DON'T BELEAF IT

Mind-Bending Salvia Fails To Take Me On Promised Spiritual Quest

Imagine a hallucinogenic trip you can take in the time it takes to peel and
eat an orange, induced by a widely available, legal, non-toxic, mystical
herb that has an ancient pedigree and a Web-ful of wisdom-sharing
enthusiasts. We're talking here about Salvia divinorum, a herb in the mint
family originally from Oaxaca, Mexico, and its current fascination for
ever-curious psychonauts. But this isn't any old party psychedelic. Its
boosters call its effects divine inebriation, praising it as a source of
cosmic information and illumination of consciousness.

Me, I say it's just creepy.

After years of research, I finally get up the courage to buy a bag of dried
leaves - it's easily available at head shops or online. The experts - whose
stoner descriptions fill the chatlines- advise against taking salvia at
raves, noisy parties or concerts, stressing that it's a vision quest thing
suited to quiet, darkened rooms. And they warn never to do it without a
sitter. Advice I don't take. I smoke a bowl with a torch lighter in a water
pipe and later thank my lucky stars I didn't use the more powerful
extract-enhanced leaves.

What's it like?

If you've done large doses of magic mushrooms or LSD you'll have some idea,
but the sensation and visuals are quite distinct. The first thought in my
mind is "It worked!" but those words start echoing inside my head to the
point where they lose all meaning. I try to stand up, intent on going
downstairs to tell my mom that it worked.

Realizing that my motor control is disrupted and my vision too impaired to
get to the door of my room, I suddenly remember not only that I do not live
with my mom, but even if I did she probably wouldn't be that interested in
my successful experimentation with a new hallucinogen.

Depth perception is completely gone - the wall 10 feet away seems right in
front of my eyes, but I can't even understand that it's the wall I'm
seeing. I can't formulate any coherent thoughts and realize later that when
you're under its influence it's easy to forget salvia is the cause. It's
also easy to forget where you are. There's a strong feeling of rising
higher in the air and of being pulled back inside your head. You feel like
you're behind yourself, looking through a tunnel, detached from your body.

After about five minutes, things start returning to normal, but I'm left
feeling deeply confused.

In an effort to understand my experience, I invite friends to try it.
Responses vary: two of the eight experience virtually no effects, while the
remaining subjects have trips of differing intensity, despite all having
consumed similar amounts. "It feels like you're in a dream," one remarks.
"I don't know what you'd use it for, though. When would you want to feel
like this?"

One friend is bothered by the feeling of floating and rising, saying it's
triggered her fear of heights. Tellingly, the only ones interested in doing
more salvia are those it had no effect on.

Nobody in the test group reports any of the spiritual awakening or
revelations common to mushroom trips, but the aftermath does encourage
self-examination. Personally, it makes me question my whole relationship
with drugs, from caffeine to weed. I also start wondering if substances
used spiritually are of any use at all outside their cultural contexts.

Historically, Cuicatec and Mazatec Indian shamans in Mexico have taken
salvia to aid in finding lost objects and diagnosing illness. There are
also reports of small amounts being given to cure minor ailments, but most
of the anthropological information suggests it's an obscure substance - or
perhaps deeply secret.

When salvia first appeared on the psychedelic scene, it was described as
another form of DMT, the businessman's acid, an assumption that has since
been proven wrong. In fact, it wasn't until 2002 that any progress was made
in identifying the mechanisms that cause its visionary effects. Scientist
Bryan Roth of the Cleveland-based National Institute of Mental Health
psychoactive drug screening program says its a potent "kappa-opioid
receptor agonist," a kind of analgesic, which was at one point investigated
by pharmaceutical companies as a possible painkiller. This effort was
abandoned due to its mind-bending side effects.

"A student came to me who had had a disturbing experience with salvia,"
Roth says. "I had never heard of it. I then obtained some samples online,
and we set about trying to find out how it works." There have been reports
of people using it successfully to treat depression (against their doctors'
advice), but as Roth says, it's unlikely that many people would want to do
this. "The drug itself is too intense and unpleasant to be used medically,"
he says.

And the legal issue? A spokesperson for Canada's Justice Department says
the department is aware of salvia and is monitoring it to see if there's a
potential for abuse. Currently, only Australia and Finland have made the
drug illegal, though the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency is now investigating
the matter. Says Roth, "It would be a nightmare to schedule, because it
looks like the same salvia that people grow in their gardens, and it can't
be synthesized. As well, even experienced hallucinogen users don't like it
and generally don't do it more than once."

Well, not exactly. There's a small minority of folks who are hooked on
salvia's teachings. A local artist/computer programmer who goes by the name
Redgreenvines says he has smoked some extract almost every day since he
discovered it 13 months ago. "Salvia has helped me see the sequence of
consciousness - you can see it unfolding. There's a long fade-out of each
moment, and the immediate moment becomes very dense because it's
overlapping with the previous impulse."

He keeps doing it, he says, because he hopes to bring back "souvenirs" to
help him grasp and retain the cosmic understanding he feels at the time.
You can read more about his excursions on the Yahoo salvia group.

"I'm attracted back again and again because I haven't brought the
experience back yet. The souvenirs are empty; you can't keep that
understanding with you," he says.

And this may be the ultimate problem. Hallucinogens deconstruct your
thought processes so you can see the layers of your own understanding, but
the experience is so alien that it's very difficult to translate into
something comprehensible outside of that altered reality. In other words -
what's the use of looking for enlightenment if you can't remember its
secrets when you find it?