&lt;div class=&quot;report-text-surround&quot;&gt;
&lt;table cellspacing=&quot;0&quot; cellpadding=&quot;0&quot; align=&quot;right&quot; border=&quot;0&quot;&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td width=&quot;15&quot;&gt; &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;!-- DoseChart --&gt;
	&lt;table border=&quot;2&quot; cellpadding=&quot;4&quot; cellspacing=&quot;0&quot; bordercolor=&quot;#224422&quot; class=&quot;dosechart&quot;&gt;
		&lt;tr&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; align=&quot;right&quot;&gt;DOSE:&lt;br&gt; T+ 0:00&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; class=&quot;dosechart-amount&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;0.5 hits&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-method&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;oral&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-substance&quot;&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;/chemicals/lsd/&quot;&gt;LSD&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-form&quot;&gt;&lt;b&gt;(blotter / tab)&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		&lt;/tr&gt;
		&lt;tr&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; align=&quot;right&quot;&gt;  T+ 1:45&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; class=&quot;dosechart-amount&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;0.5 hits&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-method&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;oral&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-substance&quot;&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;/chemicals/lsd/&quot;&gt;LSD&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-form&quot;&gt;&lt;b&gt;(blotter / tab)&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		&lt;/tr&gt;
		&lt;tr&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; align=&quot;right&quot;&gt;  T+ 6:30&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td width=&quot;90&quot; class=&quot;dosechart-amount&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;0.5 hits&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-method&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;oral&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-substance&quot;&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;/chemicals/mdma/&quot;&gt;MDMA&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		 &lt;td class=&quot;dosechart-form&quot;&gt;&lt;b&gt;(capsule)&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/td&gt;
		&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

	&lt;table border=&quot;2&quot; cellpadding=&quot;4&quot; cellspacing=&quot;0&quot; bordercolor=&quot;#444455&quot; class=&quot;bodyweight&quot;&gt;
	 &lt;tr&gt;
           &lt;td width=&quot;110&quot; class=&quot;bodyweight-title&quot;&gt;BODY WEIGHT:&lt;/td&gt;
	   &lt;td width=&quot;80&quot; class=&quot;bodyweight-amount&quot;&gt;170 lb&lt;/td&gt;
         &lt;/tr&gt;
	&lt;/table&gt;

&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
&lt;!-- End DoseChart  --&gt;
&lt;!-- Start Body --&gt;
How we decided to try LSD or the first time was both interesting and unexpected. Having recently discovered MDMA, my best friend decided to accompany some of his friends to a European electro festival where, he told me, he had been invited to try LSD. Given my &#x27;knowledge&#x27; of LSD at the time I was afraid that he might just do something as silly as try it. What did that knowledge consist of? Well, the typical media lies:
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Persistent perceptual changes
&lt;br&gt;
No insight into being on a substance and, therefore, an inability to make smart decisions on LSD
&lt;br&gt;
Horrible acid flashes with demonic figures dancing across your visual field (especially at moments when you most needed to focus and concentrate)
&lt;br&gt;
The burning of holes into ones brain, holes that fill with acid that periodically burn bigger holes (and thereby cause said acid flashes)
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The wealth of misinformation that exists is extensive and, as far as I can tell, a terrible ploy to prevent people from exploring the inner workings of their minds and the outer edges of what is possible. Harm reduction and safe tripping seems wholly better than a generation of liars leading a generation of lied-to.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Anyway, my own pursuit of psychiatry had lead me to learn about experiments using various psychoactive substances for the treatment of certain conditions. MDMA was being explored for its utility in treating death-anxiety and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Interestingly, prior to the development of MDMA, LSD had featured prominently in psychotherapy for much the same reason - it enabled the user to tap into his or her inner mind and emerge with new insight into the origin of problems. Thankfully, the organization which orchestrated much of this research and reported on it had resources for the interested consumer to peruse.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Out of curiosity, I downloaded and read the personal account written by a prominent psychiatrist from the 1970s about his LSD trip experienced as part of a training session while preparing to perform LSD psychotherapy. My eyes were opened. A psychiatrist took the stuff? Believed in it? Lived to tell the tale? Huh.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The website had a well researched and composed document outlining the pharmacology of LSD as well as its physical and psychological effects. The media lies were exposed. LSD is merely a serotonin agonist, much like many of the drugs used in the medical world. My fear evaporated.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
