How MDMA Taught Me How To Feel

Before I took MDMA I didn’t trust my feelings at all. They always seemed wrong and didn’t fit in with the outside world. So I shut that door in my head, boarded it up, and tried my hardest to forget that room ever existed.

Without my feelings to guide me my life became a bit of a mess and I couldn’t figure out why. If I thought about it logically, then I should have felt happy. I was married, lived in a nice home, and had a job I loved. But I was depressed. Instead of recognizing that this may have been a sign that something was wrong, I persevered and tried to use my thoughts to block out the feelings that were seeping through the cracks in my head. But I couldn’t escape, as my thoughts were also manifestations of the guilt, resentment, and shame I was frantically trying to bury in the background.

And then I took MDMA. And it blew the door off the hinges.

I remember the first time I took it:
A room full of annoying stinky sweaty strangers turned into the most beautiful human beings I’d ever met. I was deeply connected to everyone, including myself, and had the suspicious feeling that this is what it felt like to be a “Happy Person”.

And then, like every fairytale, the effects started to wear off and those beautiful people turned back into annoying stinky sweaty strangers. (Again, including myself.)

But something remained. I couldn’t ignore my feelings anymore. The door was open and now that my life was illuminated by this experience, I could see how far off course I had drifted over the years. And I had no idea how to deal with that.

So I went to therapy and spent the next few years trying to rearrange my life in a way that aligned with what made me happy. And the guilt, resentment and shame that I assumed was a normal part of life, disappeared. And now that I try to be guided by my feelings, I am a much happier person*.

*Work in Progress