Post-Avatar-Depression-Syndrome (PADS)

Ram Dass tells the following story: He was approached by a professional, scientific organization, and asked to comment on various photos, presumably related to the use of psychedelics. One of them depicted a man, lying on the kitchen floor, gazing at a puddle of spilled Coke. Ram Dass said that the picture gave him pause, for it brought to mind the many hours he himself had spent in just such a position, staring in awe at puddles of spilled Coke or something equally and allegedly "mundane."
News reports have appeared recently speaking of people who see Avatar and subsequently fall into a deep depression at their inability to access a world in reality as beautiful, entrancing and spiritual as Pandora, the mythical planet depicted in the film. But before you join a Post Avatar Depression Syndrome (PADS) support group, consider the lesson of the spilled Coke, or really, one of the lessons of LSD. Yes, it is a drug-induced state, and yet, for the time that it lasts, the habitual filters through which we ordinarily view existence are removed, revealing a magical universe residing in the very spot that we would have dubbed "mundane" and passed by without a second glance in our non-altered state.
Such eye-opening revelations of the deeper mystery of everything, animate and inanimate, can occur not only through ingesting a possibly dangerous chemical (the ER and I can attest to that part, but that's another story), but also via intentional practices as well as random circumstances -- death or great loss, "Acts of God," the birth of a child and so forth. Virtually anything, if the timing is right, can temporarily jolt us out of our blind slumber and awaken our inner vision to a grander vista.
Ram Dass eventually realized that no matter how much or how often he took LSD, he would always "come down" to ordinary reality, and be left with, like the Pandora-smitten viewers of Avatar, a powerful hunger to live in those deeper realms all the time. Thus, he proclaimed at one point, "The spiritual path is not about 'getting high,' it's about 'being high,'" and that, he explained, requires discipline, long hours of spiritual practice, and Grace.
Another contemporary spiritual teacher, Adyashanti, has shared that he noticed at some point in his development that no matter how far out his experiences sometimes were, no matter how blissful, insightful and other-worldly -- or how terrible -- he always seemed to return to "this." Just this ordinary, regular moment.
There is really not much use in continuously revisiting artificially induced states if it is at the expense of doing the actual work required to integrate the teachings from those selfsame states into one's life in a meaningful and less transient manner. Philosopher and Zen practitioner Alan Watts compared it to a scientist in a lab who discovers something under the microscope; she doesn't just keep on repeating the experiment and staring at the result; she takes new actions informed by her discovery. Or, switching metaphors, Watts also said, "When you get the message, hang up the phone." Because it only takes one such mind-shattering epiphany to recognize that William James was indeed onto something when he declared in The Varieties of Religious Experience that, "Our normal waking consciousness ... is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different."
A single glimpse of this truth upends our entire world-view, and reality is never quite the same. We are suddenly launched, for better or worse, onto a path that is fueled by our yearning to part the veils that shield our eyes from seeing a puddle of spilled coke as anything less than a fantastical, mystical, miraculous and mysterious appearance in the midst of an inexplicable infinite universe! And the same for every blade of grass, our little finger, and all of our fellow creatures. Our earth-Gaia-like Pandora, is teeming with life, every quark connected to every other and all linked to the whole through the vast web of Indra's net. Sneeze in Kentucky, and a cockroach in Calcutta moves a little to the left.
The alluring world of Pandora is not "out there." It surrounds us every moment, it is the very atmosphere in which we live and move and have our being. Hell and heaven are separated only by an infinitesimal turn of the mind and inner view. The longing to live on Pandora is our deepest soul cry to be who we really are and see life as it really is.
The late guru Adi Da Samraj used to find it interesting that people would gaze up at the night sky, hoping to see a shooting star, as if the sky itself, just as it is, isn't already completely mysterious and beautiful. It just wasn't quite enough; people needed just a little more to be properly bewildered and awestruck!
Marcel Proust wrote: "The only real voyage of discovery ... consists not of seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
And William Blake:
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.
He could just as easily have written, were he alive today . . . To see a World in a Puddle of Coke.
Image by shareski, courtesy of Creative Commons license.
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I enjoyed this post alot!
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Word-Worlds
Great post.
High Up ... and Down Low
So many "trippers" I knew came to realize, even in our late teens, after a few intense sessions, that one only needs to associate intimately with an Entheogenic substance on such rare occasions that such a need truly arises.
No one I knew ever thought they were for constant use ... yet possibly throughout the life ... here and there ... like in the beginning of manhood, as initiation ritual .. in middle of life ... and again, towards the end {many variations on the theme} ... as there was always more deeper internal lessons revealed than just visual phantasmagoria
This limited visual sense is usually only associated with chemical synthetics like LSD & DMT in synthetic high extraction manipulations.
When organic indigenous Entheogens are kept in their wholistic form, the more synergized cosmic sense of connectedness {wisdom} usually pervades and over rides any "eye candy"
Many of us never came down, but simply stabilized high, more or less, never seeing our world ever quite the same .. so lets not sell ourselves short.