I contacted my friend and told him I wanted to know what it would be like to see sounds and hear colors, to hallucinate and explore the edges of the universe and to challenge the &#x27;realities&#x27; we accept blankly. We picked a weekend following my exams where life would be devoid of stress and we started to plan.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
At first we were unsure whether or not we&#x27;d have our first psychedelic experience with mushrooms or LSD - but reading a host of internet forums lead us to one major conclusion: people seemed to believe that despite being a markedly longer trip, LSD was more mellow and therefore harder to have a bad trip on. As we were both keen on avoiding a bad trip we decided to skip the mushrooms and go straight for the LSD.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The night before we dropped the acid we had a wonderful dinner with my family and then retreated to my house in a small community 45 minutes from the city. Arriving there we immediately noted the peace and tranquility which bathed our surroundings. We&#x27;d brought with us comfortable clothes, arts and craft supplies, and a glass globe with an electrical component at its centre which caused purple beams of light to radiate from the middle towards the glass surrounding the electrical component (if you can&#x27;t visualize that I apologize for my poor descriptive writing). We had a quarter ounce of cannabis, 4 pills of MDMA and 2 tabs of acid. 
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
That night we smoked a joint together. I typically don&#x27;t smoke pot with anyone except this particular friend I was with, my best friend, because of its tendency to induce paranoia and self-reproach in me - things I can easily do without. Marijuana, while helping me have some deep thoughts, also makes me doubt myself, my relationships and my surroundings. It makes me go, as my friend and I say, &#x27;into my head.&#x27; That night was no exception. 
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Some wonderful experiences were had while stoned, but by the end of the night I was questioning my productivity, I was questioning the extent to which drugs had secretly taken over my life, I was questioning my career choices and I was definitely questioning whether or not I would stick to the plan and take LSD the next day.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
As awful as this sounds, it actually had a wonderful repercussion. The day after I smoke pot I tend to have relinquished much of the negative cognitions I experienced the day before, but I have a certain &#x27;brain fuzz&#x27; that lingers. That day, again, was no exception. I was able to think more clearly and I was able to come to grips with most of what had happened. But two issues remained.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
1. I had been unable to express to my best friend and confidante what I was struggling with the night before - choosing rather to remain silent and not bring down his high.
&lt;br&gt;
2. I was experiencing insecurities regarding my recently started relationship with the most amazing girl I know.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
I told my friend about what had happened the night before and, in his usual supportive way, he told me that we wouldn&#x27;t go ahead with our trip unless my mind was in the right place. Simply knowing that we could abort this plan at any point helped me realize that I was in control of my drug experiences, not the other way around. To ensure that any issues that arose were discussed we made a fluorescent multicoloured sign and stuck it to the TV screen where it would be unmissable. The sign read:
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
If you have a problem...
&lt;br&gt;
JUST SAY SO
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
If you think there&#x27;s a problem...
&lt;br&gt;
JUST ASK
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
LLP (Life loving people)
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The beauty of this was the we had instituted a rule whereby openness and honesty were to be employed and respected, and as much as they were before, it was now a stated necessity.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Moments before dropping, my friend employed the rule and told me he sensed that I was off. I told him about issue #2 (above) and, with his usual brilliance and insight, he told me to call my girlfriend. I did so. I told her openly about my feelings of vulnerability with her, that if I lost her I could no longer brush it off, that I would be devastated. She reassured me in the most honest way possible. Her words alone sent me to the moon. I smiled. My anxiety faded. I met my friend in my living room and we got ready for our adventure.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The acid tabs we had were much smaller than I was expecting. About 5mm x 5mm each, and they weren&#x27;t paper thin as I&#x27;d imagined, but were rather about 1mm thick. As I said, there were two of them. Not knowing how potent they were, my friend and I had agreed to start out with a half tab each, to wait 2 hours (as we&#x27;d been lead to believe the trip would last 12 hours) and then take the other half if we felt we could handle it. 
