MRI scan - magic mushrooms: "enabling a state of unconstrained cognition"

[Carmody]

Your brain on 'shrooms: fMRI elucidates neural correlates of psilocybin psychedelic state



http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/early...03309.abstract

Psychedelic substances have long been used for healing, ceremonial, or mind-altering subjective experiences due to compounds that, when ingested or inhaled, generate hallucinations, perceptual distortions, or altered states of awareness. Of these, the psychedelic substance psilocybin, the prodrug (a precursor of a drug that must in vivo chemical conversion by metabolic processes before becoming an active pharmacological agent) of psilocin (4-hydroxy-dimethyltryptamine) and the key hallucinogen found in so-called magic mushrooms, is widely used not only in healing ceremonies, but, more recently, in psychotherapy as well – but little has been known about its specific activity in the brain.


Recently, however, scientists in the Neuropsychopharmacology Unit at Imperial College London used complementary blood-oxygen level dependent (BOLD) functional MRI, or fMRI, in conjunction with a technique for imaging the transition from normal waking consciousness to the psychedelic state. The study found decreased blood flow and BOLD in the thalamus, anterior and posterior cingulate cortex, and medial prefrontal cortex. The researchers concluded that the surprising results strongly suggest that the subjective effects of psychedelic drugs are caused by decreased activity and connectivity in the brain’s key connector hubs, enabling a state of unconstrained cognition.

Lead researcher Dr. Robin L. Carhart-Harris, working in the Neuropsychopharmacology Unit created by Prof. David J. Nutt, recounts the team’s main challenges in establishing an fMRI methodology that would be specific enough to highly correlate neurophysiological activity with the neuronal presence or absence of psilocybin. “There were a number of considerations,” Carhart-Harris tells Medical Xpress. “In terms of experimental design, we had to determine the precise dose and delivery protocol that would be appropriate for obtaining clear fMRI results. “For example,” he explains, “we had to consider temporal dynamics: If the drug was administered orally, the protracted period of time between ingestion, metabolism, and crossing of the blood-brain barrier would fall outside of the short scanning window needed to capture induced brain activity.” They therefore had to rely on intravenous administration.

“Another issue,” Carhart-Harris adds, “was methodological – specifically, isolating any placebo effect derived from changes not due to the injection itself, such as anticipatory anxiety.” The team also had to measure physiological parameters, including breathing and heart rate, in order to use these signals as weighting factors, correlate with baseline levels and remove them as a possible explanation of any observed brain changes.


http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-0...es-neural.html

Further:

Carhart-Harris is also interested in the effects of psilocybin on memory. “When subjects are in the scanner,” he illustrates, “and are shown personal memory cues, then asked to close their eyes and remember the emotions at the time of the original event, the recalled emotions are more vivid – indicating elevated brain activation – when under the effects of psilocybin.” Moreover, Carhart-Harris notes that when administered psilocybin when undergoing psychotherapy, there is an increased incidence of sudden personal insights. He speculates that this suggests that psilocybin-induced visual changes indicate that the visual pathways are more sensitive to signals from the hippocampus, which is involved in memory, when under psilocybin.

In addition to depression, Carhart-Harris observes, there are other research and applications that might benefit from the team’s findings. “Those suffering from cluster headaches,” he notes, “report excruciating pain that is difficult to treat, sometimes describing it as worse than the pain childbirth. During such headaches, they show an increase in hypothalamic activity to date has only been ameliorated by deep brain stimulation. However,” he concludes, “when administered psilocybin, they display a decrease in hypothalamic activity and a corresponding suspension of cluster headaches.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Personally, instead of drugs to do this, I used meditation as a form of self hypnosis and kundalini exercises. This, as a daily fare, for a good 18 months, on a daily basis, with no outside world mind numbing and thought blocking aspects of what we call 'the normal world'.

For the ego attachment to the normal world as a form of repetitive actions and conditioning of the mind into 'hunting and expecting/anticipating' (the same way we can muse and self-talk about a situation we need to clear up-we obsess) of those worlds, spaces, integrations and actions ......is what suppresses internal and personal growth.

