On Entheogens: Blue Lotus
Nymphaea caerulea and Nymphaea nuchali: the confusing world of a once-revered Egyptian water lily
Blue Lotus is a unique companion. At once purported to offer aphrodisiac, sedative, euphoric and psychedelic effects, it was used by the Ancient Egyptians almost as ubiquitously as alcohol or tobacco are used by some other peoples. It featured in funerary rites as well as orgiastic festivals for Hathor, among many other less notable occasions. It has become extremely popular among psychonaut circles, including many New Age "seekers", music festivalgoers, and tourists stumbling into our local legal psychoactive tea shop. Advertisements utilize its lore as an ancient drug connected with mystical religions and tout its spiritual connectedness to push overpriced bottles of tincture and ounces of dried flowers. Yet ironically, most of what is consumed today as Blue Lotus is, in fact, a completely different flower[1].
Even more so than most of the entheogens I plan on talking about, I feel like Blue Lotus deserves some detangling. Let me begin here, defining what our subject actually is and where some of the common confusion arises.
Getting to the Root: What is Blue Lotus?
When imbibers of Blue Lotus, sellers, and academics say "Blue Lotus", what they allude to is Nymphaea caerulea, a flower native to the Nile River valley in Egypt and some other parts of North Africa. It may be worth mentioning that it is not an actual lotus flower (which is an entirely different genus), but a blue water lily. This is the flower that the Ancient Egyptians used in their rites. It is known for its potent effects including euphoria, a sense of relaxation, and for possessing some psychedelic qualities which may include mild hallucinations.
What is actually being imbibed most often, however, is Nymphaea nuchali, or a handful of other, more common water lilies. Some contain the same alkaloids and compounds that make Blue Lotus psychoactive, just in much lower amounts, and some seem to not be psychoactive at all.
When discussing my experience with Blue Lotus, I am actually talking about experience with a hybridized lily which does contain the same psychoactive compounds as Nymphaea caerulea, but which is not technically the authentic flower. This is what was available in my area, without sourcing from out of the country. Because it is still containing of the same compounds, however, and because it is somewhat more ecologically friendly to use the fake Blue Lotus, I will discuss this alternative flower as though it is Blue Lotus for the purposes of this article, allowing the already-misattributed name "Blue Lotus" to be a kind of general term for water lilies which contain the same alkaloids.
Pharmacology
While not all supposed Blue Lotus products will contain these, true Nymphaea caerulea contains nuciferine, an aporphine derivative with complex effects. While nuciferine itself blocks dopamine receptors, its degradation product acts as a dopamine receptor stimulant. It has been shown to reduce some negative motor effects of things like PCP (head twitching and other involuntary movements are hallmarks of PCP intoxication or abuse) or Parkinson's disease, and is potentially a potentiator of morphine's pain relieving effects. It is structurally related to aporphine and other apomorphine derivatives.
Importantly, many other species of water lily are known to contain aporphine. Aporphine, like nuciferine, is an alkaloid which antagonizes dopamine receptors, although its detailed pharmacology does not necessarily immediately indicate the effects that are commonly reported from ingestion of Nymphaea caerulea or its look-alikes (nuchali and others).
It is likely, and seems to be widely accepted, that the complex effects of nuciferine and aporphine on dopamine and seratonin receptors are responsible for the flowers' effects, though it is interesting that the pharmacology behind the purported effects is more opaque than that behind most other substances.
Use in a Spiritual Context
Because of the scarcity of authentic Nymphaea caerulea, as well as more nuanced historic cultural fragmentation, I can't find an example of any practice that utilizes Blue Lotus in an entheogenic context that has a continuous cultural history. This makes it a unique substance: while this fact allows us to generally alleviate our concerns of cultural appropriation more so than with most other entheogens, it also leaves us a bit adrift when it comes to building a container for the use of this substance in our own practice.
When comparing Blue Lotus to many of the entheogens we will discuss, especially if what we are really using is not the ecologically sensitive and endangered caerulea, we potentially have the unique opportunity to find a guide and mentor in a plant that we can cultivate ourselves[2] and which we can create a language around that is not inherently stepping on or bastardizing an existing tradition.
For this reason, I am extremely interested in the potential of Nymphaea nuchali for spiritual practices which themselves are not continuous, or for sharing in ritual with others who may not have potential relation to other, similar medicines.
Which brings us to the question: how do we use it? More specifically, how should we use it in a way which is respectful and which thoughtfully builds this new relationship?
Initially, I was introduced to Blue Lotus through my partner, via a friend we are no longer in contact with. I thought very little of the experience, and so did he. Then I came across it again at a local tea shop specializing in legal psychoactives, and only made note of it because the person I had brought there with me had knowledge of it from festivals. It came to me again through an event I attended at a now out-of-business local apothecary, and was recommended for dream work (whatever that meant in that context).
