It's interesting that these Elves never seem to provide any useful, actionable information, especially information that their human interlocutor would have had no way of knowing. Instead it's just vague, mystical fluff.
One take on psychedelics I find intriguing is that instead of providing actual deep insights, they simulate it. While you are high, everything just seems profound and mystical, but there is really nothing there, it is an artifact of the distorted brain chemistry.
I find this makes sense because in my experience, people that regularly take psychedelics do not seem wiser or more insightful to me than people who don't. There is probably some way in which they boost creativity by making thought processes less rigid, which helps in things like music and maybe some kinds of technical innovation.
Just spitballing and I have no particular expertise.
I do not have experience with Ayahausca, but I do have experience with Psylocibin, LSD, Ketamine, Salvia Divinorum, and a few other things. Psychedelics disrupt the Default Mode Network (this has been shown in brain imaging studies), which the brain process which covers internally directed thought, self-reflection, self-criticism, etc, and that this disruption appears to be what helps many people overcome ingrained patterns of negative thinking.
The trouble appears to be that this state of epiphany following a psychedelic experience is not permanent, I have heard figures of six months following a psylocibin experience. Therefore, to keep achieving this affect repeated doses would be needed which may have a negative effect, further studies may tell. However it may provide time window to allow other treatments to work, in the same sense that antidepressants are supposed to be paired with therapy.
I'd always heard that psychedelic experience provides similar effects to a deep meditative experience and thought "well, who wants to do that boring meditation when you can just take a magic potion and be done with it" ? However, meditative and mindfulness practices, for those it helps, would seem to be far more sustainable than any drugs. I have lately been reading The Craving Mind by Judson Brewer, and the RAIN (Recognise, Acknowledge, Investigate, Note) framework it prescribes has been useful in reducing negative ruminations and undesired cravings.
Currently I am completely sober from all substances and am using mindfulness and meditative practice to find a more sustainable path to peace within myself. I have no desire to take any substance which would jeopardise this.
"Many people are experimenting with the drug ecstasy. I heard you say once that a lie is sweet in the beginning and bitter in the end, and truth is bitter in the beginning, and sweet in the end. I have been meditating, but I don't have the experiences people report from the drug ecstasy. Is the drug like the lie, and meditation the truth? Or am I missing something that could really help me?"
It's by no means said that it's a form of insight that helped them. First, that's a self-reported quality, and self-reporting is very unreliable. Second, it's not the only effect that psychedelics have.
Yeah, using this drug to break down the compartments of the brain will lead to increased creativity (which is all hallucinations are, daydreaming on overload), it will not last. And the more you use DMT the more you will need for the same effect.
DMT acts on the HTR2A and HTR2C receptors. When you activate HTR2C receptors at high levels the nerves respond by changing the number HTR2C receptors. This is called having an "effect of receptor density".
You can read about it in this study: (I know what you are going to say, that this proves one cannot get habituated to DMT But that is wrong adn you will need to read the second study to understand why.
Because drug efficacy changes with receptor density and cellular microenvironment, we also examined the properties of DMT in native preparations using a behavioral and biochemical approach."
One difference was evident in that the 5-HT2C, but not the 5-HT2A, receptor showed a profound desensitization to DMT over time. This difference is interesting in light of the recent report that the hallucinogenic activity of DMT does not tolerate in humans and suggests the 5-HT2C receptor plays a less prominent role in the action of DMT.
Furthermore, abnormal receptor density ratios are strongly associated with positive and negative symptom severity, which are typically assessed using the Scale for the Assessment of Negative Symptoms
In addition, Hurlemann et al. (2007) proposed that 5-HT2A receptor density was also decreased in the At-Risk Mental State patient subgroup, regardless of conversion to psychosis [4]. The progressive decline in subcortical 5-HT2A receptor density could provide an indicator of conversion to schizophrenia.