YES, you have to get away from modern fast paced world in order to have your mind grow and to have your mind correct it's self and your given issues. Fomative and thus cogition issues which you all (and I) have, however you may wish to ignore them, by -or through- externalization and self distraction ---by and through the ego system of the body's interaction. Yes, you have to separate the self from the world. In the old days, we went into caves or sat under the bodhi tree and meditated until some bits of clarity came.

In the modern world, you must step away from modern stresses and any form of contact with it, form quite some time. Or environment has changed.... but the time frames of isolation and rumination for mental clarity in the human being itself, has not changed.

Addiction cycles are 21 days. To even begin to get a glimpse of mental clarity, you have to separate yourself from the crap noise of the 'western' or 'modern' world for a good six months with exactly NO external stimuli, outside of the relaxed gentle stimuli of your mind trying to dig into itself. The ego fears big changes in the neurological connectivity and the neurological chemical balance/stressing of the mind, as it fears any given large change.

Since the change you are looking for is at the deepest levels, the 'mind' or ego structures..they/it fear those situations that might bring that about.....at least as much as death itself. Thus the body fights back against attempts to clear the self, via projections and complications that really aren't there. (this ties back to the cognition thing spoken of, regarding 'shooms and visual centers/cognition)

Which is a large part of how the masses of the world ended up being hooked on an overly busy world constructed entirely upon and out of mental and emotional garbage. (projections tied to emotions-as representations of reality)

Like a robotic/motorized toy car with a limited instruction set, having driven itself into an inescapable corner unless a reset takes place.....humanity has painted itself (with help from those with evil intent) into a corner of over exposure to external stimuli ----and needs to reset itself.

* * *

While I appreciate the connection to some basic form of personal salvation, the world of self cognition and self repair that this article brings to the fore...... a bag of 'shrooms and a week in the the sun in the tropics.... is about as far from a true reality check as you can get. It's not even a beginning, it's just the wisp of smell from a wisp of smoke, it is not the meal or the sustenance. It is only a directional indicator.

Due to the right or correct drugs being capable of opening the mind into a state of re-wiring itself for greater intelligent and cognition, these drugs are banned, whereas the one thing that self-pleasures through intentional mental/physical destruction, high levels of alchohol consumption..this is why alcohol is legal. Properly done meditation will actually make a person more intelligent, better balanced and thus more effective in being a human being who understands the true state of the world and reality function/existence.

If the PTB could outlaw mediation as a drug, and a crime.....they would.


However, that would show their hand too much, so they back off and then simply destroy all civilizations and societies this world, all of that type that from a basis of self analysis as part of a life path.

[leavesoftrees]

Posted by Carmody (here)
This, as a daily fare, for a good 18 months, on a daily basis, with no outside world mind numbing and thought blocking aspects of what we call 'the normal world'.

For the ego attachment to the normal world as a form of repetitive actions and conditioning of the mind into 'hunting and expecting/anticipating' (the same way we can muse and self-talk about a situation we need to clear up-we obsess) of those worlds, spaces, integrations and actions ......is what suppresses internal and personal growth.

YES, you have to get away from modern fast paced world in order to have your mind grow and to have your mind correct it's self and your given issues. Fomative and thus cogition issues which you all (and I) have, however you may wish to ignore them, by -or through- externalization and self distraction ---by and through the ego system of the body's interaction. Yes, you have to separate the self from the world. In the old days, we went into caves or sat under the bodhi tree and meditated until some bits of clarity came.

In the modern world, you must step away from modern stresses and any form of contact with it, form quite some time. Or environment has changed.... but the time frames of isolation and rumination for mental clarity in the human being itself, has not changed.

Addiction cycles are 21 days. To even begin to get a glimpse of mental clarity, you have to separate yourself from the crap noise of the 'western' or 'modern' world for a good six months with exactly NO external stimuli, outside of the relaxed gentle stimuli of your mind trying to dig into itself. The ego fears big changes in the neurological connectivity and the neurological chemical balance/stressing of the mind, as it fears any given large change..

I immediately wondered how you achieved this separation. Did you lock yourself in your room for 18 months, or find a hut in the middle of nowhere? If so there is then the problem of feeding oneself, which often involves contact with the modern world, unless you are a proficient hunter gatherer

[seko]

So basically Psilocybin( does not create addiction) helps to reduce the pain from severe headaches, migraine.

