THE WORK R (0r,T The Eclectic WorkplaceIP Acid Test) In hep San Francisco, innovative office workers have found a new way to boost productivity: microdosing psychedelic performance enhancers during their 9-5. But can taking LSD really make you a better employee? To test the theory, one MH writer decided to trial his own weekday trip from COULD LSD ADD COLOUR the (relative) safety of his desk. This is what happened TO THE MONOTONE

GUTTER CREDIT GUTTER OF YOUR DAILY GRIND? WORDS BY TOM WARD – PHOTOGRAPHY BY AGATA PEC

68 MEN’S HEALTH MENSHEALTH.CO.UK MENSHEALTH.CO.UK MEN’S HEALTH 69 THE IT’S 10AM WORK Tom is more prone to studied But on the second go the TRIP PROGRESS diligence than outbursts of effects were more noticeable. REPORT zany banter. So, even though Tom enjoyed distinct periods I was aware of his dosing, of down-time that split up his FRIDAY Will microdosing LSD at charting any changes in his work, seemingly thanks to in 2016 – is an altogether different feat. allowing the mind to settle before the work have your supervisor 9-5 demeanour was tricky. better focus on projects. In I tentatively message a friend whose cycle begins again on the fourth. Taken at readying your P45? MH’s In fact, by the end of the first meetings, his ideas were less Facebook photos feature variations this dose, LSD’s effect is ‘psycholytic’ as deputy editor, David Morton, Monday, I had forgotten he encumbered by overthinking. of him hanging about Indian temples opposed to psychedelic – mind-blowing charts our writer’s progress was ‘experimenting’ entirely. Which is a trip I’d like to take. arrayed in patterned sari pants as he in a way that won’t have you picturing bats gazes lustily at the sunset. He responds MORNINGand as the MH editorial team sits down swooping overhead. As Fadiman wrote, almost immediately promising to order for its daily meeting, every one of my “The rocks don’t glisten, not even a little.” my LSD from the ‘Dark Web’. Fadiman thoughts is focused on the tab of LSD was being sold in the US as a psychiatric Whether microdosed or ingested at recommends using liquid LSD, but the I’ve just ingested. None of my colleagues medication under the trade name Delysid. full strength, LSD works by stimulating only source online is selling 25 250mg know I’ve taken it and I am as yet unsure From the mid-’50s to 1973, the CIA got in the 5-HT2A receptors in the pre-frontal vials for £240, which equates to 6230 what its impact on my day – my career on the act, exploring the drug’s potential cortex, increasing the activity of glutamate more doses than I require. There’s also – will be. This isn’t a ploy to lose my job, use for mind control, while it was also – a substance vital to learning – with a risk that shelling out for that much will nor have I simply started the weekend being used by the American Psychiatric the resulting sensation mimicking the land me in trouble with the law, and early. If pioneering researchers across Association to treat alcoholism. effect of the release of feel-good chemical a certainty it’ll land me with some hefty the pond are to be believed, lysergic acid But concerns about the mind-altering serotonin. According to research in the overdraft charges. Instead we plump for diethylamide – LSD to you and me – is properties of LSD and its counter-culture Journal of Analytical Toxicology, LSD 10 tabs for £45, a mere 980 doses more simply the latest in a string of unusual following were growing. In a 1965 edition has a ‘plasma half-life’ of just over five than I’ll need. A week later an envelope products claimed as workplace aids. of The Harvard Crimson, Dr Max Rinkel hours, meaning an entire dose should be arrives in the post. I open it to find a According to one Harvard researcher, by – the first American doctor to work with cleared from your system inside 10 hours. folded card labelled “BDSM Porn – Please taking a miniscule amount at my desk LSD – was reported as having expressed Contrary to the popular doom-leaden HALLUCINOGENS MAY find your login info and selected vouchers I’m opening my brain up to receive ideas, concern over the long-term effects of mythos of the ’60s and ’70s, traces of ONE DAY USURP YOUR enclosed.” Labelling orders in this way is improve focus and sharpen creativity. the drug: “Rinkel said that the danger the drug won’t be stored in your spinal MORNING PICK-ME-UP a clever stratagem for avoiding detection, But this is no mere nootropic. Get the of taking LSD outside a hospital was that column for the rest or your life. Nor can but makes for a possibly relationship- dose