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
One. Two. Three. And down the rabbit hole we jumped, hoping we&#x27;d meet Alice and her companions down below. The effects kicked in much faster than either my friend or I were expecting. In about 15 minutes we both felt &#x27;something.&#x27; It&#x27;s hard to pinpoint exactly what it was, but we were certainly not sober. The come on, as we&#x27;d been promised by another friend who had taken the same LSD, was wonderfully smooth, with very gradual peaking.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The trip can probably be divided into three major parts, at least from my standpoint.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Part 1 - Energy and Exploration
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
To start off with my friend and I decided to just hang out inside my house. We put on the electro music we love and found that within minutes we were dancing. The lightness of my feet was extraordinary and I felt light as a pixie dancing in an open meadow. I felt calm, relaxed, mellow, free and wanted nothing more than to dance. All of a sudden there was a wonderful experience of patterns and detail. I can hardly say that I stood in one spot staring at a single picture or painting on my wall, agasp and mesmerized, but I did notice intricacies of sound and sight. I felt my couch and was astonished at its softness, my friend sat down on the couch and I surrounded him with pillows telling him to feel the warm embrace of the couch. He did and he loved it. Then he discovered the carpet and starred at it&#x27;s fine hairy detail and watched it pulsate with waveforms. At the same time I lay on my back and looked at my ceiling. Nine months I&#x27;d lived in this house and never had I taken the time to stop and notice the beautiful detail in the ceiling where blobs and streaks of white paint textured it and enabled the light to change it&#x27;s appearance throughout the day. What a waste to have never noticed that.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Looking at another wall in my house I noticed that the light refracting around it caused three distinct layers of shadow to appear, how marvellous that the interaction between light and drywall could create such art. I pointed it out to my friend. He noted it too, we marvelled at it, we delighted in it and once again we danced to the music that was playing.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Then a song came on; a song that my friend said was &#x27;transformative.&#x27; I&#x27;d never heard it before. I danced freely and wildly enjoying the subtleties of the sound emerging from my speakers. My friend started to dance, but danced slower... and slower... and slower... then stopped.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
&#x27;Something is wrong,&#x27; he said. &#x27;YES!&#x27; I thought! The rule was working. I smiled and asked him what was wrong. &#x27;My energy isn&#x27;t where it should be.&#x27; I took two pillows off of the couch and laid them on the floor, I invited my friend to sit on one, while I sat on the other. Cross legged we faced one another and I encouraged my friend to explore where his energy was. We pondered and delved into the factors affecting our set and setting and suddenly it dawned on me. My friend had made an association with this song previously, in a different set. It had been transformative then, but now it was a song that held meaning in a different time and place, it wasn&#x27;t meant to be played here, it wasn&#x27;t the same song in this new mindstate, in this new place, with a different person. I suggested changing the song and my friend agreed. Within seconds his soul lifted, he smiled, he said: &#x27;Oh yeah! I&#x27;m back!&#x27; And we danced some more.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
We had instituted a no-cell-phone policy for the day, not wanting to be lost to text and phone calls, but somehow both of our phones had turned on. When my friend looked at his he had a missed call from a friend who we&#x27;d helped the night before prior to dinner. My phone revealed a missed call as well. We decided it wasn&#x27;t our responsibility to help this person and we planned to leave for a walk.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
&#x27;Something is wrong,&#x27; I said, moments before leaving. The pillows were once again placed on the floor. Once again we sat on them, legs crossed. And once again we explored the avenues of thought that were leading to wrongness. It&#x27;s important to note, that in all of this &#x27;wrongness&#x27; there was nothing &#x27;negative&#x27; felt. Everything was mellow and everything was positive, there were just nuances that instilled a certain wrongness that could be explored, dealt with and eliminated.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
&#x27;I would hate to be in her position without someone to talk to. What does it mean if we don&#x27;t provide assistance when we can?&#x27; We explored our options, carefully, every avenue discussed and brought to a logical conclusion that satisfied our souls that we&#x27;d done our due diligence to see the truth of our options. We decided to call our friend, to give her a set amount of time to unload her emotions if needed, or to advise her to call the police if things were a real problem. Another text message arrived on my friend&#x27;s phone as we were about to call and we knew that the situation wasn&#x27;t urgent, didn&#x27;t warrant the potential mind fuck that could come out of a non-desperate situation painted as desperate; and we were at ease to continue with our own exploration.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
