Magick and marijuana

Hi all, I’ve realized an issue with my current practices that I was hoping to resolve with the community’s aid. I have been a “pot head” for the last 5 years or so and quit smoking just before I began performing magick. While sober my visualization skills are lackluster and I have a difficult time even in the most mundane magick skills.

However, the occasional times that I have smoked I notice that I can go into trance, open up chakras, and even have almost achieved a successful astral projection (far more than i have ever gone). To me it feels like marijuana turns me into a kind of magick savant. There are even things I’ve read on this forum that i was able to accomplish naturally without any form of practice or even knowing what I was doing, I just kind of did it.

So my question is should I continue to smoke before ritual and cope with the natural lack of focus it gives, or should I find a way to achieve this without drugs. Obviously I require practice in my sober life to get there and I definitely don’t want to rely on weed for performing magick, but the effects of “high” magick are tantalizing.

I suppose i could use weed to figure out new ideas and sensations and then master that in sober life but afaik these things haven’t crossed over into sober life for me.

I would say no, but use the experience as a goal to build on.
I noticed a thread on here that said, if you know what the state feels like you can will yourself into it without the actual drug. Having said that, weed doesn’t work on me and never got me high, so I don’t know what it’s like, but my dreams and trance records are trippier than most people’s trip reports.

My overall feeling is, if weed is a crutch, it’s the first thing you should free yourself from. Do it because it’s fun, not because you think you have to.

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I perform magic high, drunk, with entheogens, sober, :woman_shrugging: I have been more focused on my sober state, only for the sake of roundedness, but honestly - marijuana? While yes, it alters our state otherwise why would we do it? I honestly feel weed is so inconsequential when its a state one is comfortable with, but i also acknowledge the sacredness of it, like other entheogens, especially plant or fungal based. These were tools of the ancestors! Members of the nightshade and cannabis have been found as far back as the neolithic period. I wonder if the nose in the air about entheogens in magic circles connects to literal interpretations of the classification of high and low magic? Let the lower witches have their ointments! And fine I shall. And the weed - and the mead!

I do think there is a difference between “crutch“ and “aid,” another reason i try to be more sober minded in my practice these days, but I also work with the spirits of these things which another sometimes controversial subject in magic, but i whole heartedly believe and have experienced plant spirits so dont care if others believe in it or not :woman_shrugging:, though that then turns again to my sober practice, because i do NOT believe that the sacred and magical abilities of these spirits lie just in their bioactive constituents. They are teachers, protectors, and allies - and in some cultures, gods.

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Thanks for the quick reply.
I definitely don’t want to use it as a crutch, but I think that the effects for me are too powerful to simply eliminate it from my practices all together. I didnt add this into my original post but last night (while high) I was visited by a certain demon who manifested as a giant sea serpent-centipede hybrid. I have never so much as evoked before so this experience was awe inspiring to me and really cemented the potency of magick.

However, my ultimate goal is to be able to do this sober so i think I will do as you said and build on these experiences in a sober mind set

I completely agree with that, and I might add that entheogenic plants are what led me to magick in the first place.

Balance first and foremost is a necessity to me so I guess I will have to experiment to find a way to do this

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I used to use plant materials as ingredients when i first started practicing in my teens. When i went to school for anthropology as an agnosticish occasionally witchy , i was enchanted by ethnobotany, so i started gardening, and thats how i found my renaissance, and hekate found me. :grin: Ive been a student of their wisdom and secrets since.

My magic is much different than ground up herbs in a jar. My magic is fumed, fed spirits, tended and nurtured, harvested in sacred ways, extracted into formulae, and yet, sometimes its just whispering intentions to the living plants, leaving wishes buried at their roots, communing with them in lucid dreams or meditations ive been learning - or through scent or wind or touch or taste, or even sight - the datura taught me sight, and i didnt even have to consume it or smoke it or have any entheogen whatsoever involved - for it to come out of the shadows as some huge, unnatural spider and frighten me in the dark.

Lots of peeps just dont understand them. It starts off innocent enough, but it escalates quickly. Just because their avatars are rooted in this plane, theyre not so bound.

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Anyway all that aside, i think marijuana can have its place in magic if its treated properly. :ok_hand::grin:

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I don’t think you should continue Smoking marijuana. I used to have hallucinations from marijuana. One day I got high, took a bath and started swimming in it and shouting that I was floating on the bottom of the ocean. I was terribly ashamed in front of my parents, I don’t smoke anymore.

Maybe this is why ive been so successful :thinking:

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This is so important. Its the only reason psychedelics have ANY importance magickally. @Zabazu22 maybe try focusing on the exact mechanics while high since it comes easy to you, and then just walk through the same steps sober.

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Welcome @MirandaPriestley It is a rule of this forum for all new members to properly introduce themselves, so PLEASE CLICK ON THE IMAGE BELOW and tell us about yourself and any experience you may have in magick, such as what you practice, how long you have practiced, areas of interest, etc:

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Thats what ive been doing since first posting, i try to focus on the exact sensations I get while high and do my best to recreate them while sober. The difficulty I face though is having a taste of the power in full strength while high makes me very impatient while sober.

Its been a challenge to develop my senses sober because i know how far i am from what ive perceived to be the ideal.

The best comparison i can give is that my magick while high is like watching a huge 4k tv and then sober it reverts to a television from the 50’s. It makes me want to just get high and use the 4k every time but i know that isnt good in the long run.

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Ive used marijuana for many years recreationally and have cultivated a well tempered mind set to keep me in charge while i am on it. No need to worry, although it does make me very paranoid

I personally would tell you that if that is what works for you, (without condoning or denying) then that’s what works for you.
Using things like marijuana comes under a banner called “The poison path” It’s not for everybody, obviously most things aren’t, but it can be done. Maybe it’s for you.
https://badwitch.es/5-signs-youre-on-the-poison-path/

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Thank you for the recommend. I believe the poison path may be whats right for me. Ive been eyeing the poison path book that has been advertised here recently so I think I may end up purchasing it now.

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I’m starting wonder if it’s right for me :joy: :sweat_smile:

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Hey great article! Just an open comment to any spirit that may be reading this: stop starting me on paths I have enough already.

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