Thanks so much, everyone, for sending prayers and love to Kate and her mother. Kate emailed me sharing how grateful she is for all of you. 

As for the radio show yesterday, we all had so much fun. Erik was in fine form, as usual, and Jamie had to do some major “bleeping” throughout. I’m sure Sheila will send me the link to the recorded show, and I’ll post it when I get it. Now let’s see what Erik says about one of his favorite subjects! 

Me: What’s the effect of Ecstasy on anxiety, depression, borderline personality and other mental illnesses delivered in a medical psychiatric environment? We’ve covered this with other illegal drugs, but not with Ecstasy. Tell me about that.

Erik: I like it a lot.

Jamie (To Erik, laughing): Oh, Erik!

Jamie and I both laugh.

Erik: In terms of helping to heal the body?

Me: Mm hm. Yeah, or any spiritual benefits. spiritual journey and all that.

Erik: Well, first of all let’s define real Ecstasy versus kitchen sink Ecstasy.

Huh? There are different forms?

Erik: Ecstasy doesn’t have the visual, trippy effects. Your eyes stay the same, but your body has this sensation that any touch that comes its way is just delightful, wonderful. I think it would be extremely beneficial for those who are having anxiety about intimacy.

(Pause)

Jamie (Frustrated): He just went to talking so fast. He got on to sex therapy—going with a professional sex therapist—about the safety of intimate touch, being with your partner and being able to go into a drug-induced state where your boundaries are relaxed and you’re in a very private setting, very secure.

Erik: The mind doesn’t wander. The mind, on Ecstasy, is looking for delightful experiences: sounds, touch. Even combing your hair can be an incredible experience.

Me: Hm. Not that you ever did it!

Jamie is giggling at whatever Erik just said,

Me: No, no! I mean never combing your hair, not taking Ecstasy.

Jamie: Yeah, yeah. He got it. He goes, “Why does someone so good-looking have to touch that?”

Can you hear my eyes rolling?

Erik: This would unlock certain parts of the mind that stayed closed because of poor judgment or an injury. And even if we take it out of a sexual content and just open it up more towards treating introverts.

Me: Mm hm.

Erik: You know, they don’t really want to be overwhelmed by people or sound or chitchat, things of that nature. So, imagine if they were able to be hosted during a drug-induced state with Ecstasy and put into, not an overwhelming situation, but a situation where they feel like they can engage with the music, the sound, the environment and then upon coming out of it, be able to recognize that regardless of the circumstances, they’re still in control. The introvert or personality disorder doesn’t have to run their life. Through having this experience, it gives them the knowledge that they have the power to control whatever’s happening to them. Most people just surrender to the idea that if they have a personality disorder or some kind of tic or whatever that that’s who they are, and they can’t change their brain. They think they’re just  hard-wired that way.

Me: Mm hm.

Don’t you just love my contribution to these discussions?

Erik: Well, it’s not really hard-wired that way; it’s just that you’ve either reached a limit in whatever area we’re looking at. Maybe it’s conversation or intimacy, you know, being in the public, and you shut down. And people think that if they naturally shut down, then that’s their limit, and they shouldn’t go beyond that. That’s the bullshit part, because you can train yourself, teach yourself, or do something extreme like [Ecstasy] which allows yourself to step out of the norm. The use of drugs—this is going to be hard to digest for many people but I stand by this.

Jamie: I cut my eyes over at him and he goes, “It’s okay, Jamie.”

I chuckle.

Erik: The use of drugs gives you this understanding that you are bigger than what your brain tells you that you are. You are different than what your conscious brain tells you that you are. You are allowed to access that underlying current that you have naturally but choose not to use, and mostly you choose not to use it because you feel like you don’t have the strength, that maybe it doesn’t resonate with you or that you’re unaware of it. It should be on everybody’s fucking plate.

I get really nervous about this, but the guy’s allowed to have his own opinion, I guess.

Me: Okay, so let me just confirm this. What you’re saying is that even while you’re not on it, once you had that experience, it’s taken down those borders and makes you realize that your brain does not control you. You carry that on even though you’re no longer on it?

Erik: Yes!

Me: Okay. Does it do anything about vulnerability? Does it help you become comfortable with being vulnerable?

Erik: Absolutely, because if you’re in a controlled, guided use of this drug, whether you’re in a private or pubic setting, the safety that the person who’s hosting you, that safety that that person gives you, that will carry over. They’re not going to tell you what to say or do. They’re just going to make sure you’re okay and that you’re safe. So, when you come out of it, you realized that all of the experiences that you had and that you weren’t being told no or that it was wrong. You followed your intuitive instinct or what you wanted or what you needed. So when you come out of it, you recognize that the choices that you were making weren’t governed by the personality trait that keeps you in a box or contained and you did okay. You didn’t suffer. You didn’t die.

Me: Yeah, that’s true, but all these drugs, we’re going to put this on the blog so what do you say about the fact that these are illegal? You’re sounding like you’re condoning it.

