By Phillip Smith | AlterNet.org
Have you encountered stick men, machine elves or other discarnate entities while tripping brains on DMT? If so, you're not alone. The use of the powerful, fast-acting psychedelic dimethyltryptamine (DMT) generates reports of such entities on a regular basis.
DMT has been around for a long time, although it's never been that popular—and encounters with extradimensional critters may be part of the reason why. Back in the 1970s, it was known as “the businessman's trip” because you could take it at the beginning of the lunch hour and be back to normal it was time to go back to work. When smoked, the psychedelic effects begin almost immediately and fade away with half an hour.
It's also the active psychoactive ingredient in ayahuasca, the mind-melting tea concocted by Amazonian shamans and venerated by the Uniao Do Vegetal (the Union of the Vegetable), a Brazilian church with some 15,000 adherents.
In an article in Psychology Today, Scott McGreal zeroed in on DMT's remarkable ability to allow its users to “encounter non-human intelligence, often resembling aliens.” What's more, McGreal notes, citing the work of pioneering DMT researcher psychiatrist Rick Strassman, “some users come away from these encounters convinced that these entities are somehow real.”
Strassman, who detailed his 1990s research findings in DMT: The Spirit Molecule, explained that under high doses of DMT, experienced volunteer subjects experienced rapid and overwhelming psychedelic effects, losing awareness of their surroundings and their bodies as the effects peaked at around two minutes. After the initial rush, the subjects were able to describe their continuing experience and generally reported visual imagery that could be seen with eyes open or closed; brighter, more intense, and more deeply-saturated colors, and kaleidoscopic geometric patterns.
According to Strassman, “about half” the subjects went even further, entering into what he called “freestanding, independent levels of existence” of a most unusual nature. There, they said they encountered intelligent “beings,” “entities,” “aliens,” or “guides.” They described them as “clowns, reptiles, mantises, bees, spiders, cacti, and stick figures.”