wrong, or approach it in the wrong the size of the dosage and the purity of the the effects of the drug be accidentally shattering package to open with your frame of mind, and I may well be freaking drug are uncertain, and the reaction of triggered at a later date, turning you girlfriend standing beside you. Finding out not just at my workload, but at the any individual is somewhat uncertain. He into some kaleidoscopic Manchurian the brightly coloured tabs of LSD – a Class elephants carrying my P45 in their trunks cited the case of a woman who, after taking Candidate. On a normal, 100mg dose, A drug – inside comes as strange relief. as they float through my editor’s office. the drug, tore off her clothes and knelt a 12-hour trip will likely always be the Next, the tricky part. A single tab To find out what this means for my – before a thermostat, which she believed very limit of what your brain endures. of LSD is about a quarter of the size of for our – workplace prospects, I set out was a crucifix. The experiment was then Nor – contrary to popular belief – a postage stamp, and I need a tenth to microdose LSD once every four days, terminated.” is LSD chemically of that. I get the sharpest kitchen knife over the course of two working weeks, LSD’s inevitable addictive: “Before out and perform a surgical dissection. and record the results. Would I unlock ban came five years “By midday I’m a second dose can Never having taken LSD before, I’m the hitherto untapped potential of my later, in 1970, when yet to visualise have an impact, you apprehensive about getting this right. brain, entering a swirling mental vortex US president Richard need to leave your Even with this feature signed off by my in which words fly past my eyes as my Nixon signed tangerine trees or brain for a while to editor (and the company’s lawyers), I fingers spark against the keyboard? the Controlled marmalade skies” sort of reset,” says don’t imagine he’ll find me tripping balls Would the Pulitzer board be lining up Substances Act. Jonathan Liebling, in the office overly endearing. The next to canonise my next weightloss feature? The UK’s Misuse of Drugs Act followed political director of drug law campaigners day I meet Liebling for a coffee, hoping he And would I finally understand the in 1971. In the UK, LSD is now, along with The United Patients Alliance and LSD can allay my fears. “The effect of taking ending of Mad Men? To paraphrase the ecstasy and cannabis, a Schedule 1 drug – specialist at The Loop. “Because your 10-12mg will be no different to the late psychedelic pioneer Timothy Leary, defined as one with no therapeutic value body can’t build up a tolerance, it’s almost sugar in your tea,” he says. I decided to turn on, tune in and find out. and a high potential for abuse. It is highly impossible to become addicted.” Add that “Once you start going for 30- illegal, along with nearly all research into it. to the findings of two US studies in 2015 33% 40mg there’ll be a noticeable of subjects reported THE MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR Yet in the states – specifically the tech that concluded there is no link between effect and, depending on LSD has a storied history both in and seats of Silicon Valley and San Francisco psychedelics and psychosis, and the long-term creative the person, 75-200mg is out of the laboratory. It was discovered – bored of Bulletproof coffees, biohacking historic and histrionic outcry about the benefits in a enough for a proper trip.” by Swiss scientist Albert Hofmann who, implants and efficiency-boosting fasting, drug’s dangers appear oversold. “The 1999 MAPS study I’m reminded of a Bill after isolating the chemical from the ergot a horde of young technologists are dosing acid is just the trigger that gives your into LSD Hicks line about people on fungus in 1938, accidentally sent himself their way to the top. Circuit board whizz brain a signal to turn up the volume,” says LSD jumping to their deaths on the world’s first acid trip. “I sank into Bill Gates is reported to have dabbled, Liebling. “Your brain would not respond from rooftops, believing they could a… extremely stimulated condition… but the lynchpin behind the move toward how it does if it were going to be harmed.” fly. Birds, Hicks points out, can also fly, I perceived an uninterrupted stream of creative dosing is Dr James Fadiman, but often take off from the ground. In fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes a psychedelic researcher and Stanford TICKET TO RIDE other words, there’s no shame in starting with intense, kaleidoscopic play of graduate who advocates taking 10mg – a Sourcing LSD in California is one thing. slow. Having said that, the roughly 10mg colours,” Hofmann wrote at the time. tenth of a conventional dose – once every Sourcing it in London – where, according sliver I’m left with is almost invisible. I’d Hofmann’s discovery sparked a flurry four days. According to Fadiman’s 2011 to statistics from the Home Office, LSD been advised to dissolve the tab in water of experimentation and by 1947 LSD microdosing handbook The Psychedelic usage among 16-59-year-olds fell to 0.2% Explorer’s Guide, the first and second

