A few months ago, a little bird whispered the following account to me:
(
Disclaimer: I didn't do it! Nobody saw me do it! You can't prove
anything!)
This weekend I had the pleasure of trying Salvia for the first time, and
let it be said; it worked! Wow!
Here goes...
Since I was quite ignorant as to how much I was supposed to smoke, I
started out with just a tiny pinch, and sprinkled it into my home made
pipe (made from a bottle), lit it and puffed away. Very minor effects, yet
quite comfortable. I felt a bit more thoughtful and philosophical, and
visualizing things with my eyes closed became quite easy. Also, a vague
tingling sensation was felt, but this might come from my exitement. :)
The smoke wasn't all that bad. It tasted a bit like oregano, and keeping
it down was no problem.
But, the experience wasn't quite as expected, and I decided to give it
another shot. I waited about 15 minutes, and this time I used approximately
twice as much as last time. Probably still a small dose, I thought.
I decided to go for one big hit this time, and lit up. The white smoke
filled the bottle much thicker than the last time. I could still beel this
tingling sensation from the first try, but I could feel it getting
stronger, so I quickly put down the pipe, and laid down on the couch.
And then I laid down on the couch. And again. And again. Faster and
faster. Time stopped moving forward, and the last few moments kept
repeating themselves, up to 3 times / second or so! It almost felt like my
body was spinning. I started to feel very dizzy, but without any nausea,
which was a bit odd.
The need to get up and "shake it off" was overwhelming, because it wasn't
very comfortable, but luckily I managed to keep calm. I have read numerous
stories and trip reports where people try to get up and walk during this
"trance", and ended up falling down and hurting themselves. I repeated to
myself "don't get up, just go with it." over and over. Thinking rationally
was difficult, but I managed somehow.
After the initial few seconds (or was it longer?) the time loop and
dizzyness went away, and I felt myself sink deeper into the couch,
almost as if the couch changed into something softer. I was
staring at a picture on the wall. (The room was just enough lit to see
it.) Then - take off! The wall and parts of the picture started to flow
and dissolved into a mass of strange shapes, which everything seemed to be
made of. Most of them were shaped roughly like a key hole. The picture on
the wall seemed to lose it's "squareness", and looked more like a gate or
portal. It was very colorful, but quite hard to make any sense out of at
the time.
I suddenly realized that this was the Salvia "talking", and decided to
close my eyes, as I have read that external stimuli, like sounds and
images, can disturb the "trance".
As I closed my eyes I saw the same river of shapes as earlier, flowing key
holes, filled with small colored "sub-shapes", these also roughly shaped
like key holes. In retrospect it reminds me a bit about the typical
self-similarity of fractal patterns.
After having studied this river for a while, I accidentally moved my foot
to get more comfortable. Wow, what a sight! I immediately noticed that
parts of these shapes seemed to move "along with me". The shapes didn't
resemble anything humanoid, but they did move in synch with the movements
I made!
By the way, the fact that I was suddenly aware of my body again seemed to
interrupt the normal flow of the trip, and it seemed like I had to start
from scratch again everytime I realized that I was actually lying on a
couch, and not hovering over this river of colors. Therefore I didn't
care to study these sychronized movement effects very closely.
After a while - I had no idea how long at the time - things started to
slow down. And as soon as I noticed just that, it was over. It was just as
if someone turned out the lights. I could, however, seem to notice the
shapes if I tried real hard, but after an additional 20 seconds the ride
was over.
I sat up, and noticed that everything felt soft. The floor felt like foam
rubber. I also felt a bit "high" and trippy, but only vaguely. I sat down
by my PC to share the experience with some friends on the net, and one of
them - let's call him Ben - suggested that I'd look at my plants, and see
if they had this energy field around them. To my amazement, they did! A
soft white shimmer seemed to engulf all of the plants in the room. I have
no idea what this was. I might have imagined it, as I was told to look for
it, but who knows. This was approx. 20 minutes after the touchdown, and I
was feeling quite "sober" again. As a side note; Ben called this effect
"plant telepathy", and I understand that it isn't all unheard of with
regard to Salvia experiences.
The time never occured to me, but I guess the inital full-blown trip
lasted 5 - 10 minutes, and the much softer second part of the trip lasted
an hour or two.
Some "conclusions";
- The come-on is fast and intense! The vertigo sort of freaked me out,
especially considering the insane urge to get up. However, as all trip
reports recommend a trip sitter, I should have suspected something like
this. I'd recommend one. If not, at least be careful and start out with
small doses.
- It ends just as abruptly as it starts. However, the longer and softer
phase leaves you with a semi-euphoric and "high" feeling for an hour or two.
- Salvia is not a party drug. Not by a long shot. Actually, the trip isn't
that comfortable at all, but nevertheless, it is a very interesting
psychedelic, and left me in a very philosophical mood.