Re: 4:20

Keith, are you equating the use of hallucinatory drugs with the mystical experience that occurs with hard meditation? I've never experienced either high, so I don't know what to say. When I was doing my research on Rock n' Roll and the occult I came across a book by Alduous Huxley called The Doors of Perception. The book is a carefully written, first person study of the effects of mescaline. Huxley used the drug himself and then wrote about his mystical experiences. He describes transcending the mind and matter to see "suchness" in everything. The end result to my ears sounds very similar to the idea of transcending to "the one" (was it the Platonist who wrote about that?). Huxley hypothesized that the hallucinatory drug was opening his "doors of perception"-- which is, incidentally, where Jim Morrison derived the name for his band. I'm not recommending this book. In fact, when I read it myself I had a sort of uneasy feeling about the whole thing, but the idea is interesting and, I think, worth some discussion. Your idea about giving a high to people who are not mature enough to handle it is interesting, though I wonder what (if any) are the inherent differences, regardless of the person experiencing the high or connection to the spiritual, or however you want to most fairly describe the experience.