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Shamanicallyspeaking, to smoke DMT or ingest any other hallucinogen is to offer up ourcells as a sacrifice to the spirits. By such sacrifice, we are allowing ourconsciousness to be possessed bymysterious and invisible agents of transformation. When we ingest apsychoactive substance, a number of our neurons are “destroyed,” which is tosay, broken down to their basic constituents. In the moment of destruction,they become “food” for inorganic intelligences to gain temporary substance inour organic realm of existence, via ourconsciousness. There is a moment of overlap between the worlds of life anddeath, the temporal and the eternal. As part of us “dies,” it is absorbed by thespirit-intelligences residing in the plant or chemical, intelligences which (wecan only imagine) are seeking an experience of organic existence otherwiseunavailable to them. (Since plants are organic life forms, it might be moreaccurate to say they are seeking a different, more sentient kind of organicexperience.) In those brief moments or hours, while our neurons are beingconsumed by the entheogen, they are still connected to our conscious selves, tothe nervous system and neural network. As a result, we get to consciously experienceexistence “on the other side,” through the eyes of the spirits; at the sametime, the spirits are able to experience life through our eyes. This form ofritual sacrifice is an ancient exchange, possibly the oldest one of all.