A child is being born, it is a violent obstinate act. Tears trace the contours of a mothers beat red and bloated face, blinded by the 320 watt fluorescent slap of the lights overhead. The room sounds of a pack of hyenas, yipping and screaming in anticipation of a kill, or in celebration of one. The glass shattering vociferations can be heard all the way down the narrow corridor, to the horror of hospital guests. The sheets of the hospital bed look like a greesy fast food bag, opaque with sweat and stuck to the mothers skin. Her long hair tangled and vice gripping her face, licking at her mouth her nostrils and her eyes. The doctor scrambles to push the hemorrhoids back into the screaming mothers anal cavity, the immediate area stained the color of tea with blood shit and puss. The malleable head of the pallid babe peaks through and another shrill scream enters the fold. To the doctor this is routine, to the father, this is beautiful, and to anyone else, this is a horror.
Perception is a beautiful thing, a complex thing. Something totally individual, unique and constantly changing. It is an amorphous ball of clay, ripe with potentiality. But we are not the instruments of its formation, we are not the puppet masters pulling the strings, this ball of clay is part of us, something to be valued in introspection, a tool, and a crutch. It is our perceptions of the world that shape us, our beliefs, our passions, goals, prejudices, morality and amorality. Perception changes a tree swaying in the wind, reaching out its ample branches to better soak in the nourishing light of the sun, to artwork, to beauty, something to be inspired by, and a Van Gogh to pointless marks on a board, same token toiling. It is something entirely subjective, and it seems abject that so many people are so out of touch with their own perception and subjectivity of the world around them, and of themselves. So many people neglect one of the most powerful tools we have, and that is the ability to analyze and deconstruct our own perceptions, to subjectively view them in oppose to simple autonomous conceptualization.
Nootropics enact exceedingly subtle changes on the human experience. These are not drugs like cocaine and methamphetamine, opiates or even caffeine, whose effects are felt to the enth degree. These drugs do not get you high, they do not give you a buzz, they don't make you something you're not, they are an entirely other animal. (and I speak of course only of true nootropics, which are few and far between, there are plenty of very popular supplements out there that have very noticeable effects, these I am not referencing.)
I am in the school of thought that there is no such thing as a non-responder to popular nootropics like piracetam, but instead it is a problem of perception and subjectivity, its looking for the wrong things, its an expectation of profound change, no work, and instant results. Iv'e read far too many posts by users who don't “feel” anything from a racetam, as if they expect to take some magic pill that will make them superhuman, as if they were taking nzt, and when these expectations are not met through extension, the compound fails to work at all. I'm sure there are individuals who respond much better to racetams then others, there have been times where a large dose of piracetam has made me feel like I just smoked half a joint, with no anxiety or paranoia. But this is not the norm, and although you may not feel something, this substance is still making changes to you physiologically, whether you are capable of perceiving it or not, there is great benefit still to be had.
To illustrate this point, and also to elucidate how I personally gauge the efficacy subjectively of these compounds, i'll talk a little about my recent experience with noopept, which I had just begun trialing this week.
I have been taking noopept for five days now, and the effects have been profound, HOWEVER, I FEEL exactly the same as I did prior to using noopept. It is very important prior to delving into any of these substances that you have a firm understanding of your minds baseline state. How you act and think on any normal day, devoid of nootropics or supplements. You need to be very in tune with your own body, and how it naturally operates, so you have something to compare it to, something more then an immediate body feeling. It is important that while you are trialing a new noot, and also when you are not, that you regularly assess your state of mind, the way in which you perceive things, the kind of thoughts you normally have, the kind of feelings you usually have, you're approach behavior, the manner in which you converse, how sexual you are, how intuitive you are, anything you can think of. With all that in mind, this is what I have noticed thus far on my trial of noopept. The effects are extremely subtle. There is no feeling involved, if I did not have such a good understanding of how I operated on a day to day basis without noopept, I can definitely see how I could think I was having no reaction at all, and I think a lot of people do this, looking for something huge, something glaringly different. But its all about the nuances. One thing I have noticed is a greater number of depersonalization occurrences. Of which I have always attributed to higher order thought. I find that when you are depersonalized, you have a much greater understanding of REALITY, and the puzzle piece that you are fitting in to it. Depersonalization occurs a lot in depressed people, who have been shown to have a much more realistic view of the world around them, which I find to be incredibly useful, if it weren't for the heavy burden of depression itself. Which is why i'm so pleasantly surprised when my mind finds itself depersonalized whilst in an elevated mood state, or even simply baseline. It is as if the world has slowed down, iv'e disconnected my self from it, and i'm able to view everything like I were a child again. Everything becomes endlessly fascinating, but unlike a child, I now have a mind developed enough to truly appreciate and better understand all the miraculous things around me. I become distinctly aware that I exist, and that everything exists, and just how incredible that little fact is. And just the fact that something exists, in