Question? What is Ayahuasca? Never heard of it. Still Totally ADD
Ayahuasca The Soul Herb
by new boy 41 Replies latest jw experiences
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RULES & REGULATIONS
WHAT IS AYAHUASCA?
Young ayahuasca plantAyahuasca is an Amazonian plant mixture that is capable of inducing altered states of consciousness, usually lasting between 4 to 8 hours after ingestion. Ranging from mildly stimulating to extremely visionary, ayahuasca is used primarily as a medicine and as a shamanic means of communication, typically in a ceremonial session under the guidance of an experienced drinker.The main ingredient of this jungle tea is a vine, Banisteriopsis caapi, which like the tea itself is also called ayahuasca (which means ‘vine of the soul’ or ‘vine with a soul’). The secondary ingredient is either chacruna (Psychotria viridis) or chagropanga (Diplopterys cabrerana), plants that contain a relatively high amount of the psychedelic substance DMT.
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Island Man
Oh come on! It's a mind altering drug. It doesn't uncover any truths that lie within. It just warps your thinking and gives you hallucinations. Our "reality" - as we perceive it - is a construct of the mind. Alter the mind with a drug and your perception of reality will obviously change. It's not truths being revealed it's just a medically induced warped perception of reality. At best, it might have some psychological and recreational benefits and maybe stoke your powers of creativity, but it's not some magical doorway to hidden truths. Enough with the mumbo-babel!
Ancient peoples actually believed that they were seeing the spirit world when they had drug-induced hallucinations. They thought hallucinogenic drugs were a doorway to the spirit realm. That's why the greek word for spiritism in the book of Revelation is the same word from which we get prefix pharma used in words pertaining to drugs. Today we know that these drugs are affecting the brain which in turn produces hallucinations. Revelation unwittingly reveals that "spiritism" is all in the mind - drug-altered minds!
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new boy
Island man
My guess is you have never had this experience.
Yet you are here telling us what it is all about.
Wow this sounds like something Jehovah's Witnesses would do. Tell us about the evils of something they have no idea about.
So my friend try it and then tell us about "your" experience. Until then you really don't have a clue do you?
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deegee
What Island Man said.
There are many ways to access to the unconscious and experience an altered state of consciousness:
- drugs
- meditation
- hypnosis
- near-death experiences
- religious epiphanies
- intense prayer and fasting chanting
- speaking repeatedly and ecstatically in tonguesto name a few (there are also altered states that arise from illnesses, such as a fever or psychosis).
I have personally experienced altered states of consciousness when I engaged in deep, strong, intense prayer and mediation.
I was simply following the WT's, Bible's and elder's advice to draw close to God, become absorbed with him through deep prayer and meditation however, unknown to myself, I was actually self-inducing, voluntarily inducing an altered state of consciousness by doing this.
I posted my experience in this thread:https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6318622471356416/spirit-channeling-wallkills-bethel
Indeed, drugs can provide access to the inner world of the unconscious.
During a drug-induced (or otherwise induced) altered state of consciousness, you bypass the conscious, active processing of information in your brain and instead "see" directly into the deep levels of your subconscious where "unprocessed files" are buried.
You are just churning up unprocessed thoughts, impressions, images, visions, voices, words etc from the deep levels of your subconscious.
This also opens the way to the unlocking of a deep level of consciousness where psychic and extrasensory perception can be done. New insights well up directly from the fluid matrix of the subconscious and the subtle processing taking place there, without having to be first processed at the conscious level.
Our minds are never perfectly still. There is always subtle
processing going on in which we can't consciously identify the thoughts in terms of clear words or clear images. There are rapid and fleeting associations taking place in the subconscious mind.
Drugs like Ayahuasca can provide access to the unconscious, and help associate dissimilar things in meaningful ways.This is perhaps the reason why drugs like Ayahuasca are used in the treatment alcohol addicts.
The renown psychologist Carl Jung made the excellent point that when trauma, distress unresolved issues, concerns, fears, worries etc are buried in the subconscious, if they are not dealt with, then they will take on a life of their own.
A lot of times people just can't verbalize, articulate, identify, label what is going on inside them, while whatever is buried in their unconscious takes on a life of its own as there is no intervention.
Drug-induced altered state of consciousness can help such persons face and experience the unpleasant, frightening contents of their collective unconscious.
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redpilltwice
new boy > Some call it the god molecule
I have a friend who will agree with that. He took it and later told me he saw Jesus AND Buddha !!!
I'm a sober agnostic ex-JW now so those words raised my suspicion that these unveiled thruths were HIS truths only. Therefore I agree with Island Man.
It's a mind altering drug. It doesn't uncover any truths that lie within. It just warps your thinking and gives you hallucinations.
new boy also wrote:
Some have expressed an experience as if they were dying. This dying experience feels like the death of your ego. There is no hiding. I could see clearly what a jerk I have been. It totally strips the protective layers away too show whatever is you need to see.
That must have happened to my friend too. He has clearly seen the light (literally has more glassy eyes), created his own blog and is writing a lot about how we need to alter our perception of everything and need to (re)view our ego. Hmm, a bit too hippy-ish for me but as long as he's happy and doesn't knock on doors.
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new boy
"I have a friend who will agree with that. He took it and later told me he saw Jesus AND Buddha"
Maybe he saw them because Jesus and Buddha do exist.
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deegee
Maybe he saw them because Jesus and Buddha do exist ~ New Boy
One wonders, would he have seen Jesus and Buddha if he had not taken Ayahuasca?
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Onager
There was an interesting documentary series on the BBC called Getting High for God that had an episode on Ayahuasca. My take on it is that if you frame the experience as a spiritual journey, then you're most likely going to have a spiritual experience. Nothing is really happening beyond your brain processing what's around you and what's in your mind at the time though.
When I took LSD when I was still a JW I had Armageddon style trips, but later, when I had become an atheist that all stopped and I had trips where I felt more closely connected to nature and the world around me. Like I've said elsewhere, it's great for learning more about yourself, but you don't learn about anything that's outside your head.
Young ayahuasca plantAyahuasca is an Amazonian plant mixture that is capable of inducing altered states of consciousness, usually lasting between 4 to 8 hours after ingestion. Ranging from mildly stimulating to extremely visionary, ayahuasca is used primarily as a medicine and as a shamanic means of communication, typically in a ceremonial session under the guidance of an experienced drinker.