These substances merely tune us into the "trip that never ends / always was" ... yet the mind in certain individuals can surely get unnecessarily attached to anything ... like the anxiety of coming down from a refined sugar high.
So this type of pathology is found all through out life .. hence Shamanic guidance or even just basic brotherhood / community to stabilize
... which is all any of us awoken indigenous "hippies" ever wanted, or needed
... sometimes the simplest things were the hardest to find relative to industrial / post industrial momentums of the times
When achieving such elevated cosmic perspectives, an organic, green sustainable community to touch down within, is likely all that is required to stabilize and integrate ... such a simple version of reality is no where to be found ... so we descend into everything else but ...
In the Casteneda series Juan Matus cautions Carlos several times for his visionary indulgences ... "look deeper, see the mystery behind all that is unfathomable" .. always balancing out such psychedelic luxury with the "chopping wood, carrying water" of day to day to day chores ... as "controlled folly" ... and like in the practice of Zen ... there is no longer an "ordinary" moment .. or an ordinary place .. for any such awoken soul ... anywhere, at any time.
So the fear of loss only being relative to the "mess below" ... and not the "synergy above".
So this so-called psycho-socio dilemma can easily be taken care of with a little philosophical sensibility.
New Landscapes
Thanks for the article. I’m so glad that the landscapes of Pandora have effected so many people.
When I read the following quote some time ago, I applied one of my recent distinctions to it; that is, things are not either/or—they are AND. So the Marcel Proust quote became "The only real voyage of discovery ... consists of seeking new landscapes and having new eyes."
The new eyes part can be the effect of a powerfully spiritual experience, and the new landscape part can be your new and exciting view of the world once the effects of the experience have been integrated.
I believe the two are not exclusive, but should be considered together; seeking new landscapes after having new eyes, or, in the case of those who have viewed the movie Avatar, seeing with new eyes after experiencing Pandora's new landscapes.
Powerful Post!
That was a powerful post you linked to.
For those who are depressed -- it is not impossible to return to the world of Pandora, just difficult.
The Federation of Damanhur is the only instance I know of where a modern culture (science, technology, etc.,) have recreated/rejoined with nature and indigenous ways of thinking and being. To be at Damanhur is to be in a completely different space of heart and mind, and it's magical.
We can live differently and we can live from the heart and in harmony with nature, but we have to make difficult decisions. More specifically, we have to be willing to create what people will call cults, working together, and rethinking everything from the ground up.
But it is possible.
Regarding post-Avatar depression
"News reports have appeared recently speaking of people who see Avatar and subsequently fall into a deep depression at their inability to access a world in reality as beautiful, entrancing and spiritual as Pandora, the mythical planet depicted in the film."
Sorry to derail the entheogen-related theme of this article and conversation, but does anyone else who has seen *Avatar* have problems with this explanation of post-viewing depression? I saw the film after hearing and reading lots of hype, and was still blown away by the mythical scope of the film, its critique of colonialism and imperialism, and the fully realized virtual ecology. When I left the theater, I found myself depressed too, and thought about the reasons for this depression as described in the media.
Then it hit me. I was depressed not because I couldn't go to Pandora and hang out with felinoid hotties, but because I was stuck on the planet where "we killed our mother" (as they noted in the film). The notion that people are depressed because they can't live in a make-believe world misses the point. Maybe we're depressed after seeing *Avatar* because it reminds us of what we're destroying here on Earth.
Returning control of the conversation to the psychedelicists...
Totally!
I totally agree with you L-P !!!
In fact, I returned to the theater several days later to see it for a second time, just to enjoy the beauty of it all without being emotionally tied to all the guilt I left my first viewing of the movie with .
It feels somewhat more innocent being financially poor...
Unfortunately, the author has a fundamental misunderstanding...
Charles Shaw
Author - Exile Nation
Not going to happen...
I read this article in Huffington Post and it is very good. There was one thing I didn't think was made clear though. The states that one can reach in psychedelics feel really, really good. Like having some hedonistic mad scientist lay into you with a gatling gun that shoots orgasms instead of lead good.
I have never, ever, ever heard of any level of spiritual attainment that feels THAT good for any longer than say a day tops and the technique I'm thinking of takes a minimum of around 5 years(referring to Jhana meditation, ). And even then you come down after about a day or so.
Nothing will allow someone to reach those high levels of joy indefinitely and I think that it is somewhat disingenuous to not be explict with that or to lead the reader to assume that those rarified states one reaches with meditation are the same as the insane levels of joy one experiences in psychedelics, i.e., "The spiritual path is not about 'getting high,' it's about 'being high,'"
Would he were fatter! But I fear him not:
Yet if my name were liable to fear,
I do not know the man I should avoid
So soon as that spare Cassius. He reads much;
He is a great observer
Feeling Bad
Also there is the reality that many of us are somewhat jaded in our ability to adjust to any/all "highs and lows" ...as we live for the "rush" in this modern age.
We go through so many resources, so fast, tiring so easily, so often ... always looking for the newest, latest fix.
Hence we avoid, like anything, any of this "coming down" sense, which integrating helps balance out our sense of wisdom.
