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Ritalin comments on Open thread, Dec. 15 - Dec. 21, 2014 - Less Wrong
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The Anti-Drug
I've seen that a lot of drugs seem to act like "gratification borrowers": they take gratification/happiness from the future and spend it all on the present, sometimes extremely quickly, then leave you feeling miserable for a certain duration, the "low" or "hangover".
I was wondering whether there was any drug that did the opposite, that functioned like delayed gratification: a drug that makes you feel utterly miserable at first, then eventually leaves you with a long-lasting feeling of satisfaction, accomplishment, and joy.
Does anyone here know of such a thing?
Reminds me of a Gregory Bateson quote:
Hm, a drug where the negative effects are first... Well, almost all medicines fit this category: unpleasant taste is common.
Illegal drugs that people want to take? Ayahuasca comes to mind:
Exercise.
But more seriously, try asking this again in the next open thread, this one seems flooded.
Actually exercise has been suggested to me as the alternative to drugs. "Spinning", specifically. Addictive, very pleasurable, and makes you healthier (unless you overdo it, but sports are much more difficult to overdo than drugs, for some reason).
There are drugs for alcoholics that make you sick if you drink, so it makes you feel miserable short-run but may help you to be stable/functional/productive long run.
In my experience Salvia divinorum works very much like this.
Could you elaborate on any specifics? Apparently the plant is legal in most of the world and only prohibited in very few countries.
For me it produced a feeling I can best describe as a tactile analog of the sound of fingernails scraping on a blackboard. It's not exactly pain but something similar and unpleasant. When it wore off I would feel noticeably happier for several hours. I didn't repeat the experience many times, partly because of the unpleasant feeling, and partly because I didn't find a good delivery method other than smoking. I used a concentrated extract strong enough that I could get the full effects from two inhalations, but once I'd done it enough to gain a basic understanding I didn't consider further use worth the risk of smoking.
The main effect is strong hallucinations very distinct from those I got from magic mushrooms. Much less colorful, less detailed but more realistic imagery (similar to dream imagery), extremely strong tactile and proprioception distortion, little if any time perception distortion, weaker audio distortion, and completely overpowering all other sensory input at the peak. There was always an undercurrent of unease; unlike mushrooms which felt a very natural and appropriate mindstate for humans, Salvia had a alien and threatening feel to it. The peak only lasts about 2 minutes and the whole thing is over in about 15.