Gateways, Drugs, and Lessons Learned

Part 3 in 5 Part Series 

After religion I tried a darker, though still fairly common route to satiate my inner nag.  In a word:  Drugs.  I could provide an impressive list of substances (all the common ones plus a few specialties), but I would prefer to explain how I justified my lifestyle to myself at the time. 

As a lost soul, I was predictably depressed and marijuana dispersed the cloud of gloom that tracked me like an overhead shadow.  Incidentally, this impact was both real and effective.  Marijuana has obvious negative effects on ambition, intelligence, and diligence, but in my personal experience it has a very positive impact on depression. 

Hallucinogens were another matter.  If anything they made me more melancholy and detached when I sobered up.  No, the justification for hallucinogens was based in a desire to pursue the expansion of my mind into more ethereal and abstract realms of understanding.  To some degree they worked.  Hallucinogens helped me overcome my fear of dancing in public, pushing inhibitions out of my mind.  More importantly, hallucinogens helped me to understand the beauty of nature.  Green life, moving water, peaceful sounds all bring me a sort of instinctual joy that can be explained evolutionarily as a positive emotional reaction to the type of lands were humans will most likely prosper.  My sense of nature is still enhanced by a vague memory of boundless ecstasy from less responsible days. 

Unfortunately, I nearly died from a severe allergic reaction to a plant which I must've failed to notice under the influence of certain mushrooms.  That slow agonizing recovery made me realize the risk I was taking.  The lack of awareness I subjected myself too under the influence was shockingly irresponsible.  Any number of things could've happened, and my equally impaired friends would've been of no assistance.  That was the last time I used hallucinogens.

Uppers had yet another justification.  Uppers do not have a universal impact.  Some give you energy and a sense of invincibility.  Some focus your mind like a miniature laser on whatever subject falls into your sights.  Almost all of them make your heart flutter, your mind race, and your endorphins flow. 

The good lesson I learned is how to enjoy a state of heightened exertion, something that has continued into my daily exercise even today.  To some extent, the 'runner's high' you get after running a few kilometers at high speed is similar to the peak of excitement on one of the more invincibility inducing uppers.  Knowing this feeling is certainly an aide in motivating me to exercise until I can sense the loopy thrill of that exhaustion induced trance. 

The bad lesson I learned from uppers: A lack of sleep is detrimental to every aspect of your being.  Your energy, your attractiveness, your attentiveness, and of course your happiness all suffer horribly.  If you want to be a happy and balanced person, do not use powerful stimulants recreationally.  Period.