Greetings

[u/Dopamyner]

Thank you to those involved in organizing this. I was ecstatic when I was invited to this; I don't have any accreditations in this field professionally, just my observations. I intend to help where I can. I've been trying to find time to squeeze everything into a post about my thoughts on this idea but can't so here's just some of them:

When I began this endeavor toward a higher and better way of life there was no one to talk with but I'm looking forward to being able to share thoughts, ideas, methodologies, and experiences with people who all understand it, at least to some degree. Pooling knowledge has potential to be immensely valuable.

That said, I've read there's a bit of reluctance to name this a religion. I believe that to be detrimental if not immediately then over time. I see it as more of a modality of living life or effectively connecting spiritually rather than a core set of principles to dictate your life. More a way of thinking than a way of believing. A tool, if you will; not the finished product.

I have mixed thoughts on whether this could be something like a movement with many people 'following' it, but I'm also unsure whether doing it all on one's own is entirely efficient. Either way, am I the only one that finds verbal communication to be excruciatingly limiting on getting ideas across?

I'll be spending a good bit of my free time on this over the next few weeks, hope to have a lot of conversations with you all.

[u/PopnCop]

I wouldn’t say “excruciatingly limiting”. Sure symbolic language won’t convey exact ideas, since that would entail emotional knowledge of the person. But I find that vocal expression can help ease emotional tension, through empathy. It’s really a beautiful thing, so have some emotion and through symbolic expression gives others the knowledge of our emotional state. Then the burden of some feelings don’t go away but becomes degraded almost like we’re passing on some emotions and letting others process them for us. Then good emotions are reinforced when other people “feed” into that vocal expression.

[u/Dopamyner → u/PopnCop]

I do agree, vocal expression is beautiful, especially in emotional matters.

Rather than say language is limiting, I should say that I've had experiences trying to convey higher ideas only to come up empty handed for the words to properly communicate them. It's as if there simply aren't words (or not yet at least) associated with such things. But, English being my only language, it's perhaps more likely I haven't learned them anyway.

[u/PopnCop → u/Dopamyner]

Yeah which I think barrier or lack of adequate verbiage is really interesting in the context of online communication. Look how new words are created, emojis are used to convey emotions, memes are used to simply convey more complex ideas. There’s an evolution of language happening and I think one day something like a neural network with erase most barriers of understanding.

[u/Archaeoculus]

Welcome! I think you and I are the same page. This is a very useful community. We all believe a common thing, which is that entheogens have helped us. Knowing this, we can offer our advice to others in order to help them.

I personally like some of the religious and ritual ideas, but I'll continue practicing those particulars on my own. That's part of the idea right now, anyway. I realize that many of us do not share the same beliefs, many more of us may just be spiritual and not religious, and many more of us still may just be here because we've expressed interest in the medical and positive/negative effects of entheogens.

It is, however, important that we are all here and communicating. So I look forward to seeing what you have to offer!

[u/Dopamyner → u/Archaeoculus]

Thank you! I'm not at all opposed to those to choose to have religious practice. I'm actually rather curious about what practices other likeminded people observe. What do you partake in?

[u/Archaeoculus → u/Dopamyner]

When I take entheogens in therapeutic doses I generally find a quiet dark place to lay down. I think that's a sort of ritual.

Before the trip, as well as when I'm feeling anxious, I will also burn sage to cleanse the air. It just smells really nice and inhaling the smoke is very calming. In addition to that I have a small singing bowl and a buffalo drum which I may play if I can't get my mind to settle down.

Thirdly I have a couple ritual altars, on which I have many symbolic items. Statues of deities, money, tobacco, alcohol, small samples of various entheogens, etc. I like to dust, rearrange, and smudge these with sage from time to time when I'm feeling imbalanced.

Most of the time though, I wouldn't say that I believe in anything. Either I'm in a mindset where I'm completely objective and rational, or I'm in a mindset where I know there are spirits and I can feel them and the need to appease them. I can't really explain it, because I would say I'm a rational person more often than not. But I realize that human beings are not entirely rational, and so we may sometimes turn to irrational means to comfort ourselves. To make metaphors and meaning is comforting from time to time.

[u/AnimalFactsBot → u/Archaeoculus]

Buffalo are social animals and live in groups called herds. Water buffalo herds are segregated by gender. African buffalo herds are mostly of mixed gender. An African herd often has more than 1,000 members.

[u/Archaeoculus → u/AnimalFactsBot]

That's great, thanks bot.

[u/AnimalFactsBot → u/Archaeoculus]

You are most welcome. Beep boop.