How or has Herb enabled your spiritualy?

[SageTree]

This is a topic that I wanted to get down here before I forget what I was going to say. I just want to tell my story and ask how has herb effected you in this area.

When I was 18 and had just joined this site, I was without a church having moved away from my homestate and really didn't know how to start looking for a one and at that point of my life, if I even wanted to go to a church, which didn't leave me a place to go. I thought. I had been smoking for a year and some change and had eaten around 200 hits of LSD within that short time. I had known the good feelings from youth about what it was to be in a community with love, and had learned a whole new level of where my mind could reach, via the Lsd. Pretty much from the time I started smoking , I thought, this really makes me sit back and think about how I really feel about life and ponder what was really good or bad, if they even existed.

My Grama has and still sends me 'The Upper Room' a Protestant Christian devotional. One nite while thinking it came to me that it was okay with me if it was just me and God, whatever that was. I never quite got into the white bearded interfering type God, even as a youth. So I decided that I would use this herbal tool to annalize and study the Bible via the lessons that I kept getting in the mail. I didn't want the paper or postage to go to waste.

Each evening I would sit on the floor with a my study Bible, which was referances, The Upper Room, and a joint. Also in the room I kept many candles and often only had a dim reading light on in the room and incense burning. I would first read the UR and get the daily passage, mark that, as well as mark the pages for the 'Bible in a year' reading. While finishing up I'd be smoking this joint and sitting there, kinda wondering what the scriptures were going to say. After I would smoke I'd open the pages I'd marked and read them through and look up some of the foot noted verses.

After reading these I would sit there and finish up my joint, which I'd snubbed out and then sit there in silence and try to absorb the meaning not so much the words. While doing this one nite, I decided to close my eyes and do what I figured was meditation.

Now after a few nites of this I decided like a good orthadox dogma ridden believer, I went to the internet to look up properly meditation. What I found was that there really wasn't A said way to sit and there were many ways to meditate depending on tradition.

Well this was mind blowing for me. 'No wrong way'. Wow. These few sentences opened my mind to the possibilities. What is a Buddhist I thought? So I read on.

This is what I came upon first.

The Four Noble Truths

1. Life means suffering.

2. The origin of suffering is attachment.

3. The cessation of suffering is attainable.

4. The Path to the cessation of suffering (The Noble 8 Fold Path).


The Eight Fold Path:

Wisdom:
1. Right View
2. Right Intention
Ethical Conduct:
3. Right Speech
4. Right Action
5. Right Livelihood
Mental Development
6. Right Effort
7. Right Mindfulness
8. Right Concentration

The Five Buddhist Precepts:

I undertake to observe the precept to abstain from ...

1. ...harming living beings.
2. ...taking things not freely given.
3. ...sexual misconduct.
4. ...false speech.
5. ...intoxicating drinks and drugs causing heedlessness.

I became overwhelmed when reading the 8 Fold Path, because I felt I had been striving to live in this manner all my life. I had found a Way, that matched how I thought I aught to be reaching spiritually.

Next time I'll talk about how I veiw the 5th and why this got me wanting to type this up.

Generally in alot of spiritual paths, intoxication isn't looked upon favourably.

But I'd like to hear your story if you like to share.

Tomorrow I'll come back and talk alittle about this idea and tell some more of my story perhaps...perhaps like maybe the forest is full of trees But then would it be a forest if it wasn't?

Loving Kindness,
SageTree

[JcP]

I'll reply in full later, but for me, pot's effect on how I viewed reality was paramount in my spiritual "awakening." The moment I became aware that ingesting something could alter my entire perception of the universe, I also became aware that how I saw the universe was equally fragile and arbitrary. What I used to take as "TRUTH" and "FALSEHOOD" all began to blur into an undefined "maybe." And from there, obviously, anything is possible.

While I don't smoke much anymore, smoking pot has without a doubt been one of the most (if not THE most) important things I've ever done....ranging from the type of decision making it took to finally give it a try, to how pot has affected my functioning in the world. My entire spiritual life, at least in terms of an active and vibrant exploration, is a product of the effects of pot.
Anyway, I'm going back to sleep atm. Will post more later.

