Editor’s Note: This essay is a personal reflection, not an endorsement or recommendation. LSD is illegal in many jurisdictions and carries significant psychological and physical risks. The purpose of this piece is to examine thinking, not to promote altered states.
Most people think of LSD as a shortcut to insight or transcendence. My experience was different.
What LSD revealed to me was not hidden truths about reality, but something far more ordinary—and far more dangerous: how the human mind manufactures thoughts, attaches emotion to them, and then mistakes those thoughts for truth.
Under the influence, this process becomes impossible to ignore. Thoughts arise rapidly, connect themselves into emotional chains, and reinforce one another. Sad thoughts generate more sadness. Euphoric thoughts generate more euphoria. The mind, left unchecked, becomes self-confirming.
This can feel profound. It can also become destabilizing.
Over time, I came to understand that LSD is not a doorway to reality, but a powerful lens that exaggerates what is already happening in every human mind. It can illuminate how thinking works—but without grounding, perspective, and restraint, that illumination carries real psychological and physical risk.
What follows is not an endorsement of LSD. It is a reflection on what it taught me about thinking, impermanence, emotional extremes, and the danger of believing thoughts simply because they feel true.
LSD and the Mechanics of Thought
One of the most valuable insights LSD offered me was a direct encounter with the process of thought creation. Buddhist meditation emphasizes that thoughts are continuously arising phenomena. When we fail to notice this, we tend to treat every thought as real, authoritative, and true.
Under LSD, that process becomes unavoidable. Thoughts multiply quickly, and the mind’s tendency to chain one thought into the next becomes intensified.
Emotional Feedback Loops: Euphoria, Sadness, and Distortion
On LSD, emotional momentum is real. A thought with a strong emotional tone often pulls the next thought into the same direction:
- Sad thoughts generate further sadness.
- Euphoric thoughts generate further euphoria.
The mind can become self-reinforcing. This amplification is powerful—and potentially hazardous.
The Middle Path and Realistic Thinking
Euphoria is pleasurable. Sadness is displeasurable. But neither state is especially useful for clear thinking.
When the mind moves too far toward either extreme, realism fades. Euphoric thinking feels important but can lose grounding. Sad thinking feels true but can become distorted by despair.
The most productive mental space—the one closest to reality—is what Buddhism calls the Middle Path. From this position, thoughts can be observed rather than believed.
Impermanence and the Illusion of Awakening
Another critical realization is that the LSD state is temporary. It is not a new permanent awareness. It is a drug-induced physiological condition that ends when the substance leaves the body.
Failing to recognize this impermanence is one of the major risks. Believing that one has achieved a permanent awakening can distort judgment and identity long after the experience ends.
Psychological and Physical Risks
It would be irresponsible to discuss LSD without emphasizing risks.
- Psychological risk: The experience can destabilize thinking and, for some people, lead to lasting harm.
- Situational danger: Impaired judgment can result in fatal decisions. Being alone, in unfamiliar places, without trusted support increases risk.
- The illusion of insight: A drug-induced state can feel like “truth.” That feeling is not proof.
- Legal consequences: LSD is illegal in many jurisdictions, and illegality carries real outcomes.
Personal Context and What Stayed With Me
When I was a student in the 1970s, LSD became mainstream in some environments. We were warned about chromosomal damage—warnings that later proved unfounded in my case. I went on to father four healthy children.
At one stage, I was taking LSD three times a week. I rationalized the risk by noticing high-performing peers using it as well. In hindsight, academic success was never evidence of safety.
I also learned how much set and setting matters. Taking LSD in unfamiliar environments, without friends around, put me in danger. In one instance I was alone, and my thinking turned sad. I had to keep reminding myself the drug would leave my system. It was not pleasant.
Despite the risks, the experience left me with a lasting curiosity about human existence and a sharper appreciation of how thoughts form—and how easily they can masquerade as truth.
Writers such as Sam Harris have discussed altered states as a way to recognize that thoughts are mental events, not necessarily reality. On that narrow point, my experience aligns.
Closing Perspective
LSD did not show me reality more clearly. It showed me how persuasive and self-reinforcing the thinking mind can become when it is untethered.
That lesson—learned with real risk attached—has lasted far longer than any trip.
Thinking Clearly (Series): This essay is part of Thinking Clearly—reflections on belief, cognition, and the habits of mind that quietly shape our lives. Read the series hub here: Thinking Clearly.
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Related: My review and notes on Sam Harris
Thinking Clearly (Series): This essay is part of Thinking Clearly—reflections on belief, cognition, and the habits of mind that quietly shape our lives.
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