days see a boost in focus, with the third CREDIT GUTTER CREDIT GUTTER

70 MEN’S HEALTH MENSHEALTH.CO.UK MEN’S HEALTH 71 THE WORK OPENING A NEW TAB R IS THE SHORTCUT TO T IP ENHANCED FOCUS FEELGOOD HIT OF THE SUMMER When it comes to potential harm to the user (black overnight then drink the mixture the next bar) and those around them (yellow), LSD ranks morning. I do this, swallowing the tab for lower than most weekend indulgences, as studies good measure. Liebling has told me it will from research body DrugScience demonstrate kick in in about an hour, giving me time to navigate the Northern Line in peace. 80 My editor and deputy editor are aware of 70 my drug schemes for safety reasons, but 60 50 other than that, I’m flying under the radar 40 in an attempt to provoke the most honest 30 reaction from my experience. 20 By mid-morning I long to write: “I was OVERALL HARMOVERALL 10 somewhere around the photocopier on the edge of the office when the drugs began to take hold,” but not much seems to be happening. By midday I’m yet to LSD Alcohol Cocaine visualise tangerine trees or marmalade Tobacco Ketamine skies. Neither am I feeling particularly DRUGS more focused. I begin to wonder about the vivacity of my acid. Have I ingested a duff batch? Or was the dosage simply change. And it increases one’s ability not high enough? Remembering to focus without the side effects of Liebling’s quantitative advice, I vow stimulants like Ritalin or Adderall.” to up my intake come Monday. Such was my experience of the drug. Throughout the course of my experiment DAY TRIPPER I remained stimulated but without the Fresh from the weekend, I swallow 15mg need to constantly refill my coffee mug, or of dissolved LSD before leaving the house YOUR BRAIN ON DRUGS the somewhat manic mental tremors that on Monday. Without the trepidation of overloading on caffeine can entail. Nor, Think that LSD’s psycholytic effects are all in my first trial, I feel happy and focused. My as the drug wore off, did I experience an the mind? As this brain-imaging study from workload is a challenge to be completed, unpleasant comedown. The tide receded the Beckley Foundation proves*, you’d be not a mountain threatening to tumble gently over a few days without any absolutely right. By stimulating the visual down on me. When writing, the words sudden decline in my abilities. Friends cortex, microdosing LSD allows for integrated I’m looking for are at the tip of my fingers, have previously self-administered Ritalin communication between neural networks. Normal The brain rather than the tip of my tongue. Upping to help them work, but LSD, to me, equals Just show your boss this picture, OK? brain activity on LSD the dosage, it seems, is paying dividends. a calmer and more natural stimulus. And this is no placebo effect, either. Were it made legal tomorrow, I would In a study last summer, Dr Neiloufar certainly lay in a supply to be used in Family, an expert in psycholinguistics at David Nutt and Dr Robin Carhart-Harris I look at my watch it is already past 5pm. as early as 1966. Some 50 years later, Waldman – an Israeli-American author the face of any particularly daunting the University of Kaiserslautern, found of Imperial College London to record Instead of feeling frantic, my thoughts researchers are only marginally closer to and journalist – explores in her new book deadlines. It would save me money on consumption of LSD has a profound the brain activity of subjects under are calm. At the weekend I’d felt a similar understanding its postulated potential. A Really Good Day: How Microdosing coffee, too. For his part, Liebling believes impact on semantics. Family asked 10 the influence of the drug. It was the level of focus when running around my But cognitive enhancement is just the Made A Mega Difference In My Mood, that with a growing acceptance of the patients to name a series of pictures first legal LSD trial in the UK in