Drugs, alcohol, and loss of consciousness

 

 Emmanuel Benavides *

Have you ever felt that everything becomes lighter, that the lights are brighter, that you begin to experience a different mental and physical state than usual? Have you experienced spontaneous laughter and the trance between the world of consciousness and the world of unconsciousness? Well, that's how I felt in my first experience trying marijuana at a party. I remember how nervous and how much adrenaline I felt minutes before eating half of a cookie that my “Best friend“ had offered me, I didn't know what to expect and I thought I could have everything under control. I believed that my body could support a state of trance and change. Minutes later, while I was sitting talking with some friends, I noticed that something was changing, I began to see the strongest and most colourful lights, also the darkest colours, it was difficult for me to follow the conversation and when I tried to participate it was already too late, apparently, I was going much slower than everything around me. I saw my hands and felt them shine, I tried to move fast but the physical information did not match with what my eyes registered and my brain processed, suddenly I started laughing. Everything made me laugh, it was funny that everything made me laugh, I felt joyful, I felt happy, I felt myself going into a trance, even though I had never experienced that type of trance, nor have I experienced any other type of trance.

 

 

 

The people around me quickly noticed that I was entering into that space, in that state that many of them knew very well. Later I was on the highest stage in the whole place, the breeze was blowing my face, the streetlights and the music were spreading in the air, people were around me, we were dancing, the music was loud, they kissed and laughed, I laughed too. I wanted to speak, but my brain was much slower than normal, my words were different, my gestures were different, I laughed a lot. Suddenly I felt more adrenaline, I felt capable of doing many things, hugging, and kissing everyone or doing anything, many things that I considered mine had left me, modesty, respect, and shyness. I could say that my night ended well, that happiness lasted and that it was an exceptional experience, but it was not like that, I was inadvertently experiencing a situation that would lead me to a deeply reflexion that would forever change certain ideas that I had in my mind. I must clarify that this is a purely personal experience and the one of those close to me, so homogenizing an entire experience of this type is not my purpose. I speak from what I have lived with the full confidence that many others have lived totally different experiences, but also with the conviction that many would identify with me.

 

I consider that I am a person who is intolerant of unconsciousness and the loss of autonomy, I had experienced it when facing situations with friends in this situation and it had cost me too much, but in that moment, I was experiencing it firsthand. Initially I thought that losing control could be something positive and that I would enjoy it, but it ended up being a way that I realized that those trance states represent not only loss of contact with oneself, but also loss of contact with others. Many would say that trance is a different way of relating to other people and to ourselves, in retrospect I would think so, but just because it is a different way of relating to our environment does not mean that we do not lose or leave out important details and interactions. While I was dancing, I was very happy and I laughed a lot, I didn't know why, but I felt a lot of happiness, this kind of happiness that you don’t experience very often. However, today I will talk about the loss and disconnection experienced in these situations, a situation that many are aware of, but very few talk about.

 

Initially, everything starts with the loss of self-control, you begin to lose your ability to react, coordinate and even assimilate. Even if you control your movements and you can usually decide where to go or not, it is not the natural state of your body, you can see what is happening around you, but perhaps you do not understand it, perhaps you are not aware of what is really happening next to you. While I was dancing, I tried to talk to my friends, but I realized that they had already changed the topic and that I could not contribute to the conversation because I did not connect my ideas quickly. I had lost my argumentative power significantly. At that moment I felt present in that place without really being there, I did not feel present as I was, I was not there, perhaps there was another me, the one who was drugged and laughing, perhaps it was a way of knowing another state of me, but ultimately it was not the me that it had always been.

 

I felt that I was ignoring and being ignored, that I was present at that moment in the lives of others without really being there, because I didn't understand, I didn't want to be there either, I wasn't interested in the other, I was just living in the moment. Thanks to this I realized that in all the parties that I had been to in my life, I was always surrounded by many people who were physically there but not mentally, I realized that perhaps in most of the parties I was always alone, even when surrounded by many people. At that moment I felt the loneliness in which we are immersed in a party where people are not in their five senses. At that moment I understood that my memories with friends and others at events and parties were only mine, there were no memories to share with others because those others were not present, their bodies were there, but they were not.

 

The most difficult part of the analysis of this situation was recognizing the absence of many, the absence of ourselves when we are not aware, the loss we have when we enter a trance, memories, laughter and conversations go into the background when we are in the middle of this. Maybe you are surrounded by many people, but you are alone. You talk to nothingness, you smile and enjoy nothingness, because there is no one present, everyone is in another place. For this and many other reasons, I think many people stop using drugs at parties and so on, because they realize the reality behind the emotionality. I admire those who decide to be present, those who value and enjoy others and themselves too. It is easier to flee than to stay, it is easier to lose control than to keep it and move on, it is much more popular to walk the streets from trance to trance than to confront reality outside of it.

 

I admire those who have decided not to forget and not to ignore in a world where amnesia is almost mandatory.

* Estudiante de Ciencia Política con gusto por el análisis de temas internacionales, de desarrollo humano, conflicto y diplomacia. Políglota, lector apasionado, fascinado por las culturas del mundo y la tecnología.