I got to hear a description of what it was like to take psychedelic drugs today. I found the description surprising because it sounded a lot like my own feelings about myself. I have learned that when I was younger, I was in a constant state of alert, feeling like I was going to need to struggle for my survival at any moment with no sense of security at all. Feeling like that for years isn’t good for the nervous system. My brain and nervous system are damaged because of the abuse that I suffered. As I started to get better, I soon understood how messed up my brain and nervous system were. Essentially, they go haywire from being overtaxed for such a long time. I feel paranoid and scared even when there’s no reason for it. I feel the sensations of physical anxiety and pain in my body even though I have no physical injury. I’ve learned that my nervous system is dealing with the trauma. I can’t always depend on the sensations that my brain gives me because I’m not always sensing the physical world; sometimes I’m sensing the trauma that I went through.
Along with that I have OCD and sometimes I’m sensing the physical world through an OCD filter. However, the one thing that remains true for me is that even if I can’t be certain of anything I can be certain of God. I often feel like a spirit trapped inside of a body. And I have this faith that whatever this spirit is inside of me when my body dies, that spirit won’t. It will transcend and become part of the universe and part of God in a way that I don’t yet understand, and a part of the love that exist right now in the world. And I know that even though the idea of dying is a little scary to me, I realize that I don’t need to be afraid because I’m have the light of God within me. He is within all of us and within all living things. He is everywhere. I know that no matter what happens in my life, I never have to be afraid again because I’m never alone, He is always with me and His love binds me to everything else. Maybe a drug could make me feel that idea better, maybe it could help heal the rift between my spirit and my body and mind. I don’t know. I just know that my path is leading me to this place of love and it isn’t a drug-induced trip or an experience that I have when I die, it’s a place I want to try to be every day of my life, where I not only am mindful of God’s love for me, but I can also feel that love going through me as I see all of His children when I go through my ordinary life.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our hearts.
