed very well focused, only realizing that awkward feelings and bad energy were flowing around but never really feeling any of it. In fact, swim had a pretty alright trip. But other factors may attribute to this (i.e. swims friends are somewhat less experienced, there was a kid who kinda showed up tripping for the first time really hard, swim tripped a week ago on shrooms and acid - pretty low dose; 2 hits and 3/4 a bar - and finally, swim has done much higher doses than the dose he was tipping on during the second bad trip). Sorry about all the dose designations and such, hope it's not too confusing.

[beatnickmanduder]

Originally Posted by JDreaming

The heightened empathic awareness provided by many of these types of substances causes the group to think together in a hive-like mentality and see each other's emotions palpably manifest.

Swim searched wikipedia (sorry if that's not a great enough source) for empathy and found that apparently the neurological basis for the ability to empathize is found in what are called "mirror neurons." Swim is curious to know if anyone has more insight into the biochemcial processes of empathy? Or perhaps how psychedelics play a role in the "heightened empathetic awareness"? Swim just finds this all really interesting.

[chemlove]

Originally Posted by JDreaming

When a group takes the same entheogen together, everyone has a unique experience and yet all the experiences are merged into a greater whole. The heightened empathic awareness provided by many of these types of substances causes the group to think together in a hive-like mentality and see each other's emotions palpably manifest. This is why it is so important to have reliable and quality people to accompany one on such an experience. It would be hard to have entirely positive feelings about one's altered state while a friend is freaking out and throwing a fit in the same room.

Really well said. When psychedelics are involved its a crap shoot in a since that the smallest things could do a group in. See In SWIM's experience psychedelics have this sory of copy cat syndrome to them, and in SWIM's experience it's only good to take psychedelics with people who are ready and willing to have a good time, those in a great mindset, and lastly those with enough mental toughness to deal with anything unexpected that could possible scare someone or make them nervous two things combined with paranoia that you never want in someone who is under the influence.

[Nagognog2]

In the words of William S. Burroughs - somewhat paraphrased - If you ever meet someone and you feel like you've lost a quart of blood, for gods sake avoid that person.

Same principle.

[x cynic x]

When some is having a bad trip, their agitation and anxiety may be felt by others through empathy. Its all about the atmosphere. Be that as it may, only the first person to have a bad trip will know the direct cause their apprehesion, unless it is an element that affects all members of the group.

[meep]

You can catch anything thing from fellow trippers.

All it takes is that suggestion, 'are we walking in mud?' everyone around swims looking at the floor declaring they are kneew deep in mud! A quick torch on the floor shows dry pavement - giggles all round.

Swim has caught bad trips from friends before, the worst bit is the more everyone passes the bad vibes around the worse they get. Staying positive is very had when the person your tripping with decides he doesn't like his trip an hour in.

There was a really good discusion in another thread somewhere on the forums if I remember corectly, lots of people have reported really cool stuff. Have a feeling it was under the LSD section but I cant find it =(

Swim recently had a very 'cool' trip with a friend where swims arm swirl'd into the distance as he pointed out the path they were taking, swims arm litterally streached off into the dark horizon. This was then later seperatly described identically to a third party. weird.

[x cynic x]

To answer the title of the thread, we must first ask ourselves, "Is there such a thing as a 'vibe'?"

[badgermeat]

SWIM and a pal were going to prepare mushroom tea and knew also that another pal of theirs was possibly coming so decided to wait for him. The recipe being used takes about an hour or so anyway, so that was fine, they decided to wait. In due course this friend made contact, only now he asked if his cousin could come and partake. Questions were asked; is he cool, has he tripped before? These questions were answered in the positive, Etc etc...they arrived at this house, and the tea was then prepared. The group did about 10 grams of fresh Liberty Caps each, 50 grams or so left to steep for an hour in a flavoured tea. The time came to consume, and down the hatch the brew went. SWIM started to come up nicely and as normal, gentle changing of colours with mild visuals, a reasonable level, especially for those who haven't tried it for a while, such as SWIM's friend. The group started to feel quite high after twenty minutes, with much laughing and joking. The only member of the group that SWIM didn't really know, started to behave strangely. It turned out that he had embellished his experiences so as not to seem foolish. He also turned out to be totally unprepared for the sensations, and ended up lolling about on the floor, staring at things with the tongue out, knocking things to the ground, and generally wrecking the place. SWIM became upset, and to cut a long story short everyone ended up outside. SWIM would like to mention at this point, only trip with those you love, it is the first good rule of tripping!

[beatnickmanduder]

Originally Posted by x cynic x

To answer the title of the thread, we must first ask ourselves, "Is there such a thing as a 'vibe'?"

