To put these responses in proper context, I wrote most of it just a day or 2 after the trip when I was still in the afterglow of it (in phase 1 from below), and these visuals were still quite vivid. I marked my more recent thoughts with a ***
And FYI this is what I noticed about my changing experience of the last week:
1a, there was definitely an afterglow type effect which lasted a few days, which very much felt like what I would imagine spontaneous bodhicitta to feel like. Just an abundance of lovingkindness, coming naturally, without effort. (1-3 days after)
1b, there was a sort of knowledge of emptiness, the kind that is hard to describe, but I can tell you the this knowledge made me feel like everything was going to be okay, even in death. And it also brought a sense of satisfaction that 'everything is exactly as it is', that I was already doing exactly what I needed to be doing in life, and that I was exactly who I needed to be. (1-3 days after)
2, there was a sort of disillusionment period where these realizations became less accessible, my mind once again became a bit cluttered, and my meditations were a little bit frustrating (3-5 days after)
3, finally, I was able to get back to this place of knowing compassion, I was able to remember the feelings from #1 again, I think this was partially due to me coming back to my devotional tantra practice (described in the first journal entry) which seemed to help keep my concentration focused, partially due to investigaitoin and review of the experience. (5-8 days after)
4, current state is quite content considering the lack of sleep. I have cried happy tears several times today and I very rarely cry (maybe this is due to lack of sleep). Right now it seems generally easier to develop a mind of compassion.
"To your mind, what did the lifting of the veil reveal and what, in your words, would describe what reality "truly is"? I understand that it's difficult to express this stuff verbally, so use whichever analogies/metaphors you find most useful."
***Now the perhaps more important aspect to this is that what reality ‘truly is’ is just exactly what appears to our ordinary consciousness, though I feel that I’ve covered that in my last post
This will probably sound ridiculous but here goes:
There is certainly an infinite or fractal-like quality to things, and there is also no true separation of objects, so there’s this kind of dependent-arising feel to everything. And yet, these sort of ‘consciousness wells’ which form living entities, which are sort of arising independently out of the environment but ultimately not really separated from the environment. That’s not to say what we consider ‘non-living’ does not also have consciousness. But, there seems to be something unique about a living creature, like a human, or a cat, and especially places like eyes and ears, places where the eye sense and ear sense come into contact with the external. These appear sort of like black holes, or portals. This is where the magic happens, so to speak, where the internal consciousness comes into contact with the external. So entities, and objects in general, in one sense form sort of like planets, they just sort of materialize out of the necessity for an object to perform a given function within samsara, and they are created out of whatever junk/trash is sort of in the immediate vicinity.
It sometimes feels like we’re just kind of wading around in this beautiful soup of trash, this space jungle filled to the brim with fellow travelers running about, bumping into each other, etc etc, and it doesn’t seem like it should work in any way, but somehow it does. Kind of like New York City I guess
*** kind of looks like this:
(
https://thenewstack.io/deep-learning-neural-networks-google-deep-dream/)
"Do you have any ideas as to what "this primordial soup" consists of or how it's being 'mixed in the pot', so to speak?"
I honestly don’t know if I have a good answer for ‘what it consists of’, that’s a really interesting question though. What I can say is that everything is exactly as it appears while simultaneously infinitely complex and interdependent. So, it, and how it’s being mixed, is the result of karma, and the various parts, molecules, pieces, of the various objects. And the result of karma is nothing other than exactly what appears to us, although because of our self-grasping delusions, we usually cannot see completely what is appearing to us, we can only see like the nominal appearance of things. Perhaps what I saw was simply a less deluded visual representation of causes and conditions? I’m not sure… it is interesting to think about what actually holds this stuff together. Like, from a physics standpoint… what do gravitational force consist of?
***I think one factor of ‘what it consists of’ is consciousness and awareness. And that consciousness element is maybe no different than a mind of compassion.
"When you say "all this emptiness stuff", could you describe what that means to you right now?"
Like what you are saying later on, really the only way to talk about it is by using sort of generic placeholders for the the ‘this-ness’ that is our constant, direct experience of the present moment, which we generally do not realize moment to moment, but is still there. So in once sense it is simply the current experience, whatever that experience may be, exactly as it is.
