guinea pig, the next chapter

I have been participating in a research study for 4 weeks now. I have been meditating every morning, journalling every day, and meeting with a counselor/guide weekly. The results have been very positive. I only meditate 10-15 minutes every morning, but have already had more than a 10 point drop in blood pressure. I feel calmer and more centered. My stress level has gone down a bit.

Yesterday I completed my first psilocybin session as part of the study. Overall it was a very positive experience, although I have the mother of all "hangovers"today. What follows is the report I was asked to write last night, to turn into the study's principle investigator this morning. Bear in mind that this was written after an extremely emotional and intense, drug experience.
3/22 session one - report:
The drug took affect fairly quickly, or so it seemed to me. I felt a sort of dislocation, a kind of sense of “unreality”. I felt really nauseous and physically uncomfortable initially, but this passed. My initial images were stained glass, church spires, gothic church ceilings. I kept moving higher, and this all disappeared in streaming sunlight. I experienced a sort of synesthesia(?) sounds became light, light became sound, music became a shape. Things bent and danced, with bright blue, bright red, flashing lights. I saw what I called a hindu merry go round, but it was dancing elephants, blue figures, dancing figures, with the jeweled diamond patterns from Indian art. It did not feel religious, but it did feel FUN. It was music and joy and fun, and it was a part of everything. I heard what I thought was a drum, somewhere in the background, a beat… a beat. It became clear it was a heart beat. The heart beat. I was witness at the birth of the world. A bright gold light sphere, the heart beat was the eternal Mother, and I caught the birthed world in the palm of my hands. It was wonderful and beautiful and essential. I was a tree, old, my roots in the soil, and it was me. I was my age, and loving the feeling of age, the sense I was in a flow of time and right in the place I should be. I felt such contentment and acceptance. I saw more shapes, lights, the music became emotion and emotion became a ribbon I could trace and follow and still feel. I became the music and then I became the emotion. It flooded me. I was filled with light and joy, weeping at the beauty and truth. The joy grew and expanded until I almost could not contain it and then it flooded everything. I was bathed in white light, I was white light. And there was the TRUTH. I knew it, it knew me. And I got the assurance that I could keep it for all time. This you can keep, for always. It was a promise and a commitment and an assurance. And I felt intense gratitude. And then I felt what I can only call a universal benediction. I felt GRACE. I felt that I had heard a universal amen. I was awash in a feeling of accomplishment and triumph. I basked in it; reveled in it, took my bow and triumphal march. And then I was surprised that there was more. Delight. Humor. I was shown my faults, my cynicism, my temper, my lust, my pride, and all of it was okay. It was me as much as the transcendence. I saw a duality of things, that I could be Buddha and a bitch, and this was part of the delight of the universe. All things are a part of the whole.

Later, I could feel that I was “back”. I felt my body again. We took a little break, talked, I sat up, and then back to the couch and the blindfold. At this point it was different. The music was just music, and much of it irritated me. I could feel my body, and was hungry, tired, cranky. I had conscious thoughts again. Memories, images from life, from film, snippets of things I’d read, all back again. .

discipline

as part of my new routine, I meditate every morning when I wake up. I have done this for 3 weeks now. It doesn't matter if I want to. It doesn't matter if I am so tired I can hardly stay awake. What matters is committing to a discipline. I have lots of routines in my life, but that is not the same thing. My routines are things I do without thought. Meditation is a conscious decision.

some mornings, it is the last thing I want to do. But I get up, and I do it. And no, I don't always magically feel better for having done it.

I am trusting that there is value in the discipline itself.

I need a vacation

It never fails. The 2-3 weeks before I go on vacation are the busiest weeks I've had in months. Work is insanely busy. My newest project is to learn how, deploy, and administer an Alfresco server all in 2-3 weeks. There's that number again.

I have to write and submit my MLA portfolio, before I leave for vacation, so I have time to do any requested revisions before the deadline.

I am meeting once a week with my guide for the research study, and am scheduled to have my first psylocybin experience the week we leave.

And we still have social events, regular errands, trip errands.

I can't wait to get away and have 10 days OFF.