Well, Swim has been reading a very interesting book which has given him great new insights into the human mind. He is only about halfway through the book (which Swim highly suggests reading...it is entitled The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot), but the book seems to suggest that the universe is really whatever us humans make of it or deeply (or subconsciously or unconsciously) believe it is. So, in Swim's view, the answer to that question would be if one believes in such things like vibes (which is derived from vibrations, which to Swim suggests some type of wave resonance effects) then one will see these "vibes" manifest in all sorts of ways.

[D.U.M.B]

Your trip is affected by things and people around you. While you might not have a bad trip because of someone else it is more likely to happen

[LookingForHer]

I think it's possible, yes.

I honestly think that psychedelic drugs, while necessary and often helpful... can make people vulnerable to negative energy.

Now, when you are vulnerable, and able to "Access" other realities, it's not too hard for pure evil beings to come in and start fucking with your mind to make you believe unbelievable, impossible, disturbing, and simply bad and wrong things.

The thing is, even people with no evil in them, can "channel" evil, without being aware of it. Evil uses people as it's tool, as it doesn't want to appear directly, only manipulate people. The only way to make sure you don't channel evil, is to be aware of evil and to be aware of when it is trying to channel itself through you, and refuse to let it happen. The unaware then, are like security holes in the universe.

The only solution I've found to such situations is to do on the trip the same thing you'd do to evil beings in real life. Fight them.

The last time that happened to SWIM, he had to use ultimatums to defeat their impossible ultimatums. Some pure evil being tried to make SWIM believe that something physically impossible had happened to him. Basically something trivial that he'd put a bag down somewhere and that yet somehow they teleported it back onto his body so he was carrying it, without him picking it up. And they were trying to make him think that it was prove that they can do anything to reality they want to do, except that it can only be bad things that will happen, because they have power over everything.

In his vulnerable state of mind, he found the only way to "defeat" this impossible situation they were putting him into, was to use another "impossible" situation against it. So he had to go back to the place his bag was supposed to be, where he knew he'd left it, and then fight it from there.

He knew it wasn't that something impossible had happened, but... he also knew that they were fucking with his mind and he had no mental defences, seeing as the drugs allowed them to get in his mind, so he had no mental defence except to disprove their lies about reality, in such a way that was the most energy-wasting for the evil beings and the least energy using for him.

Blah.

Well it staved off the worst of the effects. It only became a stressful trip, not a horrific one.

He's had a lot worse experience when he did not fight against evil and lies projected into him when on drugs. and the only way out of that worse experience was when he decided to start fighting back.

going with the flow when evil turns up has never worked for him.

[beatnickmanduder]

Originally Posted by LookingForHer

Evil uses people as it's tool, as it doesn't want to appear directly, only manipulate people. The only way to make sure you don't channel evil, is to be aware of evil and to be aware of when it is trying to channel itself through you, and refuse to let it happen. The unaware then, are like security holes in the universe.

The only solution I've found to such situations is to do on the trip the same thing you'd do to evil beings in real life. Fight them.

Swim enjoys LFH's thoughts, very manichean philosophy going on. Swim can definitely relate to LFH's ideas, but there is something that comes up in light of this discussion (this could turn into a debate about the problem of evil, but oh well, here goes...)
No doubt, Swim does his best not to be susceptible to or in some way induce a bad trip, but the bad trips, indeed trainwrecks, that Swim has had may seem terrible and frightening in the midst of the trip, but by the end of the night Swim takes many lessons and much more experience away from the whole thing. It's like the old hippie saying Swim has heard that, "there is no such thing as a bad trip."
To relate this in another way to this discussion, it has great implications for the primary purpose of these "evil things," but this begs the question, are they evil, or just good's cousin?

[LookingForHer]

Originally Posted by beatnickmanduder

Swim enjoys LFH's thoughts, very manichean philosophy going on. Swim can definitely relate to LFH's ideas, but there is something that comes up in light of this discussion (this could turn into a debate about the problem of evil, but oh well, here goes...)
No doubt, Swim does his best not to be susceptible to or in some way induce a bad trip, but the bad trips, indeed trainwrecks, that Swim has had may seem terrible and frightening in the midst of the trip, but by the end of the night Swim takes many lessons and much more experience away from the whole thing. It's like the old hippie saying Swim has heard that, "there is no such thing as a bad trip."
To relate this in another way to this discussion, it has great implications for the primary purpose of these "evil things," but this begs the question, are they evil, or just good's cousin?

Hi Beatnick,

thanks for for saying you like my thoughts

My idea on it, is this. If you learnt something, it's because you turned it around.

You turned a bad situation, around into a good one.

This does not mean that the situation was good! It means that you made it good. In a sense, it means YOU are doing the good, NOT the situation.

Try NOT fighting back against bad trips and going with the flow next time, to see what I mean Try just listening to the lies and doing what the negative energy tells you to do, assume all is good, it can't be a lie

I've turned around bad experiences into good. We all do it. That doesn't change the fact that some other being tried to make it bad. I've learnt the hardest way. Through the most pain. Unless I turn it around, I will be destroyed. But... I can turn anything around from bad into good.

