“Reality is just the mind agreeing with itself.”
Prologue: The Call to Escape
It started like any other humid afternoon in Sri Lanka’s countryside. Sade and Juki were staying near a rice mill, working a few weeks for Sade’s father, helping during harvest season. Their days were filled with mechanical rhythms and earthy smells of paddy and diesel.
Then came a call from Kithul, an old friend from school.
“Come, let’s not drink this time. Let’s take a five-day trip in one.”
Sade laughed. Curious. Tempted. He had never tried LSD. Neither had Juki.
But this wasn’t a reckless move. Kithul wasn’t coming alone. He was bringing Sanju, a few years older, calm and wise, known among friends for his quiet knowledge of psychedelics.
4:00 PM: Arrival and the First Drop
They reached a secluded villa booked entirely at random. Surrounded by forest edges and golden paddy fields, it felt like a sacred place waiting to be discovered.
Groceries were scattered on a table like a picnic offering: butter, jam, chips, lollipops, bananas, ramen, chocolate, cigarettes, incense sticks. The essentials and a few delightful oddities.
Each of them took a quarter of an LSD stamp.
Psytrance started flowing from a JBL speaker. The room shifted. Something changed. Sade and Sanju went to make noodles while Kithul and Juki prepared bread.
But when they returned…
Kithul and Juki hadn’t moved. Still frozen, staring at a slice of bread.
“We were making it in our heads,” Juki mumbled.
They were tripping inside the bread locked into the grain of the slice, seeing the molecular dance of matter. Time had already slowed. Reality was shifting.
5:15 PM: The First Peak
Outside, the corridor turned into a portal. The music changed itself now deep house, soothing and flowing like the breeze. They didn’t pick the new playlist. YouTube’s algorithm or perhaps something else did it for them.
They laughed. Sat on a swinging chair. Lit joints. The world softened and stretched.
Sade and Juki began discussing Theravāda Buddhist philosophy, the ideas of impermanence, illusion, suffering. The teachings they grew up with but never felt before.
“We’ve never really appreciated how beautiful nature is,” said Juki.
As they looked out over the horizon, the sun had just dipped, but something strange began to happen. The rice fields began to rise like a wave, crashing into the clouds, and the clouds retaliated dropping into the earth.
A cycle. A dance. Like the samsara the wheel of existence.
Bats spun into the clouds like sparks in a storm.
“All this… is an illusion,” said Juki.
And Sade had seen it too exactly that. Reality, folding on itself.
6:45 PM: Faces of the Self
As Juki went in to grab cigarettes, he found himself mesmerized by floor tiles, patterns he never noticed before, sacred geometry, spirals, the language of the Earth.
Inside the room, Kithul was staring into a laser light, watching fractals explode and reassemble. Sanju had his eyes on a banner of elephants hanging on the wall, but the elephants were walking… toward him. Calm. Connected.
Back on the swing, Sade sat alone.
That’s when he saw it…. himself.
To his right, a shadow figure. Darker. Heavier. A version of himself, drenched in sadness. The pain of his recent breakup, nine years of love, gone. All manifested into a silent figure beside him.
That figure turned, smiled sadly, and laughed… as if letting go.
And then vanished.
Sade cried. But not from pain. From release.
7:00 PM: The Spiritual Turn
Juki re-entered the villa. “What time is it?”
“6:45 PM,” replied Sanju.
They were stunned. Only 2 hours and 45 minutes had passed since the trip began. It felt like days.
Sanju took charge. Lit incense sticks. A keif joint. Declared it time for a cleansing ritual.
“It’s a hot day. We should bathe one by one. Water purifies the mind too.”
Sade’s ego resisted. “Why should I listen to him?”
But the others stared at him, almost as if they heard that silent thought.
Sanju smiled. “If you don’t want to, I’ll go first.”
Coincidence? Or were they connected?
7:30 PM: The Art of Nature
Sade entered the bathroom. As the water fell, he heard everything. Droplets, pipe pressure, floor streams. Time paused.
Then he looked at the frosted bathroom window.
There was a painting. But within it, he saw everything humanity tried to forget- wars, pollution, animal extinction, rising seas, forests vanishing, rivers poisoned.
Not just ideas. He saw them. Felt their cycle.
He stepped out transformed.
“Did you see it?” asked Sanju.
Sade nodded.
“The art of nature,” he whispered.
“In the window,” Sanju finished.
One by one, Kithul and Juki went in. Each came out, changed.
9:00 PM: Taste and Memory
Lying on the bed, they noticed the smallest details.
A banana, the best banana Kithul had ever eaten.
The scent of incense not just smelled but tasted.
They had lit incense sticks every day back home, as Buddhists for rituals, for worship, but never noticed the beauty in it.
Sanju stood up, excited.
“Let’s walk. The night road is waiting.”
Sade agreed. Kithul and Juki stayed behind.
10:00 PM: Energy and Interference
Inside, Juki was tripping, releasing heavy emotional energy. A bad trip.
Kithul felt it like a storm cloud inside the room.
Juki was narrating a story, locked in his world. For him, it was mystical.
For Kithul, it was terrifying.
He couldn’t move. Couldn’t interrupt. His body frozen.
Outside, Sade and Sanju walked along the village road the tree line giggling softly, whispering things they couldn’t understand.
“Maybe one day, we’ll know what they’re saying,” said Sanju.
“Yup,” Sade replied.
Simple. Profound.
12:00 AM – 5:30 AM: The Wordless Journey
They returned to find Juki calm, laughing like he had touched something ancient.
Kithul was still in shock.
Together, all four stepped out once again no words, no plans into the cool midnight air. The moon watched from above.
They walked, together, yet alone in their minds.
Each experiencing a different universe, side by side.
Time evaporated.
When the sun began to rise, someone broke the silence:
“What happened to the last five hours?”
No one could answer.
But everyone smiled.
Epilogue: Returning
The villa was silent now. Light streamed in softly. The speaker still played gentle ambient tones.
They weren’t surprised. No one was trying to explain anymore.
There was only one feeling:
Gratitude.
For the connection.
For nature.
For the pain.
For the letting go.
For the truth hidden behind familiar things.
For the realization that maybe, just maybe…
Life itself is a trip.
And the only thing you really need is to wake up to it.
Trip Themes Experienced:
- Theravāda Buddhism – Impermanence, illusion, ego, and inner peace
- Ego Death – Confronting the self and letting go
- Synchronicity – Shared hallucinations and non-verbal connection
- Time Dilation – Hours felt like days
- Nature as Teacher – Seeing patterns, cycles, and meaning in the environment
- Spiritual Cleansing – Water as a ritual purifier
- Emotional Healing – Letting go of grief and reconnecting with joy