Alcohol

Some people have better instincts than others too. I know what you mean most of my family are alcoholics or were. It wasn't what killed them but it definitely played a role in having unstable relationships with everyone around them. My white great grandfather being an exception he never ruined relationships everyone loved him lol the max he did was annoy my great grandmother a little bit lol it depends on what kind of person you are without the substance too I believe any kind of drug will likely amplify certain parts of your personality the drug affects if that makes sense. Even a drug as simple as money that isn't an ingestabke substance only amplifies who we are. If you are rich & a genuine nice giving person you'll probably only be more genuine more nice & more giving but if you're a evil person with money its likely you'll only do more evil. So i imagine certain drugs will amplify certain things about you. If you take pcp or meth i imagine that amplifies your nutty side lmao etc. Etc. Everyone is different so things affect us differently some people may be happy people but when they drink it brings out theur depressive side others are happy people they drink & only get happier lol human beings are very complicated creatures for sure because we are all a little different even tho we are the same.

Alcohol is a drug. It is classed as a depressant, meaning that it slows down vital functions—resulting in slurred speech, unsteady movement, disturbed perceptions and an inability to react quickly. As for how it affects the mind, it is best understood as a drug that reduces a person’s ability to think rationally and distorts his or her judgment.
It’s funny how we say - it lightens the mood or it makes us giggle or it gives courage , when in real life it’s a depressant and not a stimulant. Then again some people are different... some body’s don’t react the same. Even balances can be different as well.

Its definitely one of the hardest drugs out there because of its availability it kills 88 thousand a year i think if i remember right. But yea it is a cns like many depressive drugs it slows many people down while other people may act outright insane on it without a doubt it highly impairs judgement either way but that's the case with every narcotic. Depends on imbalances too some people may take the same medication while one person processes it slower than the other the other person may process it very fast and may even be allergic to it because of it being processed to slow or too fast.

I think, like what other people have said, that it is all about moderation. With all things in life there needs to be balance. i myself do like a drink every now and again with my friends when I go out. However, on the flip side my mother has been an alcoholic for the vast majority of my life.

If you were to consult any medical text, you would see even things that are considered healthy and are necessary for our survival can be detrimental such as Vitamin C. In moderation this is a basic need for survival however, too much or overdosing can lead to side effects from mild digestive discomfort all the way to patients having kidney stones ( in the most extreme cases).

I don't drink for personal reasons not so much anything mentioned previously but just to further echo what others' have said, being informed, personal choice, and moderation. Too much of anything can kill you...even oxygen...water...sugar....at the same time you need all these things to live! But too much can still kill you!

I will say there will be probably some talk about balance within your studies here, some believe in it some don't. While balance is definitely a thing, it's been my experience in my time here that its not in balance, its the constant act of finding balance. If you think of a double-sided scale or weighing things between two hands, its not about finding the perfect middle. It's the movement going back and forth to the middle that makes life worthwhile. In one my of my apprentice journals I believe I wrote about meditation in transitions in noting that the force is more in the change then it is in the existing, or at least in our ability to feel it, at least for me. Everyone's experiences are different.

My *personal* take is that it's a bad thing, very little good can come of it in the long run.

Having said that, I am by turns a teetotaller and a drunk, presumably because of limitations of my own self-soothing and limited access to legal mood modifiers.


I don't know that Jediism has a definite view per se, though you may note a number of the "Feeder" religions and philosophies into Jeddism do, so the "trend" would be towards a life with resources (time, money, health) spent on other things.

Tellahane wrote: I don't drink for personal reasons not so much anything mentioned previously but just to further echo what others' have said, being informed, personal choice, and moderation. Too much of anything can kill you...even oxygen...water...sugar....at the same time you need all these things to live! But too much can still kill you!

I will say there will be probably some talk about balance within your studies here, some believe in it some don't. While balance is definitely a thing, it's been my experience in my time here that its not in balance, its the constant act of finding balance. If you think of a double-sided scale or weighing things between two hands, its not about finding the perfect middle. It's the movement going back and forth to the middle that makes life worthwhile. In one my of my apprentice journals I believe I wrote about meditation in transitions in noting that the force is more in the change then it is in the existing, or at least in our ability to feel it, at least for me. Everyone's experiences are different.

That's pretty much what I was going to say.

It all depends on why you drink or don't drink. If you drink because you feel you need to, that's a problem. That's an attachment. There's a fine line between attachments and addictions which is why you should be wary of attachments in general. Just wary. If you are conscious and aware enough to see the danger and temptation then you may not have a problem. Sometimes its simply the dopamine release that triggers that urge but that urge for dopamine can be satisfied from some other source of dop...amine.

But we don't need to demonize everything that could potentially be a problem, because that... would... be... everything. Some religions spend 99% of the time telling you what you can't do and when you're like "well what can I do?" and they're like "uh... you can pray!" But often those religions are the main culprits that inspire rebellion and revolution. So I think telling people what not to do is less effective then giving people positive goals and if there's anything keeping you from that positive goal then you should simply consider how much energy you put into it. I'd like to do more writing but there's a time and place for everything, including personal enjoyment. And if you don't get enough of that then you might get depressed which might lead to something worse than the thing you were trying to avoid.

So you really have to consider what's right for you. I can go without drinking. And I mostly drink water and smoothies. I wish I had less of a stomach but at 40 yrs old I have to be realistic. A six pack my not be in my future unless it says "red stripe" on it.

Lol i remember in a scene in episode 2 obi wan mind tricked a guy into not selling him deathsticks & going and rethinking his life. I imagine this is a reference to cigarettes or drugs in our society in general it was a pretty funny scene

RaisedFromWolves wrote: Lol i remember in a scene in episode 2 obi wan mind tricked a guy into not selling him deathsticks & going and rethinking his life. I imagine this is a reference to cigarettes or drugs in our society in general it was a pretty funny scene

That brings up a good point, I think.

I think moderation applies to things that you can consume in moderation without doing serious damage to your body. Drinking in excess can do real damage and mess up your liver and I think kidneys. Of course in the short term you could affect your muscle coordination. If you can drink 2-3 drinks and still drive that one thing. But if some drug has the same effect by barely looking in its direction then you should probably just avoid whatever that is entirely. That's kind of how I feel about marijuana vs almost everything else. Marijuana is very good for meditation which is why Rastafarians consider it a sacrament. Other cultures may use ayahuasca which may almost certainly trigger a vision. I definitely think there is a place for both those things but there should be some utility or added benefit like this if it's going to physically impair you. And you can't really do cocaine in moderation... crack in moderation... Although I wouldn't make any hard rules against it, I would question someone's judgment if they were like "hey, I'm gonna snort cocaine in moderation!"

Like Tellahane said, the lethality is in the dose. And alcohol (even outside of acute toxicity) is definitely poisonous.

This applies to other drugs too. I can safely assume none of us are authentic Quechua shamans, so let's be honest with ourselves and agree that we do drugs because we enjoy it (not for some deeper meaning). With that out of the way, is the enjoyability of a drug worth the costs? Smoking just about anything has chronic (pun intended) health effects beyond those of the drug itself.