First written: 2023-09-25
Author: Andromeda ✨
Report
Had an interesting DMT trip this evening. Decided to see what effects DMT might have (in isolation) on my current afterglowy state of consciousness within several days of the r*****. In particular, I thought it would be interesting to enter into a meditative state beforehand, and then play ‘Structures from Silence’ as soon as I began inhaling the vapor.
I sat in a breath meditation for about 20 minutes, with no explicit intention of going in until I felt ready. I then chose to sip a small quantity of the vapor to see what a small dose would feel like. There was a warm pleasantness which spread throughout my body – no visuals, and also no music (though I had ANC earbuds plugged in for silence). An interesting effect which I observed was that the silence would pass in and out of audibility, a 1-2 wave pattern which roughly corresponded to seconds ticking by (i.e., each ‘in’ and ‘out’ totaled 0.5s). This didn’t last for very long, and fairly quickly I slipped back into my breath meditation.
At around the 30 minute mark I took a fat toke of the pipe, taking in what I would estimate was between 10-12mg of DMT vapor. I held it in for a while, but soon felt an immense high frequency pressure on my face and chest. This was accompanied by a sense of discomfort, so I let the air out of my lungs and began breathing in a relaxed manner, attempting not to resist the pressure. This worked, but I think it had more to do with the sensation of release after holding my breath for so long.
The state was very simple and low information content. My world sheet felt like a heavy tapestry pressing upon the surface of the front of my body – mostly in the upper region (torso & face), without a strong sense of depth. The visuals were greyscale but not very vibrant. There were mostly composed of black and while lines forming beautiful curl patterns within my visual field, except I didn’t notice much detail in them because my attention was resting on the somatic sensation of breath. I did, however, notice that on each in-breath the lines appeared to sharpen, increasing the sense of contrast between the two colors and, correspondingly, their sense of reification within my experience. Also, their behavior was curling forwards as if the lines were groping appendages attached to a living organism. On the out-breath the acuity of these lines softened – less kiki, more bouba – and they appeared to gently withdraw, similar to the visual and somatic sensation of unfurling a clenched fist.
Resting my attention on the sensation of breath had some other interesting somatic effects. With each in-breath I felt the force field pressing upon my body increase in pressure, a heavy, restful, dampening feeling – not necessarily unpleasant, but very powerful. On the out-breath this field of pressure lifted, and the sense of relief was akin to holding your arms out against a doorway for about a minute and then, after the release of muscular contraction, feeling your arms ‘floating’ upwards – movement without effort. In retrospect, each breath in seemed to increase my attachments to the world, filled of forms and things, which each breath-out carried with it a sense of liberation and transcendence. Another interesting effect was that during the come-down the sense of heaviness became concentrated on my eyebrows, as if they had been caked in a thick Vaseline-like gel.
Data
[14:30.000 –> 14:44.760] The come up was a high frequency vibration. It was the sensation of pressure suddenly
[14:44.760 –> 15:08.520] on my chest. Suddenly.
[15:08.520 –> 15:38.120] It was a high frequency pressing sensation against my face and my chest. And rather than
[15:38.120 –> 15:53.400] focusing on breath, I kind of took the mental move of non-contraction.
[15:53.400 –> 16:15.480] And then the state was characterized by very, very, very high levels of symmetry. There
[16:15.480 –> 16:34.800] wasn’t very much information content, but there were some visuals. It
[16:34.800 –> 16:52.360] was an open awareness DMT trip. This is fascinating. I wasn’t focused on the visuals.
[16:52.360 –> 17:16.920] I wasn’t focused on any aspect of the experience. I had meditated for half an hour beforehand.
[17:16.920 –> 17:43.480] These moments are stillness like the 5-MeO.
[17:43.480 –> 18:04.120] The visuals were black and white, but only just, a faded hue. There was a sense of slow swirls.
[18:04.120 –> 18:15.560] No, no, there were lines, but they were curling. There was a curling motion to their behavior.
[18:15.560 –> 18:26.960] And at times there was inward swirls. And on the in-breath I observed,
[18:26.960 –> 18:37.320] they were pressing down on my experience. There was a weightedness to
[18:37.320 –> 18:50.280] the experience. And the lines became more defined. And on the out-breath there was a release.
[19:07.320 –> 19:32.280] I want to meditate for a bit longer.
