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Beauty, Reverence and Insight
Cacti - T. peruvianus
Citation:   Fortunia. "Beauty, Reverence and Insight: An Experience with Cacti - T. peruvianus (exp96815)". Erowid.org. Apr 5, 2016. erowid.org/exp/96815

 
DOSE:
50 g oral Cacti - T. peruvianus (extract)
BODY WEIGHT: 127 lb
Drug use history: Cannabis - weekly 10+ years. Cocaine 1 year of regular use and then quit. Tobacco 5+ years of light use then quit. Alcohol socially 2x (or less) per month 10+ years. LSA (woodrose) twice. LSD 4 times. Mescaline cactus 5 times. (San Pedro 3x, Peruvian Torch 2x).

Other history: Meditation 10+ years. Dream study 10+ years. Lucid Dreaming practice weekly 7+ years.

100 grams of dried, finely ground Peruvian Torch cactus was extracted with 750 ml of 150 proof Vodka through a coffee filter. The liquid was then reduced to 30 ml over very low heat and the ethanol evaporate was collected for re-use.

T + 0 hr. 15 ml of this astringent, bitter tasting extract was diluted in 6 oz (180 ml) cold water and consumed slowly over 1 hour along with generous sips from a separate glass of water+sodium bicarbonate (baking soda). I consumed a total of two 6 oz glasses of water+baking soda along with the glass of diluted mescaline extract.
I consumed a total of two 6 oz glasses of water+baking soda along with the glass of diluted mescaline extract.


No food was consumed in the 16 hours prior to the dose. The dose was taken in the hour 5pm-6pm.

T + 2hr: After some initial nausea, but no vomiting, I am shivering (but not cold) and I am feeling the effects of the Mescaline. No way am I going outside. It is a beautiful sunny evening here, but I am too obviously under the influence to maintain in public.

I am feeling shaky and I have to go lie down. Closed eyed visuals are beyond amazing. I seem to have met a Peruvian shaman and my body/soul is filled with brilliant purified white light. I am seeing closed eye visuals of the shaman and then the vision switches to someone who seems to be in Tibet. Next I see images of a golden Buddha in a temple shimmering with jewels.

T + 4hr. I am really thirsty and my first food of the day was a cold from the fridge, fresh juicy red apple that I ate with great reverence and appreciation for everything that went into the moment that the apple became my food. The nausea is gone so the apple is graciously transferring its life force to me in my now settled stomach.

I took a bath and it was a beautiful experience. I thought very deeply about the beautiful gift of life and how grateful I am for mine. I thought about all the people who contributed to my being in this life. I appreciated every single miraculous inch of myself and every single good thing in my life. I decided that the few problems I have are just things that are not good for me that I must let go of. I can now see a clear and beautiful way to surmount a problem over time that had not occurred to me before.

The closed eye visuals now look like 2 dimensional Etruscan, Greek and Egyptian art along with what appears to be MesoAmerican hieroglyphs and Native American mescaline culture art. I am seeing connections here that I never noticed before.

T + 6 hr. I am peaking.

The closed eye visuals continue to be remarkable. I am seeing the most beautiful jewel-like, geometric images imaginable. If only I had a camera to capture them all. So exquisite, so beautiful and so profound. Beings, animals, flowers, and complex and simple thoughts all unfolding in serene abstraction and geometry.

The animals I am seeing in my closed eye visuals are rendered in beautiful 2 dimensional abstraction. All are birds except for one fish. With my eyes open, I keep seeing a gray, transparent shadow image of the abstracted fish superimposed on a white area of the room in low light.

The birds are rendered in beautiful, jeweled inlay. I see thunderbirds, phoenix, and vultures but an eagle has been appearing repeatedly. The eagle is the only bird in my closed eye visuals that seems to be alive. It keeps looking at me.

The beings are abstracted and angular. They have a sort of harsh beauty to them. One of them seems to be the 'Mescaline spirit'.

T + 9 hr. It is three hours past what should have been the peak, but I am still very strongly feeling the effects of the mescaline.

I go to my favorite chair, snuggle up in my favorite shirt and listen to music. I listen first to a playlist of chillwave and classic psychedelic music. The closed eye visuals are amazing with beautiful geometric shapes that change and spiral out into new images.