this state, makes it incredible to me. I was sitting on a wooden bench in my front yard today smoking a cigarette, when this feeling struck me. I had the recurring thought, and feeling, that I exist, and that is amazing, and I started to look around at everything around me with new eyes. I looked at the old tree in front of me, I analyzed its bark, and the sediment it had build up. I looked at the insect husks hooked to the outside of the tree, its position in the ground, I thought about its age, and how it has watched this area change for decades, or more. I watched an ant intently on the table next to me, finding tiny scraps of food, carrying them to the edge of the table, and dropping them off. I thought about the mind of an ant, the hive mind, its means of communication, locomotion. I wondered what it would be like to perceive the world as an ant does, and knew that I would never know, that there is no way for me to ever understand that perception. I watched a middle aged mother walk by with her baby in a stroller and pondered what she may have looked like as a little girl, or as a high school student. I contemplated her socioeconomic status, what events may have occurred in her life to forge the way she looked and acted today, and how different she could have been had she had a different life. I was very much in the moment, and noopept seems to do that. I can easily see myself sitting on that bench instead, with my eyes metaphorically closed, entirely inside my mind, thinking of my problems, what to have for dinner, work, relationships, sensory input null and void, bland. However sitting on that bench, I didn't feel any different then any other day, I was me, as I always have been, but my mind chose to think about different things. Which isn't to say I don't think about these things from time to time, reality to me has always been the most fascinating thing, but I let other things drown it out all the more often. I have moments like this much more often on noopept, whether it be for a few seconds, or a few hours, I make note of it.
There is no mood elevation that I can tell from noopept, but moreso a mood stabilizing effect. I ruminate much less about depressing things, but also am not amped up and manic, i'm just always cool, collected and happy or neutral. There is nothing to get upset about. Iv'e always had great control over my temper, healthy or not, i'm a master at bottling up my anger and brushing it off. Noopept seems to make me more keenly aware of the hierarchy of things, that is to say, of just how trivial some things are in the grand scheme of things. That so many things people get angry about every day are so petty, temporary, unimportant and transient, and that allows me to elevate myself above the anger, and feel contended and in control, in oppose to the feeling of bottling it up.
Though I do not feel anxious particularly around people, I do have problems talking to them from time to time. I'm the kind of individual who does not value small talk. I engage in it frequently, but I often don't start the conversation. I hate the kinds of things people talk about on a day to day basis. I don't want to talk about things, or people, I want to talk about ideas, and concepts, something important. Not feeling comfortable beginning conversations about the kinds of things im interested in, I’ve reduced almost my whole conversational repertoire to witty banter and sarcasm, which gets me by just fine, I have no problem making friends, and Iv'e had countless people tell me in my life I should be a stand up comedian, so I guess ive honed my deflectitory defense mechanism quite well over the years. After all, everyone likes the funny guy. But I simply never open up to any body. Noopept definitely improves my approach behavior. I find myself much more willing to just walk up to someone and start a conversation. I feel the same, I have just noted that I have become much more likely to blurt out seinfeldesque observations about every day life that seem to lead to some interesting conversation, of which ive been able to commentate endlessly about. And I find myself moderately more comfortable talking about myself in turn. I feel a slightly greater sense of connectedness to other people, which is comforting. Also when I do speak, I speak with much greater force, there is no hesitation or softening of my voice, it feels as if I have utter confidence in what it is that I am saying.
Music is moderately more enjoyable, it isn't a euphoric WOW feeling like others have reported, or that I have felt on occasion with piracetam, but I more greatly appreciate the nuances of the song, on the instrumental side, and the lyrical side. Classical music is also a joy to listen to on noopept. I find myself skipping far less songs on pandora, and having a greater appreciation for varying genres of music and what they individually bring to the table.
Smell also appears to be moderately enhanced. I can much more easily smell my own cigarette sticking to my skin, the smell of food wafting out of a restaurant, the smell of grass in my yard, the smell of wet bark from a meter or more away, among many other things.
To bring this to a close I would just like to say for those of you getting into noots for the first time, or even just trying a new one, or have given up on a substance all together, just keep a close eye on the most unexpected of things. These substances are very subtle and present themselves often only in minor changes in your perception. The kinds of thoughts your having, you're proclivity to watch a bird fly across the sky overhead, or to analyze the architecture of a building you pass by every day, the kinds of things you're mind chooses to focus on and so much more. They bring things that are normally in the background, carelessly filtered through your subconscious to the foreground, and you may not realize that’s whats going on, its just a thought, and you might not give it any. But then again, this is also just my subjective perception of these substances, and I might be totally wrong, skewed by my own biases. As for noopept, I would highly recommend it. Its wonderful drug for expanding consciousness and enjoying in the little things. Its been a joy thus far.
I apologize for the wall of text 