re: DMT

I have done dmt a few times. I've never broke through, but each trip changed my life. Just completly wiped out everything I thought I knew about life, existance, and being human.

It truly is an ego-dissolving drug. Very humbling, without being scary at all. I was in a constant state of "holy shite holy shite I cant believe this is happening omg this is crazy holy shite"

Without a doubt. It would be like describing color to a blind person.

Don't know about 'why?' exactly... but I find it interesting that it's chemically similar to melatonin, which is best known as being the hormone that regulates sleep... And I think both can be synthesized from tryptamine and the amino acid L-tryptophan.

I think the why resides somewhere in the evolution within the above chain of activity. That melatonin affects sleep and some who supplement with it say it affects dreaming, and that DMT elicits visions seems not coincidental to me.

From what I've read, it does seem a central component of the experience is that you do communicate with or develop a higher level of understanding/insight with something outside of yourself. From this point, though, it seems that the experiences vary. You might encounter an alien that you end up conversing with (sometimes friendly/sometimes not), or it might be something more of a spiritual being (perhaps a manifestation of your own higher guardian angel, perhaps a lost relative, perhaps something not quite human).

As to the 'why?' communication with some other is so common, a couple of things come to mind:

1) It could be an enhanced, specifically tweaked variation of what a dream is and does from a data processing/communication heavy standpoint. Remember, it is similar to melatonin.

2) If you're open to more occult possibilities, then, starting with the broad premise that everything is comprised of vibration (which is as much a scientific thought of the last 100 years as it is an occult thought of the past few thousand years), it could be posited that the vibrations on the material, soul/astral and mental planes-- though interwoven into our reality-- also still possess their own substantially different qualities which pertain to their level of existence. So, it could be that DMT chemically tunes the brain (which is, in effect, changing the physical vibration of the brain) to be more receptive to vibrations of the other non-physical planes. Since the astral/soul plane is the seat of emotion and the mental plane is the seat of thoughts/form, then this could explain why DMT experiences are reportedly so rich in both emotional and mental meaning... this is just a possibility, of course, if you're inclined to give credit to the underlying principles described above.

As for me, I haven't done DMT, though I'd like to someday. I would like to take a trip to Peru to do take ayahuasca-- I think taking it in this context with someone to lead you through the experience makes it more likely to have a meaningful experience. But I've heard that the surging popularity of ayahuasca tourism is decreasing the quality. By that, I mean that there are still some legit shamans who administer the rites, but there's also a rush of unethical people declaring themselves to be qualified experts, who are not. Not even getting into the spiritual implications, such people might be less skilled in creating the brew you're going to drink. Further, there's a rise in associated crime, wherein people are getting either robbed or raped while under the influence.