Nature helping in the release of tension in the brain.

From pain to joy.

[ivaray]

"Personally, instead of drugs to do this, I used meditation as a form of self hypnosis and kundalini exercises. This, as a daily fare, for a good 18 months, on a daily basis, with no outside world mind numbing and thought blocking aspects of what we call 'the normal world'.

For the ego attachment to the normal world as a form of repetitive actions and conditioning of the mind into 'hunting and expecting/anticipating' (the same way we can muse and self-talk about a situation we need to clear up-we obsess) of those worlds, spaces, integrations and actions ......is what suppresses internal and personal growth."
Back to you:
Insightful information! I agree with you that the various forms of meditations--kundalini yoga specifically, art enjoyment, or art creation can result in an altered state of consciousness scientifically comparable (through brain scan technology) to the states of consciousness when used psychedelic substances. Modern scientists have scanned the persons who have mastered meditations or claim to have apparitions and those studies show that these persons are able to transform energy (neural firing) to the frontal lobes (persons achieve synchronic brain patterns), which effects are amazing.

Due to nature of my studies I had an opportunity to interview and listen many religious practitioners who used either peyote or some other substances. I am not sure that experientially one can compare similarities between effects of hallucinations, or the total separation from the self--the “soul journey”--caused by psilocybin with meditation or art practices. My final point is the following: Whether mushrooms or specific chemical drugs based on psilocybin, are just the shortcuts, an inducing outside triggers, but as we all know change--the beginning, the middle and the end--comes within, the self can be expanded, alert as a sharp knife, or immersed into a mystical experience, but cannot be fully lost....

[Cilka]

I just bought 'DMT the spirit molecule" by Rick Strassman. I will see what he has to say about it.

[Intranuclear]

Before people start saying what is and what is not natural, it needs to be understood that our own brain produces extremely potent chemicals that will make any drug purchased outside pale in comparison. Some are so potent, that a single molecule can change one's disposition. Many are synthesized and of course are illegal. If you could extract your own chemicals from your brain and tried to sell them, you would be imprisoned for a very long time.

The following is just a single example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Met-enkephalin

[nimmer]

Posted by Cilka (here)
I just bought 'DMT the spirit molecule" by Rick Strassman. I will see what he has to say about it.

That's a good book, I really enjoyed it. He has some really interesting hypothesis. Also check out the documentary:
http://thespiritmolecule.com/

[ivaray]

Posted by Intranuclear (here)
Before people start saying what is and what is not natural, it needs to be understood that our own brain produces extremely potent chemicals that will make any drug purchased outside pale in comparison. Some are so potent, that a single molecule can change one's disposition. Many are synthesized and of course are illegal. If you could extract your own chemicals from your brain and tried to sell them, you would be imprisoned for a very long time.

The following is just a single example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Met-enkephalin

Magic maschrooms, peyotee are all natural. We obviously have an important chemical connections with everything in nature through our chemistry. I do not disagree at all. Great. Still, inducing the altered states of consciousness might not be totally artificial, but it is not something authentic that comes only and only from "within." Perhaps, that is why we have powerufl chemicals in our body or brain....l

[Strat]

Regarding the cluster headaches and mushrooms:

I have cluster headaches (hereafter referred to as CH). Their name is a result of their manifestation. A typical CH sufferer may be pain free for months. Then suddenly they will experience 2 - 4 weeks of daily CH attacks. However, chronic CH sufferers will have CH attacks daily for months. I am one of these few, I'm going on about 8 months now.

I have tried lots of pain pills and they simply do not help at all. I have tried abortative medications such as Imatrex and they do literally nothing for me. Some have reported success but the only thing it does for me is make my heart race. Oh, and it costs $100.00 per dose. What average person can spend $100.00 per day for 8 months, sometimes 2 to 3 times per day?

I will say, oddly enough, pure o2 has a fairly high success rate at aborting attacks. I'd say like 65%, but it must be taken at the onset or it wont abort the attack. So if I am anywhere away from home and I feel pain coming on it's already too late. The pain increases very quickly. Still, I count my blessings and am happy for this o2.