[SageTree]

So I left off talking about the 5th precept. I'm not going to say that when I read that one I was thrilled. I did get drunk and still considered herb intoxicating in this manner as well, maybe it was just how much I was using. Neve the less, I decided that moderation was good in this case, after all, it is the Middle Way. I really didn't do much about having drinks and getting alittle looped up until like last year or so, where I've only had one drink when we go out and no more.
As I went further with my meditation I thought how can this be a bad thing and it really got me into my meditations. Over time I think I realized that this was okay, but it had showed me a plac where I could reach, much like alot of my use with Lsd. It took me really far out to a place where I was amazed, but even in my own mind, I wasn't crazy, I always felt really there when it was happening. So after a time I made it a point to not smoke a while before sitting. I didn't think this had the negative change that I thought might. I was still able to return to the spots in my mind. This is when I really started to think that Herb was a way for me to sit back and look at my life objectivly from a selfless angle.
During this part of my life I was meeting alot of new people. And when I say new I mean different from my hometown in PA. I was meeting alot of different cultural groups from around the world as well as experiance a more diverse deff. of American. I had alot of good talks with my customers and really heard their stories of there they came from. Two people that come to mind is a man and his brother who moved fro Kenya, and John, the biggest queen I ever meant. And when I mean big I mean 68in waist. But my perceptions of how could 'God' not love all these people. I was raised in a " make rascist jokes but I like black people, Gay is sinful, ect...." household and didn't have a preception that was solid yet but certainly not trained to my personal feelings yet. It was around this time that I really started to feel like I saw similiarity all around me. People walked around the store like a stream of water. I also had what I believe to be an OBE. This is founded in the fact that I went for a visit in my Mom's house one evening and walked around, checked on the family. The next day my sister called me and said she had the weirdest dream that I was actually in the house that nite. Wow. I didn't know what to say about that. But point in that this consciousness I was seeing opened my heart to more people and places with in myself.
From that point on I took it seriously to not let my mind get away from me with alcohol cannabis or heavy trips and to not meditate in an altered state on a regular practice, meaning like I'd still sit if I was tripping, but not with that intention of tripping to meditate.
It was around 02 when I moved back to my home state. I noticed quickly that I had really changed while I was away. For almost the last 6 months of living there I spent in my house with candles, dim lights, reading, music and silent walks. My work was the only time I talked and it was really apparent that I had forgotten how to be social! I really felt like I got to know my true self there and it was really hard to bring it home to old family and friends. Dare I say people thought I should go back to being the old Sage, as my sister put it, and Sage, you've really changed, my Mom said. This didn't make me feel that great.
However it was around this time I connected with one of my girl friends sisters and it was magical to talk with somebody about the last 6 or so months I spent thinking. It was a release.
As it turns out she was studying the Dharma as well, but had grown up in an Earth Centred spiritual family, and was looking at the Dharma as a means to express the Spirit of the Universe.
We did begin dating easily and quickly and after some time began to attend a Unitarian Church with a Mindfullness Meditation Group,samyak-smṛti, right mindfullness, the 7th Fold), which was linked to a Zen Centre up the road. Over this period I learned alot about seeking and walking the Path of Enlightenment, which had amazing results of me conquering my last socialized hurdle of learning to speak, rather than be the most intimidating person in the room, like was so common in the standoffs with my Dad, heck you had to be in those days, or atleast that how he taught it. With the mindfullness I was experiancing and a 3 theorpy sessions and I had a grip. Freedom....

At the UU church I hear a monk say that a master told a seeker to first understand his birth families faith, which is a whole other story in unto itself of personal study. I read alot and read alot of Hindu texts, which is what got me into the Dawali Festival I talk about later, along with a friend. In turn Christianity through the eyes of Indian philosphy settled and helped me actualize truths in the Jesus story I had previously not thought of as such. However Buddhism has always been my eye for everything after that first time. The centering effects of meditation always a practice. Just integrating perennial truths that all are talked about in the Buddha's words as well. But truely something I felt more sure of putting my foundation on.

