The Joker/Jester
More. That was all I could think about. I needed more. More of the medicine that would pull me out of this nightmare, this purgatory that clung to me like a second skin. I was stuck in a place where I existed, but barely. A place somewhere in consciousness, where I was aware but not fully conscious at the same time. I was teetering on the edge of something dark and consuming that gave me a foreboding feeling.
Fear began to gnaw at the edges of my mind, its claws sinking deeper as I realized I might never wake from this half-existence of who I was. The shadows—they were moving in, drawing closer with each breath that passed through my lungs. My heart pounding I thought it might tear through my chest, as my breath came in shallow, ragged gasps. My throat tightened, a noose pulling tighter and tighter. Panic swelled, ready to crash over me like a wave. And all I could think of was that I needed more.
MORE. That was the only way out of this suffocating limbo. My body rebelled, convulsing in a desperate, useless flailing, an ego tantrum of the soul, screaming for release.
“Don’t leave me here,” I whispered through lips that felt foreign, trembling from the exhaustion of my earlier screams.
“Please… don’t leave me here,” I begged and whimpered, my voice breaking. The realization began to dawn, cruel and sharp.
Was this it? Was this my fate? Had I finally gone too far and made the one mistake I couldn’t undo? Had I crossed the line? Was I…gone? Lost to whatever this place was—this space where time felt endless and reality blurred. And if I was lost, who was I now? Where was I really?
I was dying.
Yet, somewhere inside of me I knew that I wasn’t dying.
I was just waking up. But I needed to awaken fully and I needed to do it now—time was slipping through my fingers. Freedom was all I wanted. I could no longer stand the suffocating walls of my ego’s own personal cage. My mind spun out of control, unravelling into a chaotic storm of endless possibilities. A thousand scenarios flashed before me, each one more vivid and consuming than the last.
I had fallen deep into the ‘Divine imagination’, a place where reality blurred, and where all that could exist, existed as a reality within God’s mind. Suddenly, it opened up in front of me—the sky, once solid and distant, now melting into something fluid and alive. The clouds seemed to dissolve, the colours shifting and blending like an oil painting being birthed onto canvas. Birds flew across this liquid sky, their wings causing ripples as if they were gliding over the surface of a vast, endless ocean. My eyes began to well up with tears. It was beauty beyond words, a sight that overwhelmed every part of me. I wanted to be part of it, melt into it and lose myself and become one with it. I wanted to dissolve into that infinite Unity forever.
That’s when I felt it—a strange sensation in my body. My arms began to tremble uncontrollably, quivering as though they were no longer mine to command. My limbs went limp as if drained of all strength. Then, slowly, I felt myself sinking, descending into some unseen abyss. With each breath, something seemed to peel away, like a shadow lifting from my chest. The more shadows that left, the more I felt a strange energy awakening inside me, moving through me. The deeper I fell the lighter I felt. It was foreign yet familiar, like a force I had always known but never fully understood.
My nose began to run, my eyes began to burn and a deep nausea surged within me. I thought I was about to purge—everything inside me wanted to release, to let go—but I couldn’t. I was stuck on the edge of that release, caught in a limbo of anticipation.
And then, just like that, everything stopped. The trembling, the sinking, the energy—it was all over. Stillness returned, leaving me empty, unsure of what had just happened, or what I had become.
Little did I know that my dance with Divinity had only just begun. Little did I know that I was in a process of my own personal 40 days and 40 nights in the desert of the Divine imagination. I had taken a dangerous amount of 5 MeO DMT with over 10 hits ranging from 20-30 mg and my facilitator would not serve me any longer. I was in the ‘danger’ zone and could actually die. Yet my ego wouldn’t let go.
“There’s no death,” I said matter of factly.
Death was merely just another illusion, and I wanted to fully awaken from this dream. The knowing of this felt so certain that I was surprised I hadn’t known this before. I was playing a character in God’s dream.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, a flicker of light caught my eye, dancing across the wall. I tried to focus, to steady my gaze upon it, but as soon as I did, it vanished, swallowed by a shadow that seemed to emerge from inside me. The shadow stretched, darkening, growing larger, and with it, another uneasy feeling began to creep over me.
Where was I? I could barely remember.
The shadow moved out of me and across the wall, sliding over the cabinet, taunting me as I lay in my bed, struggling to stay calm. I tried to breathe deeply, to center myself and return to the melting sky, but the shadow only grew larger, morphing into something twisted and grotesque. My heart raced as I watched it take shape and in awe turn into what I feared most, the devil.
The vision of the devil caught me by surprise and as it stared back at me with its eyes burning into mine daring me to look away, I realized that underneath its terror it was seeking the healing that I was seeking. A sense of calm washed over me, slow and unexpected. I realized as I stared into those eyes, that this figure—the devil—was just another piece in the grand play of duality. It was nothing more than the opposite side of God, a part of the same whole.
As this thought settled into my mind, I watched in awe as the devil’s face began to melt. The menacing features liquefied before my eyes, but I wasn’t afraid. If anything, I was transfixed. The more I looked into the form before me, the more the devil’s face changed, shifting from one grotesque form to another. It became a zombie, hollow and decaying, then a corpse clawing its way out of a grave. And then it hit me. Maybe this demon was me—an extension of my own darkness, a reflection of something buried deep within. The moment that thought crossed my mind, the scene shifted again. The corpse morphed, its grotesque features dissolving, and what replaced it was something ominous.
