Some months back, a friend of mine told me about her experience with 5-MeO-DMT, sharing that it had changed her life perspective in various ways. In talking to this friend, I sensed a new "chill" from her I hadn't seen before. She referred me to "Celeste," a woman in Malibu who facilitates 5-MeO-DMT sessions, among other things. After a couple months, I was able to schedule my session.
I can't say that there was a specific reason I wanted to have this experience. Prior to the experience (and to this day) I would like to think that I was a generally normal, functional, well-adjusted human. Not without my flaws and self-defeating habits, of course, but nothing serious or harmful. Since my undergraduate studies in psychology, I have remained fascinated with anything related to how the brain works, so psychedlics interest me. I didn't really know what to expect from the experience. I had tried mushrooms and LSD in the past, though neither had a very memorable effect on me (could have been the dosage size). If my friend had attempted to describe her experience in any significant detail, I do not recall what it was and it must not have stuck with me. I now know that nothing I read or heard about the molecule would have truly prepared me for what I experienced.
September 23 came and I arrived at Celeste’s house at about 3:50 PM for my 4:00 appointment. I walked to the door, where a sign asked that we do not knock, and that someone would come out to bring me in. After a few minutes, a man named Chris, dressed in white, opened the door, greeting me with a hug. I was a bit caught off guard and the hug was a little awkward. I signed in and let him know I had made my donation via Venmo. He guided me down some stairs to the main room where Celeste was waiting, also dressed in white.
The room was spacious and well decorated. There was some padding and blankets in front of a shrine featuring a stone cut in the shape of a butterfly. A baby grand piano was nearby, which apparently doubled as Celeste’s bufo preparation station. The expansive Malibu ocean view made for a majestic backdrop as Celeste sat down in front of me, cross-legged. She explained the process to me, some background on where she sourced her bufo, and how the donations were used (she shares them with the Native American tribe that harvests the toad venom).
The time arrived. Celeste handed me a written prayer for me to read aloud, addressed to both a Heavenly Father and Mother. I have not prayed in a long time, and reading this prayer aloud in the presence of two other people felt quite moving. As soon as I finished the prayer, Celeste led me through some breathing exercises. Deep inhale/exhale. Again. On the third exhale, I emptied my lungs entirely. Celeste then brought the vaporizer to my lips and I inhaled as slowly as I could. It was a struggle to not gasp in more air, as all that was coming in was a slow trickle of venom smoke. I couldn’t help but release a puff, and then another, but struggled on. I felt my senses starting to warp and sharpen. Finally, Celeste removed the vaporizer and instructed me to inhale a short breath of air, to make sure the last of the smoke got into my lungs.
Words will never do justice to what I then experienced. In the blink of an eye my world shattered. I felt an extremely intense rippling sensation from my chest out through my arms, what I felt to be “me” being pulverized from my body. It was terrifying and felt like what I assume death must be. As "I" exited, I exclaimed loudly “WHAT THE…,” the sound of my voice like a gong reverberating through my head. Everything came into crisp, vivid, hyperfocus. I looked up at the window and ceiling as I fell backwards (supported by Celeste and Chris) onto the bedding. The wood ceiling fractured into a kaleidoscope of shapes. “I” periodically returned, moaning loudly in confusion. “No….what!?.....AHHH!....” The sounds echoed through me. I perceived no passage of time other than when I made noise or moved my body. Those instances punctuated the otherwise timeless experience. Celeste and Chris seemed like angels in their white clothing.
This experience was so powerful that, in the days following, the mere reflection on it seemed to bring it back in some tangible way. It would make my palms sweaty just thinking/feeling about it. The immediate effect of that molecule was like being plucked from reality and put into some type of hyper realistic video game. I was put in a space of nowhere, occasionally observing what my body continued to do in real time. Celeste and Chris must have been coming and going a bit, observing me in my experience. When their faces came into view, it was like they were floating around me.
At some point (about 10 minutes in, I was later told) I sat up and cupped Celeste’s face reflexively and desperately, putting my forehead to hers. I had no conscious control of my body. In that moment I was terrified, my ego returning with frantic pleas: “What is this?” “What’s happening to me?” “I don’t understand.” “Please help me.” She smiled and kept saying “you’re doing great.” While Celeste is a very beautiful woman, at that moment I recall perceiving her as the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, and I don’t think I’ll ever forget the image of her smiling face. It felt like all of this happened in about one or two minutes, though now I understand it was about 10-15.
As I came to and my ego returned, I looked around in wonder and confusion. I sat silent for a while, twisting into stretches as I struggled to understand what had just happened. I felt unusually limber and flexible. Celeste gave me water and a tangerine to help with the aftertaste of the venom. We talked for a while about my Mormon upbringing and how no so-called “spiritual” experience I ever had in connection with that religion could even begin to compare with what had just happened to me. At some point, I felt like I needed to cry. “Now’s the time to do it,” Celeste said. So I did. It had been a while.
My goodbye hugs to Celeste and Chris were much less awkward. I drove to an In-N-Out for a burger, per Celeste’s suggestion. I called and talked to Zarina on my way. I even made some other work-related calls—despite what I had just experienced, I felt fully capable and comfortable speaking normally about the otherwise mundane.