In a sense, you could ask yourself... "did I on some level agree to that bad experience, so I could turn it around"... even if so, it still may have been a bad experience created by evil spirits. And I'm not sure it was so... perhaps some higher external force guided me into bad events so I could turn it around.

I too had to learn that it must be me who does turn things around the hard way. Without realising this, I was unable to pull myself out of the horror trips, and protect myself from them.

Once you've turned it around, the evil spirits will be gnashing their teeth and very frustrated that they can't get anything they want (which is to make everyone miserable or worse)... so no, they aren't "good's cousin". It's just how it is.

They exist, they want bad stuff, it gets turned around, they get frustrated.

[beatnickmanduder]

Originally Posted by LookingForHer

In a sense, you could ask yourself... "did I on some level agree to that bad experience, so I could turn it around"... even if so, it still may have been a bad experience created by evil spirits. And I'm not sure it was so... perhaps some higher external force guided me into bad events so I could turn it around.

...

They exist, they want bad stuff, it gets turned around, they get frustrated.

Haha, interesting indeed...Swim most definitely agrees about the situation itself not being good at all, some very scary and morbid things can come up. But like you said, perhaps that situation being brought into Swiy's database of experience helped bring about these cool "spinning" exercises which in Swim's and apparently Swiy's experiences are the best defense. In a sense, the evil things show themselves for what they are, mere thoughts which one should think them out of thought in order to keep up with the good in the trip. The "evil" things teach will power and mind power, at least in swim's mind. And in the words of South Park, a fun game is one that gets harder as you go along, so Swim could only hope the evil things get frustrated and try to find new ways of destabilizing Swims thought patterns, because like broken bones, the thoughts will come back stronger and with more experience under their belt. But of course LFH, you are right, the situations themselves are terrible when first faced; the turning around though, that could be their whole purpose, only to exponentially higher and higher degrees.

[moda00]

This thread talks about what could be interpreted as a similar type of reaction with marijuana- OP had a frightening dissociative episode, and comments that several others had feelings of being "too high" or vomiting. Of course, that gravity bong mighta had something to do with it as well
http://www.drugs-forum.com/forum/sho...hteningly+high

Swim thinks it is quite likely that no matter the substance, when one imbibes or ingests with people s/he feels close to, and aided by the substance's unique properties/"mindscape" there will be some interplay/shared mental space. Substances often act in this way by connecting individuals on another level, beyond the ordinary one they ordinarily interact in, and making them more in tune to subtleties of body language, "vibes," visceral/emotional reactions, etc- so it makes sense one would react with empathy in the most traditional sense- feeling what another feels- which would certainly influence one's own feelings, as s/he cares for this person. It certainly also makes sense that, especially in psychedelic states, one is very vulnerable/receptive to both external and internal stimuli of all kinds and dimensions- and if one takes something external that is anywhere from mildly disturbing- friend's face doesn't look like him/herself for a moment and it is a little weird- to something severely disturbing- having a horrible premonition or memory, seeing a car accident or an overdose, etc. no matter what the stimuli, it makes sense that in this heightened state, an individual could see something he perceived as negative/threatening/worrisome and transfer that back to himself and his world, ie. the negative thought loop- This one bad thing happened, or I had this one scary thought.. something is wrong with this situation.. maybe something is wrong with me.. if s/he/it's not okay.. then who's to say I'm okay? And will I ever be "okay" again? etc. Or any specific fear.. fear of death, fear of being rejected, fear of losing control can all be played out like this. So IMO while one individual either expressly stating that they are having a rough time, or whether one just perceives that something is not right with that individual, or even with something else, internal or external, it can lead to that pattern. But I don't see it as an inevitable, concrete "cause," rather than an openness to suggestion, and with a little practice it is usually relatively easy to redirect these thoughts in a more positive direction, and even, after you have gained some experience, in guiding others back to the "happy place." Obviously if swiy is tripping first time, and someone is freaking out, you may be distressed by being around that individual at that point in time, so go with your instincts- do what you need to do, with respect to everyone else, to maintain your safety and comfort. But I will say that it's not impossible to overcome negative thoughts/anxiety/bad trips- in one's sober state, or whilst on psychedelic voyages. It may take intent, and some practice, but you have to believe and know you are in control. While psychedelics do change your perceptions and open you up to new things- in a sense making you more vulnerable, you have to know that you are still in there somewhere, that you are not rendered completely helpless against some brutal force, and that the feeling will subside.

[Metomni]

"I honestly think that psychedelic drugs, while necessary and often helpful... can make people vulnerable to negative energy."

Is that necessarily a bad thing? SWIM is a strong believer in a balance of all things and for the positive energy to be properly realized and harnessed, the negative energy has to be experienced to at least some strong degree.

Sorry to only comment on one thing, I find this thread very intriguing, but that one comment really struck a chord with me.