I continue to smoke and eat some shroomies now and again, but I am getting to a point some days when studying that I forget that I had wanted to smoke before reading, and then I realize it and go back to reading. It was on a Dawali last year that I stopped smoking for a week and had one of the most powerful transformations I'd had in years durning a week of sobriety. This time the anger that I conquered was the one inside of me that was from hurt. Seeing hurt, unfairness and disregaurd for the sacredness of this Miracle we live in. I was putting my hurt ON other people, rahter than accepting I was the reason I was getting angry/hurt. I was the only one who could change before I could go out and engage. My wife, who is a counseler, said, what would you say to yourself, the hurting you. Praying on my wanting to help other, brought forth about 45 mins of some purist Gestault Theorpy, where I talked to this idea and ended up deciding I needed to live my life and that was freely engaging in love to others. My glass this week truely went to a half full or even a how can we fill it, purely for the first time in my life. I was really living and actualizing my Self and what that meant. Which got me pondering that maybe smoking was starting to just be a thing I did, not part of my identity. Simple yet profound thought at the time.
When I started again a week later I almost couldn't handle what I had smoked before, which isn't much and my wheels really started turning. Ultimately, I started smoking again, but a new light and purpose once again has transpired.
My philosophy is more solid these days and I really think Cannabis was a teacher of patience for me to sit and study such dry text, non-fiction and vocabulary. For this I am grateful.

And for your ears( really eyes) for listening, well you know what I mean.

I'm waiting for the Rev here to jump in......
Who else has a story of herbal catalyst story?

Love
SageTree

When you contemplate the body by being within the body, you should not engage in all sorts of ideas about it; the same when you contemplate feelings by being within feelings, you should enter in without ideas; the same applies to contemplating the mind by being within the mind and contemplating thoughts by being within thoughts.

The thoughts should be just the objects of mind and you should not apply yourself to any train of ideas connected with them. In this way, by putting ideas aside, your mind will become tranquil and fixed on one point. It will then enter into a meditation that is without discursive thought and is rapturous and joyful.

-Majjhima Nikaya

[420smokeman]

herb has had a part in my life for sure.. who knows what i would be like if i never tryed pot way back when , has it shaped my veiws? idk,, i know it made me think of things more and go deeply into thoughts kinda, then i herd bob marley and other music that talks about certin things and terrence mckenna and deepak chopera and all you tube vids... then eventually tryed mushrooms and had mystical expirence, became god!! rememberd who i am, complete AWE, that like my first spiritual expirnece, then after that i stopped smoking so much and only smoke 1ce a day or every 2 days and my dreams came back fully.. and now i appreciate weed soo much more after than shroom trip, after thoes shrooms i still feel my life is being guided to a certin point or understanding by all the decisions i make, like every situation is a chance to wake up, to make me relize who i am.

[SageTree]

Every situation is a chance to wake up, to make me relize who i am.

Thanks.

I can really relate to this part, well alot of it, but this is central to my thinking. Perhaps what guides me.

[ziplock]

Every experience in life has the possibility to change one's perspective.

Marijuana was the first experience I had that changed temporarily my perspective on my life and the concepts and assumptions involved in it to the point where it was largely reversed on itself.

It had an extremely corrosive effect on my conscious state.

For that, I thank it.

Daily.

[The Rev]

When I smoke, two things happen that enhance my spirituality:

1) I become honest with myself in a really profound way. (caveat: you have to listen to your thoughts critically, because that "honesty" can also come out as heavy self-criticism. You have to keep in mind that self is an abstraction and the experience of now is all that is real.) Things that I have difficulty admitting to myself become "Well, yeah! Duh." This can be profoundly centering, and helps to wipe away the confusion of the preceding day.

2) My ability to just "shut up and look" is enhanced, and I can be in the moment so intensely that it sometimes gets frightening. I'm very "here" looking hard at "now". It's uncanny. I can get into states like that in meditation, too, but it's usually only on a good day and not nearly as consistent as when smoking.

BTW, Sage, thanks for the posts about Buddhism and the 8-fold path. I, too, was captivated by the simplicity of this practice, and it has contributed enormously to my own spiritual path. In fact, if I had to pick one established "religion" my path is closest to, it would be Buddhism (or, perhaps, Jainism).



The Rev

[FineazPR]

As for ME, I choose NOT to delve so deeply into my own spirituality when I'm trying to enjoy a good high...damn! On a more constant basis, I feel connected to a superior spirit. some may call it God, or whatever. For me, its like a thread that connects all of us,on a more profound level. This connection soothes my spirit when its unsteady, or feeling weak. It helps me to remain strong in trying times. When I am having some difficulty with , say, my kids or some other close personal other, I ask my spirit to talk to theirs and see if "ya'll can't fix dis, plz, 'cause I may chokeabitch" tough topic...hope yaz get me.