At this point it was about 1 hour 45 minutes into the trip. It was wonderful. The liberation and depth of thought, the energy and activation, the honesty and truth, these are what life is full of, these are what people try to suppress so that we conform to a rigid world without color, where black is black and white is white. We decided we were ready and dropped the other half tab of LSD each.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
We left on our walk with two goals in mind: 1) Glow sticks from the dollar store 2) food.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The detail which I mentioned we&#x27;d noted in the house was something we continued to notice in the outside world. I was wearing flip-flops and as I walked over a small patch of snow, some of the icy crystals melted on my toe. The intensity of the cold was profound, but the connection it made me feel to both my senses and the world around me trumped the discomfort of the cold. I drank in the sensation and told my friend of it. He had just had the same experience with the wind on his face. I noticed things I&#x27;d never noticed before on a street I&#x27;d driven down hundreds of times. A flag blowing above a garage, the smiles of the cars that were parked along its length, the sharp angles of the trees, the interplay between light and darkness. Walking past another patch of ice my friend stopped to admire a crack in its thickness and a tiny trickle of water that rushed down a rough trough carved in the ice. How did so many patterns and wonderful sights exist on such a short street?
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Interestingly, we&#x27;d walked down the same street the night before while stoned on the cannabis we smoked, but then the street seemed unusually long. It was new in it&#x27;s length, it made me realize that I&#x27;d never really focused on it as I drove up and down it, but because I was &#x27;in my head&#x27; I wasn&#x27;t on the street noticing its beauty. But now, now I was soaking it all in.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Cars drove by us and we felt at ease. If people wanted to approach us we&#x27;d speak to them, where the night before we&#x27;d have run. We could&#x27;t stop smiling and my friend pointed this out. Trying to frown engendered fits of laughter, focusing on the smile made us aware of the tension in our muscles that were so purposefully pulling up the corners of our lips. Unable to stop smiling we passed a family, a beautiful family unit as they walked by us. We wondered if they thought we were high, we didn&#x27;t care, we just wondered. A police car drove by us, we noted how attractive the female officer was, she wasn&#x27;t scary. We thought of Hunter S Thompson. We laughed and marched on.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Prior to entering the pizza shop we noted an incredible aspect of the LSD trip - we retained an incredible ability to ground ourselves if needed. We could pull ourselves together for long enough to make it through a normal interaction - this was interesting because it combatted the idea that making decisions was impossible on LSD. More media lies. We mustered some composure, ordered pizza and proceeded to sit on the sidewalk outside the shop for the 15 minutes required until the food was ready. 
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
At this point I had not experienced any real visuals, anything unusual - I&#x27;d merely paid attention to detail. My friend is much much smaller than I am and metabolizes drugs incredibly differently to me. In his body they seem to have a much faster onset and a much longer effect when we take the same dose. Accordingly, he&#x27;d been reporting seeing things move for about an hour. Sitting outside the pizza shop was no exception. He watched the parking lot pavement pulsate, he watched light posts bend and sway. I saw none of this. Together we saw a most beautiful flock of (real) birds swirl through the sky and rejoiced in the coming spring. We spoke about our readiness to take LSD, about how hallucinations could be terrifying for people who &lt;i&gt;needed&lt;/i&gt; their world to have rules or order, who needed black to be black and white to be white. We acknowledged our readiness to have black sometimes be white, to have white sometimes be black and to have a grey zone in the middle that was every shade of purple. It was our place and time in life, the confidence we had in our existence and path that allowed us to have such a mesmerizing experience with LSD and to accept its insights and breaking of the rules. &#x27;Who,&#x27; we wondered, &#x27;could ever say that what we were experiencing was bad?&#x27;
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
The pizza shop employees, having recognized our comfort on the sidewalk, were kind enough to bring our pizza out to us rather than waiting for us to go back into the shop for it. We thanked them profusely, inspired by their kindness.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