[19:32.280 –> 20:02.160] And other things to quickly note. There wasn’t a sense of depth. The depth corresponded
[20:02.160 –> 20:10.480] to my impression of the pressure on my awareness. And the pressure was continuous across broadly
[20:10.480 –> 20:22.880] my forehead and especially my eyelids. It felt like a gel had been rubbed
[20:22.880 –> 20:35.240] across my eyelids. Even pressure. I suspect it’s because my meditation had been a breath
[20:35.240 –> 20:45.360] meditation. So there’s a sensation there of the chest rising and falling, the breath in
[20:45.360 –> 21:05.280] and out of the nose. Similar to the 5-MeO, the beginning of the experience was somewhat
[21:05.280 –> 21:14.800] unpleasant – this high frequency pressure. I remember having a thought: “is DMT ever going
[21:14.800 –> 21:23.360] to be the same after the r****?” And then I noticed the thought. Then I let go of it.
[21:23.360 –> 21:45.280] Then I instantiated non-contraction. Then it was just a release. When I come down now
[21:45.280 –> 21:51.320] I’m acutely aware of muscular tension that I’ve been holding throughout the day. My eyelids
[21:51.360 –> 22:02.160] are tearing up. But it was a state of perfect symmetry. There was no sense of depth. The
[22:02.160 –> 22:11.800] visuals were laid on a tapestry seemingly. And they had a behavior that was somewhat
[22:11.800 –> 22:20.120] lively but again I didn’t focus on the visuals. I tried not to focus on anything other than
[22:20.120 –> 22:36.440] relaxation and non-contraction. I almost feel like if I hadn’t had ‘structures from
[22:36.440 –> 22:48.040] silence’ playing, I might not have had any visuals. There was such little information content
[22:48.040 –> 22:55.880] other than the pressure and the release, the out-breath, the kind of hardening, crystallization,
[22:55.880 –> 23:06.600] and life brought to the experience in the in-breath. It’s like a gentle swaying breeze,
[23:06.600 –> 23:25.080] but the dynamics of the experience corresponded to what breath action was initiated. In other
[23:25.080 –> 23:39.000] words… not asymmetrical, but a blowing breeze only has a single movement. There were two
[23:39.000 –> 23:47.480] movements. The behavior of my experience corresponded to either of these
[23:47.480 –> 23:57.800] two movements and corresponded to where my attention was. Notice the unpleasantness of
[23:57.800 –> 24:06.440] the experience only occurred when I allowed a thought to wriggle its way into my experience.
[24:17.480 –> 24:44.440] Stronger than I expected.
[24:44.440 –> 24:57.400] My knee was a bit sore. I think the meditation posture I was in, sitting on a bed, was not good for my knee.
[25:44.440 –> 26:12.520] I had a taster of the DMT before I went deep,
[26:12.520 –> 26:20.680] which is why I was counting in the earlier part of the recording. The counting corresponded
[26:20.680 –> 26:37.640] to in-out, in-out, in-out. The in-out was hearing silence and then not hearing silence.
[26:37.640 –> 26:41.560] I mentioned it was a wave pattern.
[26:45.560 –> 26:52.280] It seemed to kind of correspond roughly. I’ll analyze this in post.
[26:53.240 –> 27:01.400] It seemed to correspond roughly one, two, three, like the ticking of a clock.
[27:07.640 –> 27:22.120] I just thought that was interesting because I’ve never observed such an easily identifiable and
[27:22.120 –> 27:37.400] analyzable kind of wave effect in a DMT trip. The first experience was just a warmth spread
[27:37.400 –> 27:48.280] throughout my body – I didn’t have music playing but I did have my ANC earbuds in, which is why
[27:50.920 –> 27:57.640] there was a sense of silence. Usually I can hear the sound of silence. It’s like a kind of
[27:57.640 –> 28:17.880] very, very low kind of fuzz and that kind of in-out, in-out, in-out, in-out.
[28:27.640 –> 28:47.880] I feel incredibly rested.
[28:57.640 –> 29:21.880] I
[29:21.880 –> 29:28.120] think my body wants to move. I’d like to continue the meditation but my body wants to move.
[29:35.800 –> 29:36.840] How long has that been?
[29:39.720 –> 29:41.720] About 30 minutes.