A face painted wild with electric blues and white —made it seem as though his features were constantly shifting and melting. His red grin was wide and unnerving, with glowing eyes that flickered between mischief and madness. Around him, swirling patterns of kaleidoscopic shapes and colours created an illusion of movement, as if the background were alive.
I looked at it in awe and thought, are you kidding me? God is a joker!? This was too much. I was exasperated and disappointed with this revelation. I didn’t like this at all and the more frustrated I became, the more the scene began to become even clearer. I stared in awe and bewilderment at the joker and noticed that my walls were changing. In replacement of my gray paint, there was now a paisley wallpaper. It was like looking through a mirror and my brain seemed to turn in and out of itself.
I forced myself to turn my head and look in another direction. I had enough of this scene and didn’t like this joker appearing before me and seemingly taunting me with its airiness and mischievousness. That’s when a soft yet bright light began to appear. I could see it through the doorway as a thin veil began to appear and disappear before my eyes. Once again I had the impression I was looking through a mirror and the more I perceived the more I wanted to pass through the veil of it. I wanted to heal all the shadows that existed within me. Unfortunately, I couldn’t seem to cross over. There were still shadows to be removed. The more the shadows lifted the more the light began to seep through and the closer I was to freedom and God.
A voice in my head said, “You can’t bring shadows into heaven.”
Something deep within me stirred and grew louder with each passing moment. My body felt heavy, weighed down by exhaustion from all the shadows I was peeling away, yet something beckoned me, urging me toward stillness. I shuffled to the bathroom, the idea of a bath tugging at me like an old, familiar comfort. Water had always been my solace, a refuge when the noise of reality became too much to bear. I wasn’t ready to re-enter the world just yet—I needed more time and space to breathe, to cleanse my soul. I needed more.
The warm water enveloped me like a cocoon, and I felt the weight of my fatigue begin to melt away. My muscles loosened and my mind quieted. My eyelids drooped, heavy with the release of tension, and in the soft blur of relaxation, something began to emerge before me at the edge of the tub. A white and gray circle danced in my vision, faint at first but growing more defined the more I stared at it. Curiosity stirred me, pulling me deeper into its vision. The circle expanded, and to my astonishment, it wasn’t just a shape—it was a cell. It grew, multiplied, transforming before my eyes. Cells divided, forming something more—an embryo, delicate and alive, shifting into the unmistakable shape of a fetus. Time seemed to stretch and contract all at once as I watched this miraculous evolution unfold. And then, it hit me with breathtaking clarity. I was witnessing my own creation, the very moment of my conception and birth. In the warmth of the water, I was giving birth to myself, reborn in a moment of profound clarity and wonder. I was speechless. My mind once again collapsed in upon itself.
I got out of the tub and dried off. As I put the towel back on its rack I glanced at myself in the mirror. I was mesmerized. There was something inside of me. The birth of myself had been replaced by something ugly. I stared at myself to try and discern what I was seeing. To my shock, I realized it was a reptilian. I was seeing my reptilian self. As soon as I recognized it for what it was the image morphed into something else. A kaleidoscope of beings revolving inside of me. The reptilian turned into an alien and then a dinosaur which then turned into an insect. I was witnessing creation and peering past all the illusions of myself. As the images disappeared a light began to shine through. Suddenly I was looking through the mirror again. Only this time my fiancé was standing behind me with his arms wrapped around me. I continued to remove layers of shadows. Not just for me, but for both of us up until a new vision appeared on the other side of the veil. A vision of my death. My fiancé was burying me. I was dead and ready to cross over to the other side. He turned and looked at me and as he did tears welled up inside of me. I was ready to come home, across to the other side where he was waiting in a field of golden wheat. And yet something stopped me. I couldn’t cross over. The mirror vanished and my energy was spent. I was exhausted and the more I tried to get back the more the image faded away.
I needed more. But more was gone. It was all gone and God’s light was buried back within the shadows once more. I collapsed in my head with faint images of shadows and light playing with each other like two lovers dancing with one another. I finally collapsed and after 40 hours of dancing with the Divine, the music had played its last tune. My Trip was over and little did I realize until the next day that the joke had been on me.
INTEGRATION
Looking back on the trip, I began to understand the tremendous gift I’d been given. While I hadn’t experienced the complete dissolution of my ego, I’d been offered a glimpse of something greater—a moment where I felt the presence of God. And in that brief connection, I realized something profound: God was looking for me just as much as I was looking for God.
It dawned on me that my real work, the work that mattered, had only just begun. This was a calling, a beckoning from the Divine to move within this realm with God in my heart. From that point forward, life could never be the same. I’d spent so much time believing that I needed to heal, that there was something broken in me that needed fixing, but there was nothing to be healed. I was already whole, I had just forgotten.
My ego had led me on a wild goose chase disguising itself as the joker in an endless flittering through the Divine imagination, always in pursuit of the light. But the light had been with me all along. I just hadn’t seen it. My ego, ever restless, had been lusting after a mystery, a puzzle to solve, not realizing that there was no mystery to begin with. I was already here.
Petra Valica
This article was written for educational purposes. I don’t condone the use of any illegal substances, and as with any potent psychedelic substance, please be responsible and use with a supportive, experienced guide or facilitator that can contribute to a safe and meaningful exploration of the Bufo Alvarius experience.