As we walked home I began to wonder about the interactions between all things. How was it that objects maintained distinct forms? How was it that objects interacted? Gravity doesn&#x27;t simply act between the earth and objects on the planet, but a gravitational force exists between everything. Between the parking lot and my sandal, between my sandal and my foot, between me and the tree 5 feet away from me. I told me friend about this, and we smiled at the way that we were connected to every object around us, to one another, to everyone. The air is filled with molecules with which we interact. We batted our hands in the air trying to feel the molecules we were hitting, wishing we could, being unable to, but knowing they were there. I consider myself an atheist, I don&#x27;t believe in an all powerful deity ruling over the world. I&#x27;m a man of science, and I believe that life happens, and that upon death there is also decay. Our bodies decompose, the molecular components are recycled. This didn&#x27;t change with LSD, but I admitted to my friend, for the first time in forever that I did believe in interconnection between all things - not godliness or spirituality, for the terms have been usurped by religions, but just an interconnectedness. And right then I felt connected.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Part 2 - Emotions and Engagement
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
We got back into the house, the warmth like a heartfelt embrace. My friend was famished and sat down to eat immediately. I couldn&#x27;t fathom the idea of food and somehow wound up on the ground in fits of hysterical laughter. I&#x27;m a person who likes to have fun no doubt, but I&#x27;m prone to about 4 to 6 real laughing fits a year. This was the second of 2012, and by far the most powerful. What a release to laugh, what a rush. My friend joined. Where would we go next!
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
At some point the music came back on. We stood with our backs to the wall and felt the bass reverberate through our bodies. But I couldn&#x27;t be contained by the wall. I danced.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
In order to further warm up, my friend and I decided to make tea. We systematically smelled each and every flavour of tea I had in my place. I chose my flavour, he chose his. We boiled the kettle, made the tea. I can&#x27;t remember when the empathy and hugging began, but, if it had been prior, it hadn&#x27;t been as profound as when the tea was made. I sipped mine, it was good, but not spectacular. I wanted to taste my friends. His was spectacular. I encouraged him to taste mine. He loved it. He loved it so much that he refused to take it when I offered it to him, he wanted me to enjoy what I had created. I told him the truth, that I wanted to trade because I preferred his. He preferred mine. We exchanged cups. We smiled. We&#x27;d exchanged for the better, but not only for our own better, but for the better of the other. What reciprocity!
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
We sat in the living room and I reminded my friend that he had told me he had two gifts for me this weekend that he&#x27;d told me about. One was intangible and had been given to me the night before - it was LOVE rolled into the joint he&#x27;d made (that&#x27;s not a drug reference, he simply meant that he&#x27;d rolled the joint with love in his heart). The other was tangible and he gave it to me now.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
In December 2011 this same friend and I had gone on an epic road trip through the southern United States. On a highway in Mississippi he&#x27;d asked me to stop the car suddenly. He opened his door, stuck his hand out of the car and picked up a rock. How many times had it been driven over, how many times had someone thought to stop and touch it, feel it, connect with it? He had this rock now. He gave it to me. He told me to have it. We agreed that the first one of us to die one day would be buried with the rock. I was humbled. Humbled that he still had the rock. Humbled that it meant so much to him. Humbled that despite that, it was a gift for me. Humbled that it would go to the grave.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Eating his pizza my friend decided he wanted vegetables. I had some red peppers in the fridge and went to the kitchen to get one. My friend joined me in the kitchen and stood against the counter staring at the floor. He asked if I could see it moving. I couldn&#x27;t. He insisted I look harder. I looked harder. I fixed my gaze. The linoleum began to shimmer and shine, the triangles of its pattern began to glimmer and vibrate. And suddenly, in a single moment the floor began to undulate. Distinct waveforms were occurring. They were going from side to side, and they were going back and forward. &#x27;YES!&#x27; I cried, &#x27;I see it!&#x27;