Whats it feel like? Women who have CH attacks say they are more painful then child birth. Doctors say it is the most painful condition in medical science. Now, I haven't experienced every pain in the world so I can't say it's true. Here's the thing; if it is anywhere in the top 10 most painful things that can happen then it is very painful. They have been dubbed 'suicide headaches' because some folks have killed themselves as a result of this pain. I will never do this, don't worry.

Anyway, the short (and rather inaccurate) description is it's like an hour and a half long ice cream headache.

Specifically, the pain is always on one side of the head and is always associated with the eye. My eye will turn red and swell up. It will water and my nose will run. The pain feels like red hot rebar is lodged between the top of my eye and the socket itself. It goes back, past the eye and into my brain (specifically the hypothalamus).

There are numerous ways to describe it, none are very accurate. My jaw and cheek bones hurt as well. The pain is a result of blood vessels constricting and pinching the trigeminal nerve. The pain sometimes causes me to vomit or dry heave.

Apparently mushrooms abort the daily attacks, leaving CH sufferers pain free for months. They are not to be used as a pain killer. Also, only a small dose is needed so a CH sufferer won't actually experience hallucinations or perceptual distortions. Can you understand the benefits of this?

Whoever decided I can not buy this as a pharmaceutical drug is a ****ing criminal. I really wish I could confront this hypothetical person and bite their head off like a lion taking down a jackal. I know it doesn't work that way and there is no one person to blame, but that would make me feel a lot better.

[Russ1959]

This probably deserves another thread, but speaking of Mushrooms this is an absolute must watch!

https://youtube.com/watch?v=XI5frPV58tY Peter Stamets, 6 Ways That Mushrooms Can Save The World!

Sorry I have not embedded this correctly, maybe someone can assist?

Enjoy!

[Cjay]

Posted by Strat (here)
Whoever decided I can not buy this as a pharmaceutical drug is a ****ing criminal.

They want us to be sick and in pain and dependent on their ineffective poisons.

Sometimes we have to take matters into our own hands. Get some REAL medicine, made by nature.

[TargeT]

Posted by Carmody (here)
the one thing that self-pleasures through intentional mental/physical destruction, high levels of alchohol consumption..this is why alcohol is legal. Properly done meditation will actually make a person more intelligent, better balanced and thus more effective in being a human being who understands the true state of the world and reality function/existence.

Ah, but I like beer SOOO MUCH (drinking one now, 21st amendment: brew free or die IPA, I recommend it ) I definitely attribute much of who I am to my heavy use of psilocybin "in highschool"; it changed my perception on reality (or rather allowed me to change my perception at will, enabling a much more empathetic approach to reality) I feel a strong understanding of what shamanism is trying to do and think it is very important for people who are deeply tied to the fake constructed "reality" of modern society to experience a foundational shake (even if it is as minor as Carmody states, for me it was a very intense experience at high dose) humans only change when a challenge is presented, and a challenge to your very reality, to what you think/"know" is real changes a lot.


this movie shows how mushrooms have a strong influence on religion and could be the very reason we have decorated trees at christmass & hunt colorful eggs at easter:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=suBqqpez_-I

[Cjay]

Posted by Russ1959 (here)
This probably deserves another thread, but speaking of Mushrooms this is an absolute must watch!

https://youtube.com/watch?v=XI5frPV58tY Peter Stamets, 6 Ways That Mushrooms Can Save The World!

Sorry I have not embedded this correctly, maybe someone can assist?

Enjoy!

Here it is

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=XI5frPV58tY

[unicorny]

Great post carmody thanks

[TargeT]

Posted by leavesoftrees (here)
I immediately wondered how you achieved this separation. Did you lock yourself in your room for 18 months, or find a hut in the middle of nowhere? If so there is then the problem of feeding oneself, which often involves contact with the modern world, unless you are a proficient hunter gatherer

I've been trying to get his methods out of him for months (though in a passive way, I haven't researched his past postings for clues, I'd rather it be freely offered) with no luck, however it is pretty easy to "live off the land" (in certain areas) and some suplemental supplies could be stretched to 6 months quite easily with some planning.

it would not be easy though, not for "modern man" anyway.

