[colordrops]

Mindfulness meditation as taught by Thich Nhat Hanh; pieced together practices from dozens of other meditation books. Lots of reading in philosophy. Some limited study of the occult and magick. Ritualistic psytrance parties; LSD and mushrooms.

[bayindirh]

Mixing practices considered harmful even if practices itself are not.

Every practice regimen has a bigger system in work so, mixing and matching can create havoc on your body.

Adding LSD and mushrooms on top of it is just lighting a big fire and calling storm on you.

I'm not against LSD, mushrooms or other practice systems, but never seen any positive outcome from these kinds of experiments.

Please, don't do it.

[colordrops]

Understood. This was over 20 years ago. I've been recently picking up meditation practices again and approaching them unadulterated. Focusing on a particular type of buddhist meditation at the moment.

[bayindirh]

Wish your practices bring you the peace and happiness you're looking for. Good luck. :)

[kritiko]

That seems to put a lot of faith in the claims of these systems. I get the sense that now that you can learn this stuff from the internet vs. going to live in a monastery, you get a lot more mix-n-match, even from teachers who are credentialed in a specific tradition.

Michael Pollan’s How to Change Your Mind has lots of stories of people having positive psychedelic therapy, which does require essentially a spiritual guide.

[bayindirh]

It depends. Some systems work, some don't. Some systems work for some people, some work for others.

I personally changed a lot with the help of the practice I do. I've faced my phobias, solved a lot of self-confidence issues, found out what's wrong with me. I've also got therapy before starting Zen. While it helped me somehow, it failed to solve the underlying issue. Zen helped me to tackle the underlying issue and move forward.

To work with a good master, you don't need to always go to a monastery and, change your life temporarily. I left nothing behind. Still live in the city. Just go to see my master from time to time. Will continue when the pandemic ends.

I had an instructor in the city, who's also a student of the same master, but he passed away due to COVID-19.

Every tradition and way contains elements from each other, but these ways find the compatible combinations and way to build upon them. Also a master/student relationship helps to guide the student in the harder times. Internet doesn't provide the guidance and safeguards, unfortunately.

As an instructor, I keep track of my every student independently. Otherwise, there's no meaning doing what I do. They also call me when things go awry and we work through it together, and we both learn in the process.

Zen, Buddhism or anything is not the only way. There are many ways to do it.

[Bumkatio]

Somehow this comes across to me like you tried to fuck your reality up.

I'm very curious on what was your main goal to achive?

[colordrops]

Good question - I didn't have a very clear goal other than to know/experience the ultimate "truth" or "nature", whatever it is, assuming it even exists. I was a very undisciplined young adult at the time.