MJ changed my life, how about you?

My experience! Its long, but its mine :thumbsup:

The first few times I smoked I was never really sure what was going on in my head. But I always came back for more, ever curious about the effects. Each time I would try more and more... and sit there, trying to figure out what being high was really like. Every time I thought I had it nailed I would realize that my realization was false and I only thought that because I was high in the first place. This became an ongoing project for me... get high... and analyze myself... attempt to resolve what was REALLY going on inside my head. SOMETHING was happening... but I was never sure what... each time I came to a different conclusion. See, I am the kind of person who must have complete control over my life, and even when I donâ??t (we never truly do) I still like to THINK That I do. <-- control freak, I guess. In any case, eventually I gave up... didnâ??t smoke for a few months... figured it was a waste of time. Then I was at party and decided to try it again. It wasnâ??t the usual stuff though... someone else had brought their own... and I took a nice huge hit... and was never the same. At first I felt kind of light headed... wobbly. I walked back into the house with the people that just smoked w/ me... and sat down. And didnâ??t move. For over an hour. This had never happened before... It was like I stuck in a spiraling picture frame, moving at about 1 frame per minute. You know when you stand up too fast and the world goes black for a minute? It was like that every few seconds, except I wouldnâ??t see blackness... I would see picture frames of the last few minutes... over and over. Deja-vu beyond anything I have ever felt. At the time I knew little of MJ, didnâ??t know you couldnâ??t OD on it, or that it couldnâ??t hurt you... My conclusion at the time was that I OD'd, and had died... and this was what they called "life flashing before your eyes"... I was dead and I wasnâ??t having any fun... at all. Panic attack. I fled. To the car... where I waited it out. "God please make me normal again." I came back the next day, and almost had another panic attack just revisiting the place I was the day before. I didnâ??t go back there, or smoke again, for over a year. Maybe two. I fled my mind.. As far as I was concerned.. MJ was not my thing.

Eventually I did some research. That feeling stuck in my mind, I thought I was having psychological problems or some other hypocondriatic melodramatic crap. I searched and found out everything I needed to know... MJ can cause anxiety. It canâ??t hurt you. You canâ??t OD on it. I felt safer already. More research revealed my own personality to be the culprit.. My constant feeling of needing to be in control of my own thoughts... wrecked by the presence of THC... sent me into panic mode. I found others, just like myself, with the same situations. I still get emails from people asking how or if I ever got over it. I still wasnâ??t over that feeling, even after all the research, and I felt like the only way to clear my head once and for all is to get back on the horse and master it. So I came back to MJ... very... very slowly. 1 time per month, very little. I started to recognize the feelings and the different series of emotions and all the "high" put together... instead of analyzing it... I tried to let go... and let it do its thing. Stressfull at first, but eventually I got good at it... Being high isnâ??t like anything else... itâ??s not an affect... like caffeine or sugar... itâ??s a state of mind to me. It changed my perception to the world, changed how I would think... I would come to conclusions and solve problems in different ways than I would normally do so. I was so worried about "short term memory loss" that I would get high, let it leave me, and attempt to recall everything that happened while I was high... and was successful... when I wanted to be. Getting high didnâ??t feel like a sharp knife cutting into my reality anymore... it felt like high tide coming in... Washing ashore with new thoughts and ideas... creativity and solutions would come as if brought in with the ocean. Music would come from no where... if only I could put down what was in my head... it was so beautiful sometimes I would cry because of it. I realized again it was just my emotions... possibly amplified or realizations of the past and the future yet to come... it didnâ??t strike me as odd anymore... I was no longer a novice to MJ... I was becoming an experienced user. A year later I was smoking once a week, I always felt like I would become an addict to it... regardless of what they say about psychological addictions and drugs... but When I wasnâ??t smoking.. I wasnâ??t thinking about it. I wasnâ??t wishing I could get high.. I was just normal. It lost its "novelty" so to speak... it was just something I did... if I didnâ??t have it I didnâ??t care, if I did have it, then great. This was good news to me, it meant that even someone like me with no willpower to overcome addictive hobbies (such as online gaming which took forever to kick and get back to the real world) I was totally and completely able to stone-cold stop smoking without even thinking about it.

