Are We Gaslighting Fun in the Name of Spirituality?

I'm spiritual and I like a wine.

There. I've said it.

And apparently, depending on which corner of spirituality you wander into, these two things aren't always supposed to coexist particularly well.

Alcohol lowers your vibration. Drugs lower your vibration. Altered states leave you energetically vulnerable. Eat clean. Think positively. Protect your energy. Keep your frequency high.

And I'm not entirely convinced it's that simple.

I'm not about to argue that alcohol is good for the human body. I'm fairly certain my liver would like to be excluded from this particular philosophical discussion. I know what alcohol does. I know it changes the way the brain functions, lowers inhibitions and can leave me feeling a little flatter the following day.

I've also learned my own limits through occasionally getting them spectacularly wrong.

That's part of this too.

But what I'm questioning is the spiritual assumption that altering our ordinary state of consciousness automatically means lowering it.

Because some of my best questioning of life has happened after a couple of glasses of wine.

Some of my most expansive thinking has happened after weed.

And mushrooms?

Mushrooms have opened doors in my mind I didn't even know were there.

Not because I've become unconscious. Quite the opposite. In the right environment, at the right level, I've sometimes become extraordinarily conscious.

Curious. Open. Present. Playful.

The normal barriers of my thinking loosen slightly and suddenly I'm looking at an idea from somewhere else. I'm following thoughts I might usually dismiss. I'm laughing. I'm dancing. I'm talking. I'm noticing. I'm allowing myself to experience the moment rather than standing slightly outside it analysing what I'm doing.

Obviously, there's a line.

There is an enormous difference between expanding your experience and obliterating yourself.

More isn't more enlightened.

Too much alcohol doesn't turn me into Buddha with a hangover.

And I've learned that the same way humans learn most things: by occasionally fucking it up.

I've drunk too much before. I've made decisions I wouldn't make now. I've had conversations I probably shouldn't have had. I've woken up and thought, for fuck's sake, Rhianna.

But isn't learning our levels part of being human too?

These days, even when I've had a drink, there's a part of me that remains aware.

I know which conversations belong to sober Rhianna.

I know where tomorrow's Rhianna would absolutely hate tonight's Rhianna for making a decision on her behalf, so I don't go there.

I know alcohol can make me looser, sillier and less inhibited. I also know that there is a point where enjoyable alteration becomes something else entirely.

So I stay on my side of it.

That's consciousness too, isn't it?

And this is where my problem with some spiritual advice begins.

Because somewhere along the way, spirituality can become another collection of rules about how we're supposed to behave.

Don't drink.

Don't eat that.

Don't think negatively.

Don't engage with low-vibrational people.

Protect your energy.

Raise your vibration.

Stay positive.

Back into the box, please.

Behave like this.

Except we've already seen what happens when positive thinking is taken to its extreme. It becomes toxic positivity.

Sad? Change your mindset.

Angry? Raise your vibration.

Struggling? Focus on gratitude.

And suddenly we're not practising spirituality anymore. We're gaslighting perfectly normal parts of the human experience.

So I'm wondering whether we've started doing the same thing with pleasure.

Are we occasionally gaslighting fun?

Because I'm human.

I'm here.

And while I'm here, I'd quite like to sample the goods.

A steak.

A chicken Kiev.

A tuna, cheese and beans jacket potato (dont knock it..).

A glass of wine.

A ridiculous conversation at midnight.

Dancing badly around a kitchen.

None of these things will sustain the human body forever.

Obviously.

If I attempted to survive exclusively on chicken Kiev and red wine, I imagine the consequences would arrive fairly swiftly.

But must everything I consume or experience be optimised for longevity in order to have value?

Sometimes something is pleasurable simply because it's pleasurable.

Fuck yes.

And pleasure is part of being alive.

We do things constantly that aren't designed to maximise the efficiency of the human organism. We stay awake too late because the conversation is too good to end. We eat dessert when we're already full. We exhaust ourselves dancing. We sit around a fire until stupid o'clock. We laugh until our stomach hurts.

We deliberately inconvenience tomorrow because occasionally tonight is bloody lovely.

Maybe that isn't spiritual failure.

Maybe it's participation.

I think the distinction for me is consciousness.

Am I drinking because I'm enjoying myself, or because I cannot tolerate myself without it?

Am I opening something, or escaping something?

Am I choosing this experience, or does it feel like I no longer have much choice?

Am I still capable of hearing myself when I've altered my state?

Those questions feel considerably more useful to me than simply declaring something high vibration or low vibration.

Because consciousness doesn't magically make alcohol harmless.

I can't meditate my liver into believing it's been given sparkling water.

And being spiritually aware doesn't mean consequences disappear.

If I drink, I know I may feel flatter the following day.

So I allow for it.

I get my human doings done. I tick some things off. I drink water. I eat properly. I let myself recover and then I relax without turning the whole thing into a moral crisis.

Not that different from a Monday, really.

The same goes for anything capable of altering consciousness.

I wouldn't casually entertain a Class A drug I knew nothing about because someone told me it might open my third eye. There are risks. There are substances I have absolutely no interest in experiencing. There are situations where altered consciousness would feel completely wrong to me.

Discernment still exists.

But I also can't pretend that every altered state I've experienced has somehow taken me further away from myself.

Some have brought me closer.

Particularly mushrooms.

They've made ordinary perception feel temporarily negotiable. Thoughts connect differently. Questions become enormous. Things I've intellectually understood suddenly become experiential.

That doesn't mean everybody should take mushrooms.

It doesn't even mean every experience with them will be profound. Too much of anything capable of opening the mind can become bloody awful rather quickly.

But I can't honestly describe those experiences as simply lowering my consciousness.

They altered it.

And I think there's an important difference.

Maybe that's what I'm actually questioning.

Why do we assume altered means lower?

Who created this spiritual hierarchy where sober, disciplined and controlled sits somewhere near the top while pleasure, indulgence and altered perception are shuffled quietly towards the bottom?

A person can meditate every morning, drink green juice and spend their entire life terrified of doing anything "low vibrational."

Another person can drink two glasses of wine, dance around the kitchen, laugh until they cry, have a completely unexpected thought about the nature of reality and wake up the following morning still knowing exactly who they are.

Which one is vibrating correctly?

Fuck knows.

And perhaps that's precisely the point.

Because spirituality, to me, was never supposed to become another cage.

It was supposed to make me more conscious of the cage.

So no, I'm not advocating constant indulgence.

I'm not suggesting obliteration.

I'm certainly not suggesting that enough Pinot Grigio eventually unlocks the Akashic Records.

I'm talking about moderation. Discernment. Self-awareness.

Knowing yourself well enough to recognise when something is adding to an experience and when you're using it to avoid one.

Maybe the question isn't always whether something lowers my vibration.

Maybe the question is:

Am I still conscious inside my choice?

Because I didn't come to Earth to spend my entire life trying not to touch it.

I'm human.

I'm here.

I intend to sample the goods.