[rollingthunder]

to be honest, it hasnt been pot that got me thinking..it was a traditional native american form of herb... well more like a mushroom with a sage leaf in it.. but in any event....

it gets you thiking in the same sort of way.. the higher demension.. only you see the thoughts of your subconcious mind almost come to life. It sounds bizzarre i know.. but it drove me to look deeper into myself, and it brought me to where i am now.

it showed me the fact that im not alone, and that there is something more out there. it emphasized the same feeling i get when im on a mountian top.. or in the middle of the ocean on a scuba dive.. one is so.. minute in the sceme of things...

as far as pot is concerned, i was introduced to that about 8 months ago, and it hasnt really gotten me too far in the direction of spirituality (wrong setting.. around the wrong people to do that sort of thing with) i hope i can do that soon.. it seems like it mite get me thinking a little differently...

[reverie]

Nice stories

Its always been a good tool in perceptive relativity for myself. Always gain such a genuinely open mind frame to operate upon.

Just like most other substances though, marijuana has always been an incredibly sensual experience for myself. I find myself lost from relative existence, as if one would expect from a dream state. It helped me dissolve boundaries I thought were concepts off in the distance, to realize they aren't separate from me. In this sense, it has allowed my theoretical vision of spirituality become a tangible reality.

Marijuana continually births new experiences or thoughts for me to test my ideas while showing me the uncertainty and mysteries of the universe. In the beginning I used to think I was really fucked up, because I took to MJ the same way most people take to shrooms. I'd start saying shit that most people couldn't relate with, and it wasn't until my amazing man helped me by encouraging the process that I really started to utilize it as a tool.

Damnit I hate being without.

[SageTree]

It seems the major theme so far is skewing of lines and opening pathways to consider outselves, ideas, beliefs, misconceptions. And are open to what if we find we don't believe the same things we used to? Openess to change.

[verklingen]

it has made me much more receptive. not only of concepts and ideas, but also experiences and their meanings. that's the element i treasure most.

[SageTree]

Simply beautiful

[my_scatterheart]

Allows me to delve into all the trains of thought regarding my feeling and perceiving that every day life and societal norms usually force me to squash within moments of conception. Those ideas that ordinarily, I'd brush off as inane or asinine. Free.

[BibleGuy]

My first couple of experiences with the sacred herb were profoundly "awakening" to me. I felt/perceived/saw myself being "known", healed, lifted in a cloud of pulsating light. I gained new eyes for the world and openness to other spiritual traditions with a compelling interest in what we have in common rather than what separates us. I now value other perspectives and look to understand their essense. My perception of God has changed dramatically. I understand the Bible better now. I've lost faith in mainstream Christianity while gaining faith in the man called "Christ". I now question everything considered orthodox. My desire for a high rung on the corporate ladder has been replaced by a desire for simplicity, contentment, nature, taking in the sunlight, gazing at the moon and sitting around the introspective campfire with friends. There's more, but its been life-changing to say the least. I can see now. I am very thankful.

The biblical meaning of "Peace":

Greek eirēnē (i-rah'-nay)
Probably from a primary verb εἴρω eirō (to join); peace

The biblical meaning of "Incense":

Hebrew qâṭar (kaw-tar')
Through the idea of fumigation in a close place; to smoke, that is, turn into fragrance by fire (especially as an act of worship); identical with to inclose: - join

Incense = peace = to join = oneness. There is a reason why the classic hippie expression is "peace" - they spend a lot of time in the biblical incense (also found in other spiritual traditions).

Peace... and Namaste!

[Mydriasis]

Cannabis has taught me many things, here are some of them.

1. It's okay to be uncomfortable and that is what enables growth
2. Fear is the opposite of Love and Love is a stronger force.
3. It has helped me get the strength I needed to stay off of dead-end substance addiction.
4. Nature provides the cure for any ailment.
5. Respect and love life-forms of all kinds, they are all here for a purpose.
6. When you look out you cannot see in.
7. To take things how they come and follow the natural flow of life
8. To appreciate and be bewildered by the smallest things that are normally ignored.
9. It helps me come into contact with my muse's and energy sources in which my creativity comes from. So in a way it has taught me to let go of my preconceived notions of how this universe functions and only take to heart that which truly is designed for the heart.
10. It has taught me to explore my concsiousness(s.p?) and my existence. I am constantly curious after taking the sacrament .
11. The pleasure of being alive, food is good, music and are is good, feeling things is good. It's showed me a way to just piss off of my seriousness and just let go and laugh. Suffering is a part of life, but there is so much great fucking joy in the silliest of things.

Edit- I loved reading everyones hence the thank's you have all received

12. To be greatful and thankful for any gift of any kind.