Even something as silly as "sunshine is good" rain is bad" ... "Summer great" .. Winter sucks" ... how foolish, yet common are such sentiments expressed daily in todays world.
Remembering that much of the more "standard" depression in our society is due to our humanistic, capitalistic world not having matched up to it's ideological fantasies of happiness / satisfaction.
All one has to do is listen to the sound effects of any action movie, or the volume and/or hype of any advertisement ... "in your face" ... "cranked to the max" ... all that is left is the feeling of "less than" such "hyper-sensation"
High sugar, high salt foods ... high energy drinks .. crash, crash, crash
every day is a miracle
open the conduit. let the light from your star, your higher self, your angel shine through in every action. the time of the ascension is near. everything is sacred. soon we will realize, all in a flash, our true nature. and it is far more than the bodies to which we have been assigned. don't believe me? breathe deeply, and see.
we are celestial beings. earth is our temporary home.
im going to qoute my friend
PADS == Mild serotonin syndrome?
Here's my theory: There's something in the brain that happens when we're watching this new dazzling 3D that's causing a ton of serotonin to be released. The post-movie depression is almost like coming down from MDMA.
I'm the first to admit that this theory is entirely from assland. But Avatar seems the biggest breakthrough in moviemaking technology since the Wizard of Oz, and I wouldn't be surprised if in a few years we learn that there's some physical cause of all this depression.(and Yes, I got depressed after seeing it.)
Great
community
PADS, psychedelic come-down
what about universal love?
More on universal love
My sense is that to be human is to need to love and be loved.
King (Dr. Martin Luther) said, "Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice and justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against love. And this is what we must see as we move on."
How can the potential for love be enacted?
thanks!
Avatar addiction
Heh
Pandora and reality
Huh?
zezt, Not sure how you went from my comment to the need to cut down the rain forest. I remember an episode of "Survivorman" where Les Stroud was dropped off on a Costa Rican beach for seven days. Les has tremendous outdoor skills and at one point in the show spends the night in the jungle; by the next morning it was pretty clear that he was completely spooked by all the creepy crawlies that showed up after dark. After that he was back on the beach. Here in New England the Abenaki would migrate out of the woods and down to the coast when the bugs got fierce in June. My point about Avatar was simply that it presented an idealized and fanciful idea of what indigenous life is like. It was science fiction with an emphasis on fiction. It was a wonderful film experience because it played to our fantasies and imagination. Who wouldn't want a 9' tall body on a light gravity planet, and those amazing tails with their tendrils of sentient communication. Yum.
I haven't been homeless in a major city. That has nothing to do with my post. Have you been lost in the jungle? Not fun and potentially fatal. Read what Daniel P wrote about it in his book 2012; you get off the path and you are in deep doo doo.
Great movie, Avatar, fantastic not realistic. And in my first post I didn't mention the microbial kingdom with all the intestinal parasites, ferocious bacteria and opportunistic viruses. It is a jungle out there.
Avatar Blues
Quote
beauty
Hi Elieser,
You are very rigth on your main point, nevertheless BEAUTY is in the eye of the beholder. Most people bounded by the mundane and blinded by it. Curiousity as it could does not exist. The inside is aware that life is a miracle, that it contains the extraordinary all around but the outside does not let it become conscious, just won't let it through. Some of us are taken the surroundings as an endless adventure, every moment as an oppportunity to find new amazing features but it really does come down to what life you allow yourself to experience. The deafening reality is caused by the force upon us to susupend your life and to accept the world as it looks on day-time TV. Strange is, that a movie like FightClub doesn't catapulate people into depression, it just inspires a few receptive ones because it escapes from reality back into reality adding some changes and advices on the way. Perhabs that is the only fault with Avatar, that it doesn't circle back into this world but leaves you stranded with the finale which makes you think that if not an entire other world than nothing at all.
I liked your post and Blake is Rigth isn't he
We’ve all seen a
Yea, I kinda laughed when I
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Keeping an Eye on you
I haven't been on this site long, but methinks I shall keep an eye on your posts.
I read a mightly large amount of articles on-line, and I find nothing worse than academic whaffling or spiritual posing. The way I see - if it's not entertaining, don't bother saying it.
Not many writers can combine spiritual awareness with artistic finesse. You do. Well done.
;)
excelent :)
Your article is well
Very interesting read! I
There is really not much use
I believe that psychedelics
GE RMT
I’ve been looking around
This Avatar subsequently
Return from the total bliss state and how to stay there...
The 'return' to what passes as a normal state of mind after psychedelics put me on a search for some easy method to boost my bliss tolerance during daily living. Best I've found is what a call 'tracheal resonance,' learned from my purring friend, Charlie the cat. Purring in and out - some might call it snoring - vibrates the trachea that snuggles up next to the upper aorta so that the vibration passes into the blood stream and then tingles out the body. Here's a 3-minute demo: "Purring to Nirvana" here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvyW3-2QSeQ
And more info here:
http://www.raysender.com/skypointing.html
Hey, I'm serious! These days I can coast on the equivalent of a post-coital buzz after ten in-out purrs.
how is that such an ignorant
pandawill