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Elated for me, and excited that I could share in his visuals, my friend turned to me, hugged me as I watched the floor wave on. What an embrace, it was so selfless, it wasn&#x27;t for his joy or pleasure, it was because of my ability to enjoy something he&#x27;d seen and marveled in. &#x27;That&#x27;s what I&#x27;ve been seeing for over an hour! Isn&#x27;t it incredible?&#x27; I agreed, how could I not, the rules of straight lines and solid floors were malleable - nothing is what it seems or as static as we are told it ought to be.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Next we decided to have 4 water experiences. We were going to drink water out of a glass, out of a pitcher, out of a water bottle and through a straw - I wondered if each would be different. But before we started my friend added a fifth water experience. He grabbed another red pepper, cut off the top and filled the bottom half with water. He invited me to take a sip. It was the most incredible water I&#x27;d ever had. The intensity of the smell upon bringing my nose to the pepper was wonderful. The naturalness of the flavour was heavenly - if only all water could taste like this. I closed my eyes and sipped and was immediately surrounded by green. It&#x27;s difficult to explain the extent of that green, because although my eyes were closed, the color was not merely in my minds eye. I saw myself as a small person on a red platform, surrounded extensively and on all sides by a deep natural green. The moment the sip was over, and the moment I opened my eyes the color faded. I pushed the pepper into my friend&#x27;s hand and told him to experience the same.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Something we noticed about the LSD trip to this point was that it had taken us places we never could have imagined we&#x27;d go. This wasn&#x27;t just like getting stoned on pot with silliness and, in my case, paranoia. This wasn&#x27;t like getting sluggish and uninhibited with alcohol. This wasn&#x27;t a simple empathic euphoria like MDMA. While we had been embraced by a myriad positive experiences to this point and a paucity of negative experiences, we hadn&#x27;t expected some of the thought experiments, visuals, and intensity of detail and emotion that we&#x27;d experienced thus far.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
I mention this because shortly after the pepper experience we both seemed to come down a little, and wondered if the trip was ending. I turned to my friend and said: &#x27;who knows where we&#x27;ll go next.&#x27;
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
There was no way we could have known.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
Less than a week before this experience I was accepted to a training program in a city that isn&#x27;t my home city. It will be away from my family and friends. I&#x27;m excited for it, but I had been living with a certain denial of the reality of leaving my loved ones behind. My friend had alluded earlier in the night to the fact that it would be hard when I left. We tried to brush this aside, not wanting to introduce the potentially painful reality of this transition into our trip. But in accord with our sign, issues had to be dealt with. I expressed to my friend that his friendship over the last 3 years had been transformative in my life, that the only reason it was going to be hard to say goodbye was because something valuable had happened. I told him I knew we&#x27;d be friends for eternity, that this was being solidified today. I told him we were freer people having had friends like this in our lives. I brought myself out of that denial of leaving - or so I thought.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
I can&#x27;t remember the actual sequence of events which lead to me bringing a scented candle and scented oil diffuser kit into the living room, but at some point I did. These had been a gift from my sister, my best friend. When my girlfriend had been in town a few weeks previously, I mentioned to my sister that I wanted to borrow her scented candles for the weekend for my girlfriend and I. She refused to let me have her big ones, and opted to give me a few scented tea lights. A week later when I saw my sister she had the kit which I now took into my living room waiting at her house for me. How kind, how sweet, how selfless.
&lt;br&gt;

&lt;br&gt;
I took the candle out of the box, I took the diffuser kit out of the box. I told my friend where they&#x27;d come from. And suddenly I felt a sharpness in my throat. I looked at the diffuser kit and said to my friend: &#x27;I&#x27;m not going to open this, I&#x27;m going to save it for my new house, so that my sister can always be with me.&#x27; He said that sounded perfect. I said I&#x27;d light the candle. We opened the diffuser bottle with the oil in it to see what it smelled like. The scent was as powerful as the emotion that it brought out. I was so blessed to have a sister like her, so blessed to have her love and her kindness, so blessed to be cared for and appreciated by that amazing girl. I tried to hold back the tears. I tried because I didn&#x27;t want to face the reality of moving away yet. But it was impossible.
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In a flash I was a crying mess, I was, as my friend later put it, breaking up (not down). He checked that my tears were of joy and not sadness, and I assured him they were. In respect for that my friend backed off to a couch and let me have my thoughts and tears. I asked for permission to break the no-cellphone policy and call my sister. Without hesitation my friend agreed.