That Evening
That evening I wanted to be in darkness. Something about the light was distracting. I chatted with friends and wrote out some of these thoughts. I vaped a little bit of cannabis, which felt nice. While sleeping, I had a slight reactivation.
Saturday
The next day was going to be a busy one for me. I started with an errand, running some supplies to a friend. I had signed up for a yoga class and hit a traffic jam on my way there. Normally, I get quite anxious/agitated when I feel that I’m going to be late for something important to me and there’s nothing I can do about it. This time, the distress I felt at potentially missing the yoga class was still present, but much more subdued. I felt mild disappointment that, even if I made the class, I wouldn’t have time to prepare for it and get in a calm mindset.
I ended up just barely making it. When I arrived, the class had already started, and there was literally only one open space left for me to set out my mat. It felt like an object lesson about there always being a place for me in life, even if I don’t arrive there when I want to. The yoga class was downright amazing. Partly due to the teacher, a man in his mid to late 50s who I had seen in class before, not realizing he was a yoga teacher. He had a great voice and energy, and my flow/practice felt noticeably more focused and meaningful, but I can’t say it was entirely due to the teacher. Something felt different in my body. I recall feeling less bothered by the strain from holding the poses.
I went to a baby shower later that day for my friends Alice and Jarrod. One thing I noticed is that the bufo experience wrought no miracle on my social skills—i.e. it did not magically make me more talkative or extroverted. I felt a bit reserved and not really excited to talk to or meet strangers. Later, Laura and Jean showed up and I felt much more relaxed. I mostly wanted to talk about the experience, and related some of it to Laura. I had to leave the baby shower relatively early to head over to Drew and Jackie’s wedding in Laguna Beach.
I had three drinks at the wedding over the course of several hours. I think I was social enough with the people around me, though frequently I found myself staring into the candle in front of me on the table, reflecting on the experience. I mentioned it to Eddie. After getting home that night, I felt like it was somewhat difficult to recall the experience, and I wondered whether the alcohol had something to do with it. I vaporized some cannabis flower and that seemed to help. (Later, in listening to a book called “Entheogenic Liberation,” it was confirmed that alcohol dulls the effect of 5-MeO-DMT.)
***
It is now October 7 and I am in Hanoi. It’s been nearly two weeks since my bufo experience. It is harder for me to mentally summon the experience with the same poignancy as before. However, I have been experiencing slight reactivations while sleeping fairly frequently.
One such reactivation was last night. I think I may have entered a state of lucid dreaming during this reactivation. I became aware of the experience, while also aware that I was sleeping. I felt that I could open my eyes at any time, but was worried that if I did, I would disrupt the timeless sensation I was feeling in that moment.
My visuals were all in the eye of my imagination, but the kaleidoscope effect was present. I started to wonder whether I was in fact still in my original bufo experience and half expected to come out of it at any moment to find myself in Celeste’s house. I felt myself cycling through countless experiences, both real and imaginary/future, none of which I can now remember, but which in the moment felt important to me.
One thing I distinctly recalled was that I was not in a symmetrical position during this reactivation, which in the past I have found seemed to help facilitate the experiences. I was laying on my left side, and I felt that moving significantly simply would have taken me out of the experience. I could have been wrong about that, however, as I have had other reactivations where shifting to a symmetrical face-up position actually helped. I have also noticed that repeating the same types of “hums” I exhibited during the experience also seems to help.
It seems that at night while in bed is the best and only times I get reactivations. I’m getting more sensitized to what is happening in my body, so I feel that I am better able to enter that euphoric state more volitionally than before. I’ve also noticed that since my bufo experience, I no longer get that heart flicker/flutter that I would often get when thinking about something stressful in my life. I don’t think I can even purposefully summon it. It’s just…gone. It’s not that I don’t perceive some things as stressful or daunting, but that experience is now tangibly more subdued.
***
It's now October 23, the day I am originally posting this. Reactivations have mostly stopped. The memory of the experience is not nearly as present as it once was. However, I still can summon it to some degree. I do think the experience did something to me on a physiological level. I feel generally calmer, less impulsive, less interested in my usual indulgences, and more interested in a healthy lifestyle. It may sound trivial, but one day recently I decided to stop biting my nails, a lifelong habit that I do when feeling some level of anxiety. And after I made the decision, I just stopped. I sometimes feel the urge, but it's easier to resist.
After the session, Celeste said we were just peeling back one layer of the onion, so I am curious to see what effects future sessions will have, though I don't feel any compelling desire to do that again soon. I'm content to continue processing what I experienced and seeing whether some approximation of it can be accessed through something like meditation practice. I'm very new to this experience of the ego being the observer of our conscious experience--I've only ever heard it discussed in podcasts and audiobooks in the past, never really understanding what was meant. I'll be surprised if the experience provided by 5-MeO-DMT can be replicated without the effect of the molecule itself at sufficient dosage levels, but if so, that would be amazing. I'm going to try my first sensory deprivation experience next Friday, so more to come!
