From time to time the subject of psychedelics arises here so I thought I would finally give it a home, but I was not sure were to put it. So, while I do not want to give it its own subsection; nonetheless, we need to put it somewhere, so why not under 'Samadhi' where it will be understood as chemically induced altered states of consciousness and how this subject relates to our focus here, which is following the Noble Eightfold Path and practicing meditation correctly leads to altered states of consciousness and how those states relate to chemically induced states of consciousness.
My journey to the Noble Eightfold Path and the daily practice of meditation, which led me to the states of consciousness that are associated with samadhi, took me through some abuse of drugs and alcohol having grown up in a western dysfunctional family system which exhibited a fair amount of abuse of alcohol and child abuse. My parents were working alcoholics, which means they responsibly went off to work and drank heavily after they got home from work on a daily basis. So, based upon observed behavior of my role models I began drinking heavily Friday and Saturday nights in junior high school. I believe it was by my sophomore year that I was introduced to marijuana. I found marijuana a far better drug than alcohol because alcohol made me sick; whereas, marijuana did not. By my junior year in high school I began to experiment with psychedelics, which was mostly done with a type of LSD known then as "windowpane."
My experiences on LSD were profound and always intensely blissful. I started out taking LSD on the streets of the small town I lived in in Southern New Jersey, Haddonfield. It was a safe town to wonder the streets on Friday and Saturday nights, and this is how drinking alcohol that had been taken from one of our parent's liquor cabinet led to smoking marijuana and smoking cigarettes while walking down the street to smoking marijuana to putting a tiny pill in our mouths and walking down the street until the street started to wobble and the limbs of trees became the friendly and loving embrace of nature, to paisley-like brightly colored patterns of light to profound altered states of consciousness and Out-of-Body experiences. I was so moved by the intense feelings of bliss that I was experiencing under LSD and finding no love or affection at home that LSD became a weekend occupation for me. By my 21st birthday I had moved from taking small doses of LSD, 1/4 tab, to taking mega-doses of 12 tabs of windowpane. That was my last trip. It was so profound, and I had already been practicing meditation daily and experiencing the states of samadhi, that I gave up taking drugs altogether and took up a radical healthy contemplative lifestyle. This is how I became a dedicated contemplative.
