Insight on drugs

Seeing how things are, if just for a moment

Living without alcohol opens up my mind to what is happening. Yesterday, suddenly, my mind opened again. Under influence of chemistry I got insight into how things are.

Among other facts, I noticed, how fragmented my personality is. On one hand I’m this playful joker, who loves to laugh and spend time with people, party, makemusic. On the other hand I am a buddhist, I meditate, try to live mindfully. And there are plenty other personalities to me. When I become one persona, to much extent I forget how I behave and think as another persona. I don’t notice that everyday. Yesterday though, I opened up to this truth, and I got scared, it felt like I just discovered that I was crazy. I’m just never aware of that.

I think we all have various personas. Some of them are more skilled in seeing things clearly, some less. When we get angry, or depressed, our skills of perception detoriorates below the regular mode of average person level. We can’t think clearly, we can’t assess world clearly. All seems worthless, or irritating, sad. But that’s not how things are — that’s just our temporary perception.

So yesterday, it happened, I opened to how things are. I saw clearly my personas, in all its weirdness, all craziness. I was able to get out of myself, if just for a while, and that was scary. I think it’s that very uneasiness, that fear of being aware is what prevents me to see things as they are on everyday basis. I don’t really want to see how fragmented I am, I don’t want to see that I will die one day, that all that’s happening now is a kind of game. That I deliberately choose to forget about some of facts from my life, to make my life easier. So I knew I would forget. Just like when you get excited, or angry, you forget how it is to think equanimously.

The experience though made me reassess how I feel about buddhism, meditation, awareness. Until now I mostly had very practical, down-to-earth motivation towards meditation. Equanimity, concentration, better memory, relax — to back up my career, personal goals. That glimpse of higher reality made me want just to see. To wake up. To see more, be aware.

It felt like a special experience to me, something I’d like to carry with me, to have impact on me. In the same time I know it was quite mundane, quite down-to-earth thing. It’s like getting sober after being drunk, getting chilled after being really angry, getting satisfied after being depressed. In this way there’s nothing special about insight. It’s just meeting with right circumstances, right mindset, right attitude, and see how things are. And the world appears full of possibilites, colourful, lively, beautiful.

In a way finding about truth is always about thinking out of a box. So we, as human beings, can box ourselves in a whole spectrum of different mindsets that will limit our perception. Some of them are related to chemistry (alcohol, sugar), some to our emotions — and I have a feeling that former are related to emotions as well (after all we experience different feelings under influence of drugs). The more relaxed, equanimous, and open we are, the more we can see.

I like the buddhist saying that we are like children playing toys in a burning house. We are so absorbed with our toys that we don’t see the fire around. Thinking out of a box is about letting go of objects we are focused on, and taking a look around, to see what is happening. When we are angry this is observing that our temporary judgment is faulty, and that there is more comfortable way of being. When I am comfortable, this is noticing that I have some goals that I want to realise, that I won’t live forever, and that life is happening right now. And ultimately, as a buddhist, it’s noticing that one day I am going to die, that nothing is permanent, and life isn’t just a game. That there are some inherent, universal, terrifying truths about us that we choose to ignore.

As interesting as my experience was, I wouldn’t recommend taking drugs to get insight. 95% of the time they just create more chaos in my mind. And from my experience, my mind on drugs opens not only to truth, but pretty much to anything. I can only imagine that possibilites of brainwashing, also self-inflicted, are endless. Getting insight by disabling our critical thinking (that’s what happens) is probably not the smartest thing. Also, I got more clarity at least a few times just by meditating, usually on retreats. And they were definitely more long-lasting. Just one glance at the post above, and amount of chaotic thoughs I experience today, makes me realise, this might be of a irregular, temporary nature.

Still, it’s interesting how drugs sometimes can inspire to wake up to reality, to be here and now, be aware. Yet they can never do that for you, just give you a glimpse, how this could be. And it made me so much want to keep my mind clear, to be abstinent. Not only from alcohol and drugs, but also from craving, hatred, sadness, cynicism, and everything that clouds my mind. Ultimately, seeing things as they are is much more interesting than anything else. And being high on life can be just as pleasant, as with any drugs - it just takes much more patience and skillful actions. So let’s book a retreat!

With metta,
f.