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Hearing my sisters voice and being able to express my emotions to her was a validation like I haven&#x27;t had in ages. The tears were such a reprieve, the joy that followed immeasurable. I felt as though mother earth had bathed me in the purest fountain and I felt an inner peace and tranquility like I haven&#x27;t felt for ages. All the while, my friend sat on a couch across the room watching the interaction, he teared with me. I was honoured that he could witness that. Very few of my friends have ever seen me break up like that, I think all of them have been girls but this was different, this established a bond the likes of which my friend and I had the potential for, but had never established.
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My friend wanted to share the experience and told me that he was unsure what it was that would let him release. It took a while to be able to find the release, but we did nonetheless. It related to him being from out of town and missing his family, wanting them to know that he loved them, being amazed at what incredible people they were. I told him it was okay to cry, okay to miss them, okay to break up. Between fits of laughter and half tears we weren&#x27;t sure what was going to happen. But the the flood gates opened and my friend lay on the floor crying as well. Being on LSD he couldn&#x27;t exactly call his family at the time (my sister knew we were tripping that day, so I could call her without worry), but he cried. Earlier in our friendship this same friend had told me about a time in his undergraduate degree when he had been having a hard time and had been invited to spend the night at a friends place where they shared a bed and were just there for one another. I knew that that experience had meant the world to my friend and I had always wanted to have something similar, to solidify the depth of our friendship. As he lay crying on the ground, I put my arm around him, my other arm on his head and told him that it was okay, to let it out. He did. I cried with him, understanding the power of his emotion. The connection established at that moment was unlike any I&#x27;d had with a friend prior and transformative. There was now &lt;i&gt;nothing&lt;/i&gt; that my friend and I couldn&#x27;t say or do in front of one another, nothing at all - we&#x27;d transcended the limits of possibility and had gotten so much closer in the depths of the rabbit hole.
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&lt;br&gt;
Part 3 - Exhaustion and Endings
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&lt;br&gt;
It was difficult to transition from this deeply emotional state to one of mellowness and ease. The intensity of emotion, while being positive, had also been just that - particularly intense. The heat of the house was becoming oppressive and we began to question whether or not we were still having fun on this trip, not in a negative way, but in a curious way.
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&lt;br&gt;
We decided to go for a cigarette, and from there on another walk to buy cold drinks. The walk, while refreshing was, unlike the one before, tiring and long. I continued to question whether or not my friend was still enjoying the trip, really wanting him to be, but realizing that the more I agonized over this the less I was enjoying it. This isn&#x27;t to say that I wasn&#x27;t enjoying it, just that there was &#x27;something wrong&#x27; because of my wondering. Almost at the store we lay down on the ground. The crisp grass felt amazing on my body and the still night sky felt just as refreshing. I decided that I needed to lay down when we got home, not to sleep, but just to stop moving. Our minds had been moving at a mile a minute for about 5 hours now and our bodies hadn&#x27;t ceased either - a rest seemed like a good idea. 
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&lt;br&gt;
We bought our drinks and made the agonizingly long walk home. Reaching home I put on socks and shoes, got a blanket and moved to the backyard with my friend. I had a profound sense of akathisia (sensations of inter restlessness) at this point which was problematic because moving was exhausting, but laying down left me too still. I tried to focus on the sky with some success. I marveled at a tree which, bathed in light, seemed like it was covered in glass or crystals. I was mesmerized by a flock of white birds which glittered in the moon light and danced through the sky. 
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In the backyard my friend and I explored the definitions of mental health and objective reality. He got scared when he recounted a story from work, wherein a young man with psychosis told my friend about his hallucinations of an amish girl he saw at night, black holes for eyes, blood coming from various orifices when he looked closely. I was terrified that I wouldn&#x27;t be able to get the image out of my mind. Just then the gate of the back yard, which we&#x27;d walked through earlier in the night, creaked open and swung shut again. There was an eerie feeling of being in a true horror film. I advocated for my friend and I to leave and go back inside the house, but he said something amazing: &#x27;We know it&#x27;s just a gate, we know nothing bad can happen...let&#x27;s challenge the fear.&#x27;
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&lt;br&gt;
The profundity of that statement may seem benign, but given the intensity of the LSD emotions it was an incredible challenge to face the fear and an incredible reward to surmount it. As the fear faded my friend and I smiled at our success. We retreated inside not because of fear, but because of the cold. We had been successful.