On the other hand it is so much more than that. That there can be the possibility of ‘something existing’, for reasons we will probably never fully understand, because that means there is the possibility of boundless, infinite joy arising out of something completely mundane, like the washing of a dish, is just truly a beautiful thing, is itself a cause for that joy to arise, which is also both fascinating and humbling.
A lot of my understanding of emptiness comes from didactic teachings, like meditating on the emptiness of the body or the mind, (think like Rob Burbea’s meditations on emptiness). From a theoretical perspective, I think of it as the way that things exists, so it’s sort of a way of looking at things, like by investigating or noting using the 3C’s.
We have these different sorts of ways that we’ve come up with that point us towards this thing that sort of exists outside of existence, outside of time and space, and yet, is itself time and space.
*** So i feel like practice at this point should be aiming towards more consistent realization of that 'thisness'
"Beautiful. Did everything 'have' consciousness, or would it make more sense to say that "everything is exactly as it appears" arising as consciousness? In other words, was there any distinction present or would a phrase like "world of appearances, simultaneously perfected" more accurately convey what was perceived?"
I think that is a more accurate description. It was like I was imputing consciousness onto various objects, not like a separate consciousness of “this is what it’s like to be a book” or anything like that, but more just like a shared consciousness. Like ‘this book’ is a living object that I feel this sense of connection to. It’s similar to states that I have found myself in during meditation before (I think of it as 6th jhana kind of stuff) or when listening to or playing music. So I think fundamentally, it’s kind of like empathy or compassion. It’s a knowledge or understanding of what it’s truly like to be someone/something else but weirdly, not in a way that’s really any different from your own experience. Empathy in a way is just this shared sense of compassion based around some mutual experience.
*** expanded on this in my first post
"In most cases, the habitual patterning of personal karma will encroach again and reinstate the subject/object polarity. This is natural so don't worry too much about this realization remaining stable yet."
*** At this point there is definitely a lot that has faded. But, there does seem to be some sort of lasting effect. Still kind of sorting it out.
"Avoid clinging to the placeholder, or trying to recapture it. The harsh truth is that it's nothing special, even though it may feel that way. Instead, incline mind towards that 'space' and rest in it for increasingly longer periods."
Thank you for this. Like any profound meditation experience, there can be attachment, it is always good to be reminded of this.
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(Cutting out the Buddhist - space stuff since I already covered that in my last post).
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“I write this for no other reason than to present and project this experience to the shared sense of consciousness. The truth of reality is that there is no separation between the self and the other. There is a sticky web of love that binds us all together, though we are all free, we do not exist independently.
The universe for both of us, the universe inside of us.”
"Love it, love everything about it! What would you say that "sticky web of love that binds us all together" looks like? Is there more to than "love", and if so then what else was apparent?"
I don’t know if I can get much more detailed from a visual perspective than my above descriptions since the memories were more vivid at that time. There is more to it than just love, though I think lovingkindness is kind of like this driving force behind it, perhaps the thing that actually binds things together - perhaps gravity itself? There is karma, but karma is the result of action and intention as well as the cause of action and intention, so lovingkindness and karma are kind of inseparable. Or more simply, wisdom and compassion.
“Let it wash like a wave of experience telling you that you know who you are”.
"How would you, in your own words, define what this wave of experience is telling you about "who you are"?"
I would say it is a knowing. It is a resting into this knowing that everything is exactly as it should be, of "thisness". But, there is a element of ‘doing’ associated with this know-’ing’, that doing is in essence nothing other than your own consciousness, your own awareness.
"I appreciate your caveats re. LSD. More people could do with understanding why the same dangers we can encounter on psychedelics can also occur with more advanced practices, e.g. Six Yogas of Naropa. Unless we have the capacity to handle and integrate what these experiences reveal about the nature of the thing, then we risk problems that can have long-lasting and life-changing effects. Seeing what samsara really 'is' could easily send most people into psychosis, and I don't say that lightly."
To be clear I am ultimately thankful for all of those experiences, I just feel like it would be irresponsible to not be honest about those experiences. I don’t mean to scare anyone away from it or anything like that.
"In closing, take refuge in the Three Jewels. Incline the mind via remembering what was experienced. Contemplate, integrate and actualize these insights however you see fit, and I wish you all the very best in your practice. "
Thanks very much for the time you’ve put into this. It has been very helpful to me, I hope it has been beneficial to you as well in some way. Thank you also for the reminders and encouragement to practice.

John