DOSE:

0.5 bowls

smoked

Salvia divinorum

(extract)

[Erowid Note: The dose described in this report is very high, potentially beyond Erowid's 'heavy' range, and could pose serious health risks or result in unwanted, extreme effects. Sometimes extremely high doses reported are errors rather than actual doses used.]

BACKGROUND

I had wanted to get hold of a hallucinogen for a while - it was the wrong season for mushrooms, acid seemed to have evaporated from the area and the only person I know who deals 2c-b didn't have any in. I have tried legal hallucinogens - Hawaiian Baby Woodrose seeds, Morning glory and Amanita Muscaria before with no great effect - certainly no open eye visuals (something I have never experienced). I have also tried disasociatives such as ketamine and ether - again with no response other than being unable to move for a while, even after taking a whole gram of ketamine in one go.
MDMA completely failed to do anything in terms of hallucinations, even when a whole gram was consumed in one go. I have never tried acid or mushrooms, so I don't know if those potent hallucinogens will work for me. So, in a desperate search for something to make me hallucinate, I found Salvia. I looked online and found a site offering 2 grams of 60x extract (cherry flavored) for 30 pounds sterling, which I bought.

SET AND SETTING

When it arrived I went outside, as the sun was lancing down on the grass - a rare enough experience in England, and one I wanted to enjoy. I sat on the lawn and rested up against a small garden wall, turned on my iPod and selected 'Cody' by 'Mogwai' and put it on a loop. All of this was to ensure that the 'setting' was correct - Cody is one of the most relaxing songs in existence, the sun is glorious and I was in the safety of my own garden, comfortably resting in the light. I breathed deeply and slowly to induce a state of calm so that the 'set' would be correct. I had seen bad trips and I had heard how powerful it was - I wanted to minimize the risks of following this.

PREPARATION AND COMSUMPTION

So I took out one of the vials and half loaded my pipe bowl - It can't have been more than 1/8th of the gram - probably more like 1/10th. I have no apparatus for measuring such small masses, so I couldn't check. The smell of cherry was instantly strong and overpowering - that's what you get for ordering cherry flavor. Unlike when smoking tobacco through the pipe, I didn't try to light it and allow it to burn down - I held the flame above the pipe and then drew a deep long breath into my lungs - I kept drawing until the material in the pipe had turned to ash before I extinguished the lighter flame.

It was painfully hot - not something that someone who has never smoked before is going to be able to do first time. I have smoked both tobacco and cannabis in the past, so I have a tolerance to the pain. Nonetheless, it was still painful for me, especially as I had to hold it down for 20-30 seconds. I tried counting in my head as I held it, reaching 20 before I released the lungful. This is not an accurate measurement of time as I did not start to count until I had drawn all the smoke in, and the material was incinerated - which took 5-10 seconds. Also towards the end of my counting I became confused as the salvia kicked in so my measurement of seconds is subject to doubt.


ONSET AND PYSICAL EFFECT
After 15 seconds the effects of the salvia became apparent, by 20 I was sweating profusely, my body felt uncomfortably hot and sticky and my jaw began to have a feeling of a certain shooting rigidity - almost like a muscle clenched that I couldn't unclench. My clothing became uncomfortable and I had a strong urge to take it off (which I resisted). During this time I controlled myself, and did not move from my spot, even though I had the urge to dash to the shower to cool myself down. I forced myself to relax and accept the sweating and great discomfort.

VISUAL EFFECTS

I was expecting some kind of vivid imagery - to see things that were odd or curiously out of the usual - my garden remained as it was, although the grass did appear to be rising to meet me without moving at all - the usual mild distortions and long lived after images that I have experienced before. Some may call these hallucinations - but if they are all that is to be experienced through hallucinogens I can barley understand the attraction of them. They were nothing like the kaleidoscopic LSD visuals I had seen depicted in art, nor were they like the MDMA induced experiences my friends had had - seeing dead kings on biers born through night clubs etcetera. It was remarkably boring in terms of visual effects.

MENTAL EFFECTS

At the time I was in a confused mental state - when I closed my eyes I came to believe that there were people around me, but when I opened them again, it became apparent that it was a delusion rather than a hallucination. However, when I closed my eyes again, for a sustained period of around 5 minutes I certainly felt strongly delirious - it was not that I saw anything at all - only the darkness under my eye lids - but that it seemed that there were two ways to look at things - I was solidly fixed in reality, seeing what was there only, smelling and touching and hearing only what was there - but I could see how others could slip into another world where imagination became super-imposed on reality. I could feel suggestions from that world. I am using world in a strongly figurative sense – I am an Atheist – when I say world I mean that some can break through the mental barrier that separates imagination from invading reality under the influence of drugs or otherwise, and some cannot so easily.

The suggestions came across not as reality but as suggestions as to what reality could be. Thus I knew that I was sitting on the grass with my back against the wall, but I also knew that I could be in a different reality, in this case a lilting octagonal tower, with people calling me from each parapet. I did not come to believe that I was in the octagonal tower, but the idea became suddenly apparent and forcefully suggested – “You are not, but you might be”.

Still it was not a sensory hallucination – I had no sensation of sight or touch or smell of the octagonal tower, it was just a thought – all the time that I was thinking of it I still saw the inside of my eyelids, and felt the grass under my hands, and smelt the smoke and cherry and fresh clippings. It was such a full on, sensory experience that I had wanted – I have dreamt more powerfully and certainly less uncomfortably before – and again, I was let down. After 10 minutes at most the sweating died down, and the comfortability with it – I was left with a deep feeling of relaxation which, too, left 10 minutes afterwards.

EVALUATION

As to whether it was “worth it” or not – I got the salvia at the best price I could find (₤,15 for 1 gram), and perhaps it was worth it just to be able to know that it doesn’t work for me. I have more left so, before I post this I will try it again a few times – some people have indicated that there is a reverse tolerance.

Summary:

Dosage – 1/10th of a gram, 60x extract
Consumption methods – smoked in a metal pipe
Set and Setting – positive
Experience – Neutral

EDIT: I have tried it again and again with no real difference. It is still as powerfully uncomfortable every time.

Exp Year: 2007	ExpID: 63665
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: May 24, 2008	Views: 9,042
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Salvia divinorum (44) : Alone (16), First Times (2)