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&lt;br&gt;
At this point we were exhausted, it was about 10 at night and the trip had been 6 hours long at this point. We went inside the house, played some more music and covered the living room floor in brightly colored towels. My friend feel in love with the pattern of one towel and expressed a desire to have one like it. I offered him the same one he grew to love. He smiled, asked if I was sure. How could I not share what I had with someone who&#x27;d gone down the rabbit hole with me, with someone I&#x27;d cried with as such. We embraced. 
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&lt;br&gt;
We made tea again, and I had one piece of the pizza (that was all the food I ate that day, the stimulant effect of the LSD acting as an anorexic and eliminating any hunger). We settled on the couch to watch Pirates of the Caribbean. It was exactly the relaxing activity we both needed, to be entertained and to no longer be entertaining ourselves and one another.
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At 10:30 we were confident the trip was over and we decided to take a half capsule of MDMA each. What followed is part of a different story, as the MDMA experience seemed distinct from the LSD trip. Needless to say, however, the empathy wrought by the MDMA was that much more powerful between my friend and I given the depth of friendship we&#x27;d built over the day.
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&lt;br&gt;
In all, this trip was incredible. It was deep, profound, inspiring and moving. We gained appreciation for detail and the connectedness of the world. We recognized the way in which every moment exists for both a moment and forever, how missing a moment means potentially missing a lifetime of memories and moments, how appreciating life for every moment enables one to live forever. We saw the floor move and saw the freedom in breaking the linear rules of the world. We had been free and had transcended the bounds of the possible and of reality. But most importantly, we had done it together, we had tripped as friends and emerged as something higher than friends.
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I&#x27;m writing this two days after the trip and I have yet to truly see how this trip will integrate itself into my life and to see what longstanding changes it will make. I didn&#x27;t appreciate the impact of MDMA in my life until a good week or so after taking it and so I harbour no delusions to fully understand the power of our experience yet, but I have no doubt that it was for the better and will ultimately give me insight into my life, my world and my friendships that I would have never gained without that tiny piece of paper covered in LSD.
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I will say that the trip was &lt;i&gt;far&lt;/i&gt; less visual that I understood LSD to be, perhaps it was the quality, perhaps it was the quantity or perhaps my understanding of the visuals is misguided due to the aforementioned media lies. All I know is that visual or not, LSD is an incredible substance that entices the user to explore the true workings of his or her mind, body and soul, makes lies impossible and makes truth beautiful. Perhaps this is only because, as I said before, my friend and I were ready for the trip. Perhaps (or, likely) the substance is horridly scary for those unable to face their inner truths - but that something as insight provoking as LSD is considered &#x27;wrong&#x27; is perhaps one of the wrongest things I can fathom. 
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It brought me joy and tears and depth and insight that, while being unsure of their permanent impact, I will never soon forget.
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Thank you Albert Hoffman. Thank you to my friend - that truly was the trip of a lifetime. Holy is our friendship.&lt;!-- End Body --&gt;
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&lt;table border=&quot;0&quot; cellpadding=&quot;5&quot; cellspacing=&quot;0&quot; class=&quot;footdata&quot;&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td width=&quot;700&quot;&gt;Exp Year: 2012&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td width=&quot;90&quot;&gt;ExpID: 95292&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Gender: Male&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td&gt; &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Age at time of experience: 26&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td&gt; &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Published: Mar 18, 2013&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td&gt;Views: 30,029&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td colspan=&quot;2&quot; align=&quot;center&quot;&gt;[ &lt;a href=&quot;exp.php?ID=95292&amp;amp;format=pdf&quot; type=&quot;text/pdf&quot;&gt;View as PDF (for printing)&lt;/a&gt; ] [ &lt;a href=&quot;exp_pdf.php?ID=95292&amp;amp;format=latex&quot;&gt;View as LaTeX (for geeks)&lt;/a&gt; ]
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&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td colspan=&quot;2&quot;&gt;LSD (2) : First Times (2), Glowing Experiences (4), Small Group (2-9) (17)&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
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