over local park. Just as in the office my mind corner of the tab. LSD is thought to have My Marriage And My Life. Following medical applications of marijuana, the while under LSD. They frequently made 45 years and the results showed an did not wander, while running I was able other, substantial implications in the Fadiman’s 10mg principle, Waldman argument against using illegal drugs mistakes, answering, for example, inarguable increase in brain activity. to focus on the task at hand without my clinical sphere. Carhart-Harris believes explains how microdosing saved her as medicine will soon crumble, leaving “train” or “bus” when shown a picture “Taking a psychedelic reduces the blood mind convincing my body that it was time that by “disrupting stereotyped patterns life at a time when she the door open for LSD to be of a car. But while the answers were supply to a brain network called the to head home after the first few miles. of thought” it could be used to combat was regularly Googling “Were LSD made thoroughly analysed. wrong, LSD had supercharged their ‘Default Mode Network,’” Beckley conditions that adhere to rigid mental “the effects of maternal And if the idea that we semantic networks, allowing 102 Foundation founder Amanda DOORS OF PERCEPTION patterns, from addiction to obsessive- suicide on children”. legal tomorrow, may soon be microdosing at related subconscious concepts LSD discoverer Albert Feilding explains via email. “The Despite my experiences, for many, getting compulsive-disorder. Feilding believes In her book, Walman I would certainly our desks seems fanciful, it’s to come to the surface. “Inducing Hofmann lived to DMN controls what enters our slightly ahead at work may be insufficient that by encouraging communication quotes research worth remembering that the a hyper-associative state may this age after taking consciousness, and by reducing recompense to mitigate the risks of between different areas of the brain, in the Journal of lay in a supply” practice isn’t anything new: have implications for enhancing trips throughout its influence, psychedelics allow obtaining and self-administering a Class LSD could prove “extremely valuable” in Psychopharmacology, “Before LSD became illegal creativity,” Family said. The subjects his life other brain areas to communicate A drug. According to political lobbyist combating age-related neurodegenerative which found that among a cross-section of I discovered that taking small amounts had literally opened their minds. with each other, resulting in a freer Liebling, herein lies the problem. What disorders such as Alzheimer’s. And Americans, psychedelic use is correlated regularly can enhance cognitive abilities These findings were echoed last year state in which new thoughts can arise.” recent evidence there is on LSD may be a 1988-1993 study carried out by the Swiss with a 36% reduction in suicide attempts without interrupting your perception,” when the Beckley Foundation (a UK- Carhart-Harris has dubbed this “a more optimistic, but given the drug’s illegal Medical Society for Psycholytic Therapy over the course of a year. Speaking to says Feilding. “It seems to shake you at based, UN-accredited group looking primitive style of cognition” and hopes status, research – when it is permitted to found that cancer patients combining MH via email, Waldman enthuses about a deeper level; your thoughts become into the “scientific investigation of further research will allow us to bring take place at all – can be tied up in years’ LSD with talk therapy felt anxiety about the potential of LSD: “Its effects were more exciting and the network of consciousness”) worked alongside former the secrets of the unconscious mind worth of red tape. The auspicious use of their illness improve by 20%. immediate. It enhances neuroplasticity associations becomes wider, increasing government drug advisor Professor “into an observable space.” psychedelic agents in relation to problem Where LSD treatments are likely to – the ability of your brain to grow and enjoyment and wellbeing.” And that, As Monday draws to a close, I remain solving, for instance, was first studied have the most impact, though, is in to me at least, sounds preferable to just

focused and invigorated. The first time (BECKLEYFOUNDATION.ORG) USED WITH PERMISSION OF THE BECKLEY FOUNDATION *IMAGE STUDIOS HEARST AT GRAHAM WALSER ADDITIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY: the treatment of depression, as Ayelet another day in the office.

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