Quote:
Originally Posted by madgeylou  i like to drink. i've never had a problem with it, but like jfalconer, i have had some of the most amazing nights in my life whilst drunk -- great conversations, great feelings of connection, great amounts of fun and laughter, swinging on swings at the top of a hill so that you feel like youre going to fly off the edge of the world. good times with good friends.
maybe we didnt *need* the alcohol to have those great times, but we had it, and the great times still happened, so i definitely dont see it as a damaging thing, at least not for me.
luckily, i dont like it enough to have a problem with it. if i go several weeks without drinking, i barely notice it. it's certainly no hardship.
i am definitely a big believer in the power of drugs to transform a person's consciousness in a powerfully positive way, though, so maybe that's why i have good experiences. |
Sorry for the long quote, but I have to agree with most everything you're saying. I'm twenty, male, and in college, which means I basically am expected to drink, haha --I used to not like it, a few years back, but I've come to completely agree with madgeylou here. I have had some of the best nights of my life while drunk, and enjoy drinking, and while I'm sure such nights would have been good either way, I honestly feel that there is a responsible way to use the "clouding" effect as well as an irresponsible one. One cannot do "work" while intoxicated. That much is clear, and for that purpose alcohol is a very big problem. One can, however, learn about other aspects of themselves while drunk and this is what I think leads to real utility.
I, too, feel that one can use drugs in a way that can lead to very real personal breakthroughs, but that this is very hard to do. I decided to stop getting high with my friends (we're talking maybe twice a month, if that) because I recognized that it for some reason made me sad roughly 2-3 days afterwards, without fail. A short time after making this decision, though, I gave in and smoked with them (I'm not sure why)--and had one of the most profound, life-altering nights of my life. The ideas, conversations and thoughts I had that night have ramped up major aspects of my life--changing the way I see myself, my life purpose, and my place in the universe, permanently. This isn't the "stoner goes 'woaaaaaah'" kind of thing, this was my own thought, uninhibited, leading me to profound conclusions that have stayed with me. I am CERTAIN that these kinds of thoughts would have occurred at another point without the use of anything illicit, and I don't intend to keep smoking, but I do realize there is a very real purpose for one's use of such things.
I think that anything in the world can conceivably give us insight, and I try to gain as much perspective/awareness as possible wherever I am. That's what PD is about in the first place, isn't it?