Erik: No, for this—now I get really pissed that marijuana is illegal. I believe that alcohol should be illegal and marijuana should be legal. You wouldn’t have drunk driving. You know you don’t have “high driving”. “I was high driving and wrecked at speeds of 70 miles an hour.”

Me: If anything they’d probably be going 10 miles an hour.

Erik: That shit just doesn’t happen! But with the hallucinogens, I’m all for them being illegal. I’m all for it not being accessible to the everyday person.

Me: For recreational use.

Erik: Yeah, for recreational use.

Me: But for medical use…

Erik: Ahh!

Jamie (giggling): I nailed that sound by the way.

Me: That’s good!

Jamie (still giggling): That’s exactly how he just did it! It made him laugh. He was like, “Wow!”

(Pause)

Jamie: I threw myself off a little bit on that one.

Erik: It should be in every therapist’s repertoire. There should be a specific therapist that works with hallucinogenic drugs.

Me: Oh! Yeah!

Erik: You know, someone who’s able to journey a person. Just fucking think about it!

Jamie (laughing): His hand gestures are getting a little big right now! I told him he looks part Jewish right now. He cracked up.

Me: Or Italian, too.

Jamie: Italian, definitely. The arms, they’re up!

Erik: Think about it. In other cultures they actually harness the hallucinogens, and they have journeys. Native American Indians, all over South America—Ayahuasca—aborigines, all of these cultures have the common use of these drugs that helps them journey in their human life and helps them understand their human life better. But oh no, not the modern day humans.

What? These cultures aren’t modern?

Erik: “Oh no! Not the modern day humans! That’s negative; that’s bad.” That’s bullshit.

Me: Why is our country like that? Is it because we have such puritanical roots, or is it more than that?

Erik: It’s more than that. Going beyond control, it’s misunderstanding.

Me: Hmm.

(Pause)

Me: Is that it?

Jamie: No, he’s kind of talking about marketing.

That’s a pet peeve of his. I brace myself for the rant, but it never comes.

Me: Is it like Big Pharma trying to block it?

Erik: Bingo.

Me: I figured. What about opening up autistics? Would that help for that?

Erik: Marijuana does.

Me: Okay. But if ecstasy helps loosen boundaries—

Erik: Yeah, it can for autistic kids, especially—

Jamie (to Erik): Wait. What?

(Long pause)

Jamie: I have no idea. He’s talking about on the spectrum, he’s telling me they don’t even really use Asperger’s anymore. That’s gone.

Me: Yeah. It’s all a part of the autistic spectrum.

Jamie: Oh, I thought Asperger’s was on the autistic spectrum.

Me: It is. It’s just that there’s really a blur between the different disorders on the spectrum that they don’t define each one separately. They don’t stick with these labels as much.

Jamie: Oh, okay. He’s trying to teach me something, but apparently I’m not learning that well this morning!

Jamie giggles.

Erik: Yes, it would help. It—

Me: Now what are we talking about, Ecstasy, LSD, all hallucinogens, what?

Erik: I would—and I’m sure people who have taken this will understand what I’m about to say—I would look at how the drug affects the human body, and then I would look at the personality and the illness that the person has, and I would match them up.

Me: Mm hm. And obviously this would have to be done in a safe, controlled psychiatric environment.

Erik: Oh, yeah! Can you imagine trippin’ with a psychiatrist?

Jamie laughs.

Me: They’d be entertained. You could sell tickets to these guys.

Erik: Yeah, it’d have to be someone who knows how to interpret your babble or knows what you’re going through and they can kind of quietly bring it up and not highlight it so much to where you go off the deep end. Or maybe the therapist knows that you’ve got to learn how to play like a child. Then, let’s say she gives you Ecstasy and she hands you finger paints and crayons and papers, and then here you have three hours of creating all this artwork. Imagine what it does for you, you know, in the latter half of your life as you look back at that moment and just say, “That was still my brain; that was still my body, and I had all that creativity in me, but I told myself that I shouldn’t use it because, it was too childish or that my child was injured inside of me, and now it can be let free.”

Me: How exactly does it work on a soul level?

Erik: Let’s bring the sixties back!

Jamie and I chuckle. I guess I cut him off before he was finished with his monologue.

Erik: How does it work on a soul level?

Me: Yeah. What does it do? Does it halfway disconnect it from the self, uh, that sort of thing.

Erik: It brings the soul closer to the physical body.

Me: Okay.

Jamie: Yeah, the way that he shows it to me is, um, Cling Wrap. You know that stuff?

Me: Yeah, mm hm.

Jamie: In the kitchen? You can lay it down on top of something but you get those bubbles in it? And you have to smooth out those bubbles if you want it to be completely air sealed.

I have that same trouble when I put on those stupid screen protectors on my cell phone. Protects the phone but not my patience.

Erik: So, the skin of our body is like the Cling Wrap for our soul. There are some air bubbles in there, but when you take a hallucinogen, it allows your soul to experience life without the skin, without the Cling Wrap.

Me: Okay.

Erik: All of the air bubbles disappear. Poof! The soul shines brighter than the Cling Wrap.

Me: Yeah

Hm. That might make an interesting t-shirt. Have a great weekend, peeps.