I’m giving away my isolation tank. One of the coolest things from the psychedelic movement of the 60’s that for some reason never really caught on with the mainstream is the isolation tank.

It’s an amazing invention by the late, great psychonaut John Lilly. He was trying to find a way to isolate the mind and the thoughts to be completely independent of the distraction of normal sensory input from the body- like touch, sound, sight, etc.

he idea being that if you could get away from all of the normal, natural signals and distractions your mind could function on a much deeper level.
What he came up with is a tank filled with water that’s heated to the same temperature as the surface of your skin, and it’s got 800lbs of Epsom salts in it, so that you float on the surface of the water. The water is heated to the same temperature as your skin, so when you lay in it after a while you can’t feel it.
Your ears are under water so you don’t hear anything, and when you close the lid of the tank you’re in complete darkness.
It’s a really freaky feeling, and at first it’s kind of hard to get comfortable.
Your brain isn’t used to the experience, so it’ll start giving you “busy work” - making you think that you’ve got to itch your nose, or move your arm or something, but if you can just breathe and relax you can get past this stage.
Once you learn to get comfortable it becomes amazing how clearly you can think and see things.

Being alone with your mind is a very odd feeling and it takes a while to get used to it. Outside of the isolation tank there’s really no experience like it.
There isn’t another environment like it in the world; where you can go so quickly, so deeply into the human mind.

It takes you to a place where it would take the average person many years of meditation to achieve a similar mind set, and it throws it at you right away.
For some people it can be really unsettling in it’s self-analytical effect. When there’s nothing to distract you from your thoughts it’s very difficult to ignore things that have been troubling you.

Any aspect of your behavior or your life that you’re unhappy with will be dragged out of the shadows of neglect and denial, and put on center stage with a giant spot light on it. If you’re the type of person that is trying to evolve and grow, it’s an amazing tool, but if you’re the type of person that would rather go through life with blinders on it’s going to give you a psychic beating.

I’ve had one for about 3 years now, and it’s helped me tremendously.
Initially I got the tank because I wanted to experience the psychedelic effects that I had heard it could bring, but at the time when I was thinking about that I was imagining wild, hallucinogenic visions. While it certainly can bring that, especially when you get really comfortable with the experience, another aspect that is just as psychedelic is the extreme introspection it provides.

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