These criteria explain why, in my opinion, tryptamines are so interesting and why I argue that psilocybin mushroom was the primary hallucinogen that was related to the emergence of consciousness during the Archaic period. The tryptamines, including psilocybin, have a striking resemblance to human neurochemistry. The human brain, virtually the entire nervous system, works on 5-hydroxytryptamine, also known as serotonin. DMT, closely related to serotonin, is the main hallucinogenic compound, characteristic of Amazonian shamanism and the most powerful of all hallucinogens for humans, and yet, when it is smoked, it stops in less than 15 minutes. The structural similarity between these two compounds may indicate the deep antiquity of the evolutionary relationship between the metabolism of the human brain and these compounds.

Having discussed the choice, it remains to discuss the methodology. Aldous Huxley called the psychedelic experience “gratuitous mercy.” By this he meant that the psychedelic experience in itself is neither necessary nor sufficient for personal salvation. He may not leave any traces. All the conditions for success may exist, and yet they cannot be reconciled. However, it is impossible to fail if all the conditions for success are present, and attempts are made again and again – perhaps some time factor works here?

The good technique is obvious: sit down, shut up and concentrate. This is the essence of a good technique. These trips should be undertaken on an empty stomach, in silent darkness and in a comfortable, familiar and safe situation. “Installation” and “Setting” – the terms coined by Timothy Leary and Ralph Metzner in the 1960s have remained excellent key checkpoints. The installation has to do with the internalized feelings, hopes, fears, and expectations of the psychonaut. The setting is about the external situation in which the inner journey will take place – the level of noise, light and the degree of acquaintance for the traveler. Both the installation and the environment should be most favorable and generate feelings of security and trust. External stimuli should be strictly limited – phones are turned off, noisy objects are muffled.Examine the dark with your eyes closed, waiting to see something. This perception is not just an eidetic hallucination (which arises when you press on closed eyelids), although it begins like it. A cozy, quiet darkness is the preferred atmosphere for the shaman to go on a “single flight to the One,” as the neo-Platonic mystic Plotinus called it.

When you try to convey to people with all accuracy what kind of experience, great conceptual and language difficulties arise. Most of those who read my words at some point in their life had something that they would describe as an experience of experience under the influence of a psychoactive substance. But do you know that your experience will certainly be unique and different from the experience of any other? These experiences range from simple tingling in the legs to staying in titanic and alien spheres, where the mind gets lost and the language is taken away. And the presence of the utterly inexpressible, the “totally Other.” Memories fade, splitting and decaying like yesterday’s snow. The opal shine anticipates neon, and the language is self-made, exaggeration becomes impossible. And here it is important to discuss these points.

HOW DOES IT FEEL?

What was the atmosphere of this lost world of Eden? What is this feeling, the absence of which has thrown us into history? The onset of action of the indole hallucinogen is characterized primarily by the activation of somatic, some sensations in the body. Indoles are not narcotic drugs, but stimulants of the central nervous system. The familiar feeling of “fighting or flying” is often characteristic of the first wave of somatic sensations associated with the hallucinogen. It is necessary to discipline the posterior brain and just wait out this turmoil in the animal body.

A psilocybin-type compound, which is active through the mouth, becomes quite noticeable in all of its actions for about an hour and a half; a compound that is smoked — such as DMT — becomes active in less than a minute. Whatever the way injected indole hallucinogens, the full deployment of their action is truly impressive. Bizarre ideas, often quite funny, intuitive intuitions, some almost godlike in their depths, fragments of memories and unformed hallucinations – all this claims its right to attention to them. In a state of hallucinogenic intoxication, creative ability is not something that can be expressed; it is something that can be observed.

The existence of this dimension of identifiable meaning, which seems to have nothing to do with personal past or personal aspirations, seems to convince us that we are confronted either with a certain thinking Other, or with deep mental structures suddenly made visible. And maybe with both. The depth of this state and its potential for positive feedback in the process of personal reorganization have long since made psychedelics an indispensable tool for psychotherapy. In addition, dreams, as well as free associations and hypnotic regression, attracted the serious attention of theorists of the mental process, but they are just a slit in the hidden world of psychodynamics compared with the immense vision that psychedelics provide.

ANSWER ALREADY IS

The situation with which we now have to deal, is not to find the answer, but that the answer is already there. The answer is already found. It turned out that he lies, as it were, on the other side of the fence of social tolerance and legality. We, therefore, are forced to some strange masquerade. Professionals know that psychedelics are the most powerful tool imaginable for studying the mind. And, nevertheless, these people often belong to the professorship, and they should traditionally ignore the fact that the answer is already in our hands. Our situation is not much different from the situation of the XVI century, when the telescope was invented and it shook the approved paradigm of the heavens. The sixties showed that we are not intelligent enough to take psychedelic instruments into our own hands without certain social and intellectual changes.These changes should be made, starting with each of us.

Nature, in all its evolutionary and morphogenetic abundance, offers us a completely compelling model to follow the shamanic cause of resacralization and self-change, which we have to face. The model of the image of the totem animal for the future man is the octopus. The fact is that cephalopods and octopuses, although they seem to be very modest creatures, have improved the specific form of communication, which is both psychedelic and telepathic, an inspiring model for the communication of the person of the future.