First, thanks for being so cool! Cheers!

> Do you say this having semi-substantial first hand experience with psychedelics

I am extremely reluctant to give details in this (public and recorded) forum, even in today's relatively relaxed milieu, but, yeah, you can assume I know what I'm talking about in re: psychedelics. ;-)

FWIW, I was practicing a combination of Mantak Chia's meditations and manipulations of breathing and diaphram and perineal muscles along with what's called the "Core Transformation process". The specific incident involved a "blooming" of energy at or from the first chakra that proceeded up the spine and along the nerves, reaching the brain and expanding out into the aura. Physical and biological sensations were orgasmic but non-sexual (if that makes any sense) and there was higher perception (of which I can offer no description.)

As I said, the entire process was so intense and so beyond anything in Western knowledge that I did not attempt to do it again. I was getting (less dramatic) results anyway, and other life events were happening.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantak_Chia

https://www.coretransformation.org/

> They're not a magical elixir, but thousands of people disagree on whether they've been a practically "magic" cure for their personal issues.

I probably sound like I'm anti-drugs but that's not where I'm coming from. I'm saying that we can and should analyze what happens for those people and see if we can do the same thing for others without dosing them, that's all. I know people who have had great trips and people who wrecked themselves. I'm not denying that drugs can work I'm saying that there are safer ways. Some people get a lot out of xanax, eh?

> Depends what kind of a therapist visit you're talking about of course.

Indeed!

I happen to be a proponent of something called Neurolinguistic Programming, both because I understand the underlying structure of how it evolved and why it works, and because I was cured of clinical depression while under hypnosis by Dr. Bandler. One time treatment, lifelong severe depression disappeared. (And no drugs.) So I'm coming from a POV where there is already an effective therapy modality that can do the analysis and, in fact, already has. E.g. using hypnosis you can recreate the subjective experience of cannabis or even LSD or MDMA; you can also do things like dial back your degree of drunkenness from real alcohol you consumed. Plus a lot of other weird and awesome stuff.

> This Hawkins fellow sounds quite interesting, do you happen to know if there are any particularly good videos of him that you could recommend?

To me he seems like the real deal. I've only ever watched one video on youtube, I don't have it bookmarked, sorry. Just do a search. I get a lot out of his books. Start with "Power vs. Force", as they kind of build up in intensity.

> I will check out Wilson as well.

RAW isn't to everybody's taste, but IMO he is one of the most important thinkers and philosophers in the last N hundred years. He connected with the NLP people before he passed away, so there's a good chance that everything is going to turn out okay after all. :-)

In any event, if you are interested in intense internal experiences pick up a copy of Prometheus Rising and do the exercises. :-) Catch ya in the flow!

Thank you too.