LSD

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LSD is a Connection Supplement.

Notes

LSD is a "chemical able to produce profound changes of consciousness...and...far reaching insights into one's own self and...one's relationship to others. Some takers of it have even felt that they had won an insight into the 'nature of the Universe and the purpose of Life.'...These insights can be remembered and, if the person wishes, can be incorporated into his or her everyday life to bring it a "better order."[1]

LSD increases awareness and intensifies perception, enhances creativity, reduces fear (of death for e.g.), distorts time, and is "eudaemonic,"[2] but not always. "As I’d discovered to my regret, if you take mushrooms or acid when you feel low, they do not enhance your mood, but instead exacerbate your anxiety and distress."[3]

When LSD was first discovered, it was quickly recognized as having both healing and spiritual import. Morgar[4] notes, "the major application of LSD today is to treat mental illness...", something which it proved particularly adept at doing.

Morgar notes, LSD can be used in two modalities. "One emphasizes the use of LSD periodically and in small doses as an adjunct to traditional techniques of psychotherapy (Crockett, et al., 1963). The other major approach employs LSD in a single, large dose, producing an intense and prolonged psychedelic experience. Applied in this manner, LSD serves as a catalyst for inducing rapid and profound changes in the subject's value-belief system and in his self-image...."[5] The latter technique "places greater emphasis on its more unique potentialities and value, namely, as a means of facilitating personal growth and self actualization. Rather than freedom from emotional symptoms, the primary objective of the psychedelic experience becomes a major reorganization of one's beliefs and life outlook. In short, the first method is essentially illness-oriented, the second, health or growth oriented." [6] He continues "When employed as an adjunct to psychotherapy, most investigators have associated the beneficial effects of LSD with reduced defensiveness, the reliving of early childhood experiences, increased access to unconscious material, and greater emotional expression. In contrast, when used as a primary vehicle for rapid personality change, emphasis is usually placed on the transcendental quality of the experience, the resynthesis of basic values and beliefs, and major changes in the relationship between self and environment." [7] In other words, as a Connection Supplement, LSD can be used to Heal and Connection

Klee[8] notes that LSd operates by breaking down ego barriers (by suppressing the Bodily Ego). "There is some reason to suspect that integrative mechanisms within the central nervous system (CNS) which handle inflowing stimuli are no longer able to limit the spread of excitation in the usual ways."[9] Note in this context the phenomenon of Flooding. Klee actually uses the term flooding to describe the stimulus overload that can occur.

Footnotes

  1. Heard, Gerald. "Can This Drug Enlarge Man's Mind?" Psychedelic Review 1 1 (1963). pp. 9
  2. Heard, Gerald. "Can This Drug Enlarge Man's Mind?" Psychedelic Review 1 1 (1963). pp. 9.
  3. Szalavitz, Maia. Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction (pp. 106-107). St. Martin's Press. Kindle Edition.
  4. Mogar, R. E. “Current Status and Future Trends in Psychedelic (LSD) Research.” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 2 (1965): 147–66.
  5. Mogar, R. E. “Current Status and Future Trends in Psychedelic (LSD) Research.” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 2 (1965): 156.
  6. Mogar, R. E. “Current Status and Future Trends in Psychedelic (LSD) Research.” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 2 (1965): 156-7.
  7. Mogar, R. E. “Current Status and Future Trends in Psychedelic (LSD) Research.” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 2 (1965): 157.
  8. Klee, G D. “Lysergic Acid Diethylamide (LSD-25) and Ego Functions.” Archives Of General Psychiatry 8 (May 1963): 461–74.
  9. Klee, G D. “Lysergic Acid Diethylamide (LSD-25) and Ego Functions.” Archives Of General Psychiatry 8 (May 1963): 465.