Then I did what I think every "new" smoker eventually does... I smoked daily. Anywhere from one time to all day. I run a business IRL, finding an extra couple hundred is no issue for me, my cost of living is low, and so were my bills. So I amassed a large stock of it and just smoked the crap out of it. It wasnâ??t that I had to... it was just done when things were slow... I was bored. If I had something important to do that day I wouldnâ??t touch it... no one noted any difference in me AT ALL to the negative. No one knew I was now an MJ smoker... No one called me a stoner or a pot head, because no one could tell. The stereotypical pot-head persona was just NOT me. I went about as if nothing in my life had changed. But something had... something big.

About 3 months into smoking almost daily something crazy happened to me. I didnâ??t notice it because I felt as though I was just doing whatever I always do... but other people started to notice. Itâ??s not what you are thinking! People started to react to me different. My parents treated me more like an adult, less like a child. My business partners and friends started treating me more like a successful businessman rather than a lazy adolescent. Perhaps some of it is just natural maturity and age, but in the course of three months... of smoking daily... I had changed drastically. I was getting up at 7AM Instead of 10 or 11AM. I was being more responsible with work, the air was cleaner around me or clearer, I donâ??t know how to describe it but everything was more... in tune. I could recall things easier. That bullshit about memory loss is just bullshit. Ive never had a good memory to begin with, and I am a heavy case of ADHD. I would leave my keys in the car, forget to make important calls, forget my bills, forget peopleâ??s birthdays, I would detest public appearances or parties, miss opportunities to do things that I wanted to do. All of that crap disappeared seemingly overnight. I was a totally new person. I could get up in the morning and feel good... my stomach problems and irritable bowel syndrome got better. I wasnâ??t as nervous or jumpy... as I had always been the kind of jerky movement person, very quick and make lots of mistake... I was now a smooth yet just as fast with my movements. I was less of a disaster zone... I could actually get things done! Maybe MJ does something to people with bad ADD/ADHD, I donâ??t know, but it changed my life. I backed off on smoking daily since it seemed I was building a tolerance and wearing myself out with it... Started smoking once every few 3-5 days, sometimes 1-2 weeks even, it just felt better to get high after waiting for a longer time. Im still just as productive. I've made more friends, money, making better business decisions and been happier than ever, since all this started happening to me. I felt more complete and like I could do things that I was too scared to do before... confidence indeed. Im still me, just more clear, and complex as ever. I am able to analyze situations from more angles now... depict new outcomes that didnâ??t seem possible before. Occasionally I still analyze my highs but in such a different state of mind now. When I smoke now my eyes no longer get red. If Im really high and suddenly need to get something done I can work right through it as if I Had never smoked at all, all the while feeling the effects in the back of my head, sort of like a soft pillow for my brain, relaxing me and allowing me to be productive and calm. It took nearly 8 years, but Smoking MJ is most definitely my thing.

thank you for this. as an occasional smoker i have the same exact highs that you felt when you first started smoking. now that i read this i feel i have a better understanding of what this wonderful substance is doing to my body. congratulations on your sort of epiphany. good job with your business and happy toking:thumbsup:

I understand you, I too felt that I have changed, not entirely because of smoking but, I definitely feel what you wrote. Things that before could "ruin my day" or just little things that drove me crazy now it's all right, I don't dwell on it. It really felt like coming of age or something but I like analyzing myself too and the mj certainly helped me. I'm now on vacation so I smoked daily, though I think when I get back to university I'll only do it on weekends :thumbsup:

I have this friend who is 15 (I'm 21) and he's very anal about everything (almost obsessive) and I wish I could put a joint in his mouth to relax him a little and shit, I know it could help him, but I'm also friends with his brother and he warned me about it!

That is incredibly similar to my experience with marijuana. I had first tried it but had an acute panic attack, and vowed not to do it again. well than changed, and I would analyze my thoughts as well, I'm extremely blazed right now, so obviously this isn't making any sense, but I believe if you look at my first few posts I describe some of it.

Marijuana changed my life for the better. I devote my life to the cultivation of it, as long as I am physically able to. I plan on giving myself a break (i've been a daily smoker for over a year and half) so I can experience a monumental high again, where I'd have great realizations and incredible thoughts. Now, I'm so used to it, it's become my reality, and being sober is like being in an altered state.

I feel you man, that's awesome

Great.