I spend some time thinking about several people whose behavior and attitude frustrate, confuse and annoy me. I see their own emptiness and confusion and I feel compassion. I realize that their frequently expressed disdain is really just projection. They are simply attacking something they cannot accept in themselves. They cannot see that they are actually fighting something within. This is a concept I understand sober, but I had never made the connection with these specific individuals until now.

After my playlist is up I switch my music to shuffle. I was astonished at the conflicted, unconscious, harsh ugliness of some of the music (and singers) that I thought sounded great sober. The songs are profoundly ugly and uninspired and I wonder how they managed to become hits. I ask myself why these shallow, empty singers became so popular. My conclusion is that it is a reflection of the values of mass market consumer society. While contemplating this, I don't feel contempt for the empty, confused, conflicted people in the world. I simply feel compassion.

The closed eye visuals are interesting. I am seeing a bright white light and images of someone reaching a summit. I seem to be looking at something in Ancient Greece.

Thinking about music again I find myself craving something perfectly beautiful. I want to listen to classical music right now, but I don't have any classical MP3's.

T + 12 hr. Sunrise will be here shortly and I really want to go down to the beach to greet the dawn, but I don't want to risk encountering uncomprehending people. I am still very much feeling the effects of the mescaline. I decide to go outside, but I stay in my yard.

Outside it is clear, beautiful and jewel-like. The scenery is exquisite. The Moon is directly overhead. Venus and Jupiter are rising as a pair before the Sun. I think about the traditional meaning of this combination. It is Love and Goodwill and I am very much feeling that right now.

T + 15 hr. I am having an out of character sort of morning. The sun is pouring in through the windows and skylights and Vivaldi is playing on the radio. I cannot remember the last time I listened to classical. I also cannot remember the last time I turned on the morning cable news and then turned it off to listen to classical music and my own thoughts. Actually, I don't remember ever having done that before.

I am still not sober, but I feel really calm, refreshed and relaxed. I was thinking about breakfast and I have a taste for pancakes. Only this time I just want some buttered buckwheat pancakes and some fresh fruit. I am not a vegetarian and I really like white flour pancakes with syrup, eggs and sausage but at the moment meat is not appealing - unless the animal is honorably and ritually sacrificed for my food. I am feeling very grateful for every living thing has ever sacrificed its life for mine.

T + 28 hr. The mescaline gently wore off by the 20 hour mark. I took a 2 hour nap afterward and I feel really good. There is no negative hangover, just a sense of focused calm and a continued heightened awareness of, and sensitivity to, 'ugliness' in all its forms: visual, emotional, social and auditory. After listening to a classical music station for a few hours, I later switched to a New Age music station and that played for the rest of the day. Normally, I never, ever listen to New Age music! I am not a vegetarian, but so far I still don't have a taste for meat. I am fairly certain I will have chicken, steak or sausage in a few days though. I suspect the effect on my musical taste might be more lasting, but time will tell.

My takeaway from this has been positive. I don't plan to take Mescaline again any time soon, it is too intense for casual use. The last time I took it was 3 years ago.

Observations: To me, Peruvian Torch is a somewhat different, heavier trip than San Pedro. Peruvianus is mildly agitating. It lacks the lip/body numbness and lethargy that I experienced with San Pedro. Peruvianus also did not cause the 'flying over the landscape of the earth' visions I had with San Pedro.

Mescaline was not the first drug I ever tried, and I feel that my previous experience with high quality cannabis and meditation helped make me feel comfortable in Mescaline's long-lasting, altered state of consciousness.

For me, Mescaline is spiritual experience, not a shallow escape from reality. I found that Mescaline brought me face to face with my own inner reality. I noticed that if I had anger, conflicts or internal demons they appeared to be presented to me as closed-eye visions of violent and disturbing beings. Approaching the experience with a sense of love, openness and reverence seems to tame these 'beings' and reduces the risk of a bad trip. Just like they say, setting and intent are important.

Exp Year: 2012ExpID: 96815
Gender: Female 
Age at time of experience: 35
Published: Apr 5, 2016Views: 5,970
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Cacti - T. peruvianus (69) : Alone (16), Glowing Experiences (4)

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