[mosquito]

Ever since learning from one of my Ayahuascero teachers about his 6 month stay alone in the jungle, I've been wanting to do this. But.... as we all know, it isn't so easy, you have to be pretty resourceful and able to find food, without it becoming a distraction, as that would completely defeat the point of the exercise ! Whenever I give myself time alone in nature, my consciousness changes, only to be battered and distorted again on return to "civilization", but every little counts, and if any of here are finding it hard to dedicate 6 months, I can assure you that even a day will help. Take what time you can brothers and sisters.

Great thread Carmody

[DeDukshyn]

Hmmmm ... the experience I had with Magic Mushrooms ... I went to Hell and back (extremely intense OBE -- I was shown many "interesting" things).. I experienced time shifts that others I was with also experienced - if it is all just hallucinations ... how did we all hallucinate the same thing???? An experience I will never forget, cannot be explained, and left me believing in a reality that was almost unknown to me prior. It definitely was an experience of "unrestrained cognition" While I cannot advocate drug use, a good hallucinogen trip will vastly broaden one's understanding of reality (while at the same time open the floodgate on the questions the ego will demand answers to), but usually worth it in my opinion. My trip could easily be considered a "bad" trip. I wouldn't trade it for all the gold in the world

[TargeT]

Posted by DeDukshyn (here)
While I cannot advocate drug use

I absolutely advocate for drug use,.. its MISuse (abuse) that I do not advocate.

Do not blame a tool when its wielder is the problem.

[nf857]

Before people start saying what is and what is not natural, it needs to be understood that our own brain produces extremely potent chemicals that will make any drug purchased outside pale in comparison. Some are so potent, that a single molecule can change one's disposition. Many are synthesized and of course are illegal. If you could extract your own chemicals from your brain and tried to sell them, you would be imprisoned for a very long time.

So true, as others state about the poison of some medications, i have the worse condition/disease known to man, this is still very much supressed, its called many names CFS/CFIFS/Fibromyalgia/M.E.

I suffer all four of these conditions, which makes me a extremly severe sufferer, with so much going wrong in my body, lots of research gone into whats going wrong in the body, i.e disease of the mitral heart valve, cardiovascular funtions down by at least 50%, muscular-bone,joint disease, lessions/abnormalities in the brain as severe as those found in the last weeks of people dying of aids, immune system dysfuntion, adrenal gland dsyfunction, hormonal dysfuntion, i could go on dont want to bore, reason i post this, is because one of the most reason findings is the dsyfunction in the blood/brain barrior of people with this condition, of one of these conditions. It seems we should not stay alive, but do, we have shorter life spans, however its not terminal, so why are we still alive, perhaps becuase are neurons are re-wired elsewhere to survive, we dont need all our brains to survive, just because somebody is brain damaged doesnt mean they will die, they have be so brain damaged there is no coming back, however where do we go when this happens, & many people have come back from this, as if a miracle, mayve we are capable of healing ourselves, its evident that people do miraculously recover with this illness, ive found since meditating, my cognitive impairments have got far far better, i still stuggle, however they have got better, the rest of my severe symptoms are still there, perhaps if we didn't only use 10 percent of our brains, & when we know how to use the chemicals in our brain more, we can heal very real symtoms, as evidence by tumours disappearing, & cancers disappeaing. Im not sure its positive thought, i think its more to do with people taking alternative routes, like deep meditations, perhaps these people who are brain-damaged & are apparently kept alive on machines, are just in a state of 'deep trance' the mind/soul goes on a journery when this happens, & works out how to re-wire all damaged neurons eventually, to re-boot them, this happens, when because they have been meditating for six months solid if you like, as people will say when they have come back from the dead, they went on what felt like a very very long journey, when in our reality in this time-frame, its only been 6 months, for them its felt like a life-time!!! Perhaps i should meditate for far more longer times and see what happens xxx

[DeDukshyn]

Posted by TargeT (here)

Posted by DeDukshyn (here)
While I cannot advocate drug use

I absolutely advocate for drug use,.. its MISuse (abuse) that I do not advocate.

Do not blame a tool when its wielder is the problem.

You're right ... I was being a little ... "politically correct"