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Enhanced visual perception weeks after psilocybin trip. What's happening?


breathable

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I'm experiencing improved visual perception after my first few psilocybin trips which I did in the last 3 months. My last trip was about a level 2, four weeks ago. I can't find evidence of other people going through the same after-effects, so I'm really curious about this. I'm also worried about things getting bad if I increase doses to a level where I see proper hallucinations. I wouldn't want my condition to turn into debilitating HPPD.

Here are the after-effects I've been experiencing:

  • I notice detailed color nuances that I used to not notice before, in particular on my own skin. Dark areas in a room look less dark than they used to. I now perceive our indoor lighting as yellowish, which it is ("soft white" LED lightbulbs) whereas before I couldn't see a difference with daylight.
  • Many photos and paintings look better than they used to. Small photos of people as seen on the Web look more cartoonish and smoother than they used to.
  • I have a better depth perception than I used to. This is obvious when looking at some photos or paintings which used to look just flat. Now in many cases, they appear in 3D as if I was watching a 3D movie with stereo goggles. The location of objects in a scene is now obvious. I can feel like I'm in the middle of the scene if I want to - rather than being forced to see things from the perspective of my eyes or camera.
  • Some photos and artwork look animated. They're not breathing but I see they want to breathe. I perceive the direction of the potential movement of objects. In a photo of a crowd, I perceive the direction of movement of each individual. On a photo of a cabbage plant with big leaves, I see the direction in which the leaves would move if there was a bit of wind or some shaking. Many late Renoir paintings that used to look ugly to me are now super interesting because I now perceive depth and a lot of pseudo-movement. It's wild.

I feel like I've acquired a superpower. I wish to keep it that way and I hope it can somehow help others.

Questions:

  1. Is this condition known and if so, how is it called?
  2. Is there cause for concern?
  3. Should I keep experimenting on my own?

For now, I'm trying to hold off until these after-effects are gone but I don't know for how long.

Edited by breathable
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Hi, and welcome.  I personally have never heard of visual acuity improving after using psilocybin but perception and interpretation can definitely change.  Note, I'm not a researcher or an expert.  I'm just an old guy who has lived with HPPD for a long time.

To address your concern, I wouldn't be too worried about the symptoms you're experiencing now because you dosed so recently.  But then again it's been four weeks, so I wouldn't push it.  You may have some initial "pre-hppd" symptoms (and I emphasize "may").  Personally, I'd say take the positive things you've learned from psychedelics and apply them to your life.  I'd strongly discourage continuing to consume psychedelics, or at least wait quite a while before using them again.  See if what you're experiencing subsides over time or if they get more noticeable.

Trust me, you don't want to contract HPPD because it can be a debilitating condition.  Understand, I'm not saying you have hppd or are prone to it.  I'm not qualified to make that sort of call.

I apologize if this post came off as being pushy and I'm certainly not in the position to tell you, or anybody else, what to do.  I guess what I'm getting at is proceed with caution.  Enjoy the things psychedelics have taught you, but don't assume more is better, or will teach you more than you have already learned.

I hope that made sense.  I ramble on sometimes.

Take care.

Edited by MadDoc
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Hi MadDoc 👋 

13 hours ago, MadDoc said:

I personally have never heard of visual acuity improving after using psilocybin but perception and interpretation can definitely change.

This is curiouser and curiouser... I'll keep digging. It would be nice to know whether my visual perception went from average to superior, or from below-average/inhibited to average/normal. Maybe I can take some tests that involve color vision or "spatial perception". I took a spatial reasoning test already but I didn't do particularly well on that - I think it involves a different skill unrelated than what I'm experiencing.

13 hours ago, MadDoc said:

Personally, I'd say take the positive things you've learned from psychedelics and apply them to your life.  I'd strongly discourage continuing to consume psychedelics, or at least wait quite a while before using them again.  See if what you're experiencing subsides over time or if they get more noticeable.

Sounds wise.

Meanwhile, I started painting. It's been encouraging so far!

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