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Somebody Else's Consciousness
Salvia divinorum (7x enhanced leaf)
Citation:   Snuffy. "Somebody Else's Consciousness: An Experience with Salvia divinorum (7x enhanced leaf) (exp16112)". Erowid.org. Aug 11, 2005. erowid.org/exp/16112

 
DOSE:
0.5 g smoked Salvia divinorum (dried)
BODY WEIGHT: 215 lb
Hi everyone! I'd like to share my most recent Salvia trip with you all. It has reinforced my interest in and curiosity about this herb's 'magic', as well as introducing a perhaps well-founded apprehension over it's intensity...

(First, a quick observation: These things I 'see' while on Salvia are extremely mind-oriented, not 'concrete' - the closest thing I can compare them to is a vague yet utterly convincing dream-state. In my case, at least, when I (feel a desire to) open my eyes during one of the 'Salvia scenes', I can still see my room, and myself, and everything is as real as it should be, excepting a very slight haze or brightness, at times. But upon closing the eyes, I am again 'taken back' to whatever scene (or person!) I'd just had the sense of inhabiting...)

The Setting: Home alone, watching a romantic movie on TV - something I usually avoid doing, as it often induces bitter thoughts on a past relationship... Sure enough, a smooshy scene came up, and I retreated to my room in disgust. Hoping for a quick way to take my mind off 'her', I rather crabbily stuffed my little marble pipe with about 1/4 gram of my homemade 'enhanced' dried Salvia leaf, lit it and took a few hits, holding each in for as long as I could, but also letting a fair amount of leaf burn away, unsmoked, not wanting to draw in so much that it burned my throat (which just isn't fun).

Closing my eyes and perching on my bed, I soon 'sensed' that I was a young French man, in a late 19th Century European setting, sitting on a head-level window ledge on some sort of cathedral-designed building. An older female that I (-as the French man!) knew was calling in the foreground, saying that I shouldn't be sitting there, and to come down off it (the window ledge). At the same time, I had a very odd sensation of really _being_ this young man - of having HIS thoughts, and HIS reactions to the lady calling to him, and HIS desire to sit there... It was very much like I had somehow dropped my own consciousness and 'picked up' someone else's..!

However, coming out of the trip, I noted how the movie I'd just been watching did have French main character (albeit female), along with some similar-looking buildings, so this was pretty much an 'induced' setting, I assumed...

A bit disappointed (that the trip had apparently been 'suggestible'), but still intrigued and quite excited, I 'shook it off' enough to get down from my bed and take a couple more big hits off the same pipe bowl...

Next thing I knew, I sensed that a man called 'Big Bear' (apparently a head member of a Native tribe I was a part of) was 'going to get mad' if I didn't clean out my pipe..! I would briefly drift in an out of my normal consciousness, at several points looking down and noticing, with surprise, that my finger was blackened from having used it to wipe the ashes out of my pipe into a can...! I then noticed that I was picking bits of paper off the floor I was now sitting on, so 'Big Bear' wouldn't get mad (-apparently this 'Big Bear' fellow is a neat freak...)

That wore off a few minutes later, and I was left a tad bewildered and more than a tad blown-away, sitting on the floor of my bedroom. By this time, only about 20 minutes has passed since my first hit... (I kept watching the clock whenever I was 'clear' enough, which would happen every 5 minutes or so, on average.)

I stuffed another 1/4 gram into my pipe, and drew the smoke in... Suddenly, I was standing up (the lights had always been on), looking at myself in the mirror on my wall, and saying to my self, excitedly: 'Holy Sh*t! Holy SH*T!', oven and over... This is what gets hard to explain, but I'll try - that's what I'm here for, right..! ; ) I had a sensation of something amazing having occured on a mental/perceptual level, but I was as yet unable to form a verbal idea of WHAT exactly it was that had just 'shifted' in my mind... I moved from the floor to the mirror, noting that everything in my room, including myself, still looked the same, but - I finally came to decide - I was seeing things from somebody else's consciousness...!

Frankly, it seems more than a little silly to me now... ;p But I was absolutely convinced, beyond a doubt, that I had somehow 'adopted' somebody else's conscious perception. I felt the life energy of another person - different, yet pleasantly so - reverberating through my mind and body. More specifically, it was as though 'I' (the core of myself, the observer) was placed 'on top' of another part of myself, which had just 'borrowed' some stranger's mind..! 'Blown away', is again, the word of the hour!

Not surprisingly, I took another couple of hits off my pipe... (Strangely enough, as intense as the mental stuff was, my physical coordination was never more than a bit slowed down). The strange mental perception sensation continued, only now, I was determined to somehow find out: WHOM was I 'borrowing' some consciousness from??? I sat in front of my bed on the floor and tried to quiet my mind a bit more, asking (myself, or whoever) a bit cynically, 'Ok, then WHO is it?'... I eventually 'decided' that it was the consciousness of a 16-year old girl, born on Jan 18, 1986 in 'Manchester' - New York or New Hampsire (not clear which), USA.

'Ok, fine - but I think it's kind of rude to be 'possessing' somebody's consciousness, and I don't see what it could be good for...!'

By the time an hour or so had rolled by, I'd decided that I shouldn't be doing this (whatever _this_ was!) to whomever that girl was - harmless as it might be... I just felt like I was being invasive, really, and also I was getting a bit annoyed with the persistence and length of the 'trip'! I made myself get into bed, and finally, I fell asleep.

I woke the next day, feeling as much 'myself' as usual, but still clearly remembering my odd experience of several hours before...

What can I say?!? I'll probably do that Salvia again, but I'd be hesitant to do _quite_ so much. Other than that, it was sure as heck a good way to distract myself! I'd just like to see something more useful come out of it than feeling like I've possessed somebody..! ; ) Take Care, All!

Exp Year: 2002ExpID: 16112
Gender: Not Specified 
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Aug 11, 2005Views: 16,925
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Salvia divinorum (44) : Entities / Beings (37), General (1), Alone (16)

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