Date: Fri, 05 Jul 96 16:12:53 EDT
From: Kevin Jones <100621.17@CompuServe.COM>
To: Subscribers to the maili <TWC-L@HALMARAX.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: A few thoughts on terminal Wing-dings!
agno429@acs.bu.edu said:
>your message sounds like 'the spirit medium preparing his death.'
Well, you may as well do a good job of it. I have no plans myself
to die just yet. Then again, I may well have to help a friend
with it in the future. We have similar views. Then again, she
keeps putting it off - she's got far too much to do at the
moment! ;-)
>i haven't been on an astral journey of my mindscape in a long
>time,but thinking about them hasn't helped my self esteem much.
What's the problem?
>i am just reminded that my destiny is to die and to go from
>there. whether i must carry on, who is to say?
It probably depends if you want to go on or if you've had enough.
Then again it may also depend on whether there's anything left
to do. Unfortunately life (and death) doesn't come with a user's
manual. It would be helpful. You could just turn to page 253 for
the answers instead of trying to sort them out as you go along.
Anyway, death is certain for everything - including stars and
universes. All you can do is put it off. That's the absolute
best you can do. In traditional martial arts this is something
you learn early - that you could die at any time; maybe even
in the next second (in combat that's true). So you consider
yourself already dead. The fear goes when you accept it and,
oddly enough, life becomes sharper. You see things you
otherwise missed or took for granted and you leave very little
undone. Most of the reasons why people are upset at funerals
are down to what my father calls 'unfinished business'. Things
were left unsaid that should have been said, undone that should
have been done or said and were never unsaid. Now it's too late
and you never get the chance to put things right.
Me, I've been to a lot of funerals. I very nearly know all the
funeral services by heart. I don't leave unfinished business
behind - especially when I get the feeling that it's the last
time I'm going to see someone.
>i'm not into hallucinagens, because my personal delusion is
>goodly messed up as it is.
Good idea in those circumstances.
>I think reindeer are rather partial to A muscaria & will happily
>forage for it... then it's just a matter of scooping up the snow
>where they urinate... obviously a seasonal activity :)
I had a vision of gnomic characters pursuing highly puzzled
reindeer over the countryside clutching pots and pans!
Fly agaric was also used to kill flies, hence the name. Did
the flies hallucinate just before they died? If so, I wonder
what a fly's hallucination of a reindeer would be - something
with compound eyes, six legs, antlers, wings, brown fur and a
red nose? Then again, are bad trips the result of picking up
other species hallucinations? I think the fly's idea of a
reindeer might give me pause for thought!
weed (Chris Whitehouse) said:
>Am I wrong in assuming that everyone on the mailing list accepts
>without reservation that psychedelic drugs are sacraments, and
>that even should they not always succeed in providing mystical
>experiences, they invariably produce visionary ones (using
>Aldous Huxley's definitions of the terms "mystical" and
>"visionary")?
No idea what Aldous Huxley's definitions were. No I never saw
much point in necking a load of pills just because it was
Saturday and you were bored. Anyway, I have an unconscious
habit of fighting any chemical that gets into my body, including
alcohol. I usually require double the dose of even local
anaesthetics.
I have tried a few herbal hallucinogens when familiarising myself
with the overdose properties of a plant. It generally takes a
higher dose to affect me than it does other people and I seem to
have a capacity to 'off' it unless it's too powerful. Then I have
to 'send the children off into another room to play' until it
wears off. Don't ask me how I do that. I've no idea - I just do
it. And no, I don't like the effects much. However as a herbalist
I won't use a plant on someone until I am completely familiar
with all its properties - which may mean experiments like this.
By the way, the same effect applied to lysergic acid ethylamide.
It might be a good idea to bear this in mind with the terminally
ill. A very small minority may be either resistant or not like
the effect. Resistance to LSD-25 has been in studies even at
massive doses. This has ranged from reduced effects to absolutely
no effect whatsoever at any dose. There's never been any
explanation as to why some people are resistant. I suspect that
it's less to do with differences in brain chemistry and more to
do with how that particular person's brain works.
I much prefer the traditional tribal view of hallucinogens.
Recreational use is a peculiarly western phenomenon! However,
from my point of view drugs aren't particularly controllable. I'd
rather spend the time and learn a non-drug method.
>Given the casual attitude that enables people to wipe out
>thousands of insects with a few squirts of insecticide, or
>destroy millions of organisms with the testing of a new bomb, it
>is strange the value we put on our own lives, as if somehow they
>are of more importance...
It's occasionally struck me that the rest of nature might heave
a huge sigh of relief if we wiped ourselves out and then get on
with evolving something with a bit more intelligence and wisdom!
:)
Anyway, that's it for now
Kevin