What I found when trying it, however, was that it must be used in a very specific setting. It does tend to make the user very sleepy, at least when imbibed in an alcohol tincture, and at least the variety that I was able to source. For this reason, it's fairly terrible as a meditation aid (my initial imagined use after my first experience with it): I found that when I attempted to bring it into my meditation practice I was falling asleep and having rather erratic dreams instead of finding visions or lucid dreaming. When using it before sleep I did find my dreams feeling a bit more lucid, though it made me so groggy the following morning it was a little uncomfortable to use for this purpose. When paired with a stimulant, however, the results became more interesting. I have come to the conclusion that I don't recommend Blue Lotus so much as a way to connect with and therefore decipher one's dreams, but rather, as a way to connect with the dead.
There is something very interesting about Blue Lotus' effects, particularly when paired with a stimulant that awakens one's ability to focus in on those effects. A kind of out-of-body sensation occurs after the initial rush of euphoria, at least at a generally higher dose than recommended (probably the need for a higher dose is due to not having the authentic caerulea but utilizing the hybrid flower I was able to obtain). This sensation is a bit like a waking dream, although there is something in the sensation that is much more embedded in the material world than the effects of some other substances: you feel intoxicated, but not really. Moreso you feel a little more... aware, in a tactical kind of way. The movement of a breeze, the change in temperature between rooms, the kind of language of the crickets and the trees rustling, they all feel a little more intelligible and perceptible. I suppose this is a bit psychedelic -- these are low-level psychedelic effects. However, while some psychedelics purportedly make the user feel as though they're in touch with everything alive around them: trees, grass, stones, etc., something about Blue Lotus feels less like a gateway to all of the hidden knowledge of this world and a little more like access to some other world existing in the same physical space but at slightly different aethereal coordinates.
While I have less experience with Blue Lotus than some of the other entheogens I plan to talk about, I am building a fairly good scaffolding for communal ritual use here. I plan to use it as a sacrament for this year's Dia de los Muertos event, and while this event has not yet occurred I will share an outline of how I plan to build a shared context around the use of this flower.
First, I plan for the attendees to sit together and engage in a very brief opening meditation that allows us all to set the tone and intention of the space and become open to the experiences that will unfold. Like prior years, we will begin at a fire, do our seated meditation, and then share stories about the loved ones we wish to honor on this day. We will then do a slow procession with candles and our offerings to our ofrenda, and here I wish to diverge from previous years by offering each attendee a tea infused with Blue Lotus and other herbs including stimulant aids, as they place their offerings. We will then sit with the ofrenda, the pictures of our loved ones, and the land, sipping our tea, preparing to access a state of being wherein we can send and receive messages to our ancestors and the ancestors of the land. As the tea begins to share its effects, we will lie down and engage in a deeper, longer meditation, navigating our way to the Otherworld as we are focused in on our ancestors.
I see this ritual use of Blue Lotus as one which allows us to conceptualize the connection with Death in a different way than the typical remnants of Victorian-era spiritualism that we are used to: we are not holding a seance, we are not insisting on anything "coming through" or "showing itself", we are not measuring room temperature or expecting anything material to happen, but we are finding a shared, safe context through which to receive wisdom from and which to project love and honor back to our ancestors and those which exist amongst us.
In this way we can find a sense of rebirth, a sense of the cyclical nature of reality as opposed to the dichotimous reality that's often imagined in a Christianized world: there is no "land of the living" and "land of the dead" or "heaven" or "hell" in our practice. We are not speaking with "ghosts" in the way that most tend to use that word. Instead, we are feeling what is already existent around us: the ripples of lives lived and shared.
I also see great potential for utilization of Blue Lotus as a way to connect with the beings we sometimes consume for food here at the Ranch -- as a way for the group to really connect with the act of death as nourishment, as honored sacrifice, because this reality is something that is difficult to confront when we are so used to the death of the beings we consume happening far away, out of sight and out of mind.
Final Thoughts
With Blue Lotus, I see great potential for the creation of a new relationship with a potentially[3] ecologically sustainable substance, which has mild effects navigable by those who are perhaps new to such experiences and for which a scaffolding can be built for respectful and intentional use.
Specifically, Blue Lotus seems to have great potential for communal ritual because of its mildness and navigability, especially in contexts where the focus is on death or cycles of being. For personal use, it feels somewhat less useful, though with the right container and paired with the right stimulant aid it could potentially assist a practiced user to visions or with astral projection, though I cannot say this for certain without more experience.
Thank you for reading, and I hope that you find this series on entheogens useful in structuring your own Practice and experimentation.
I plan on releasing an extra post next month where I will dive into meditation a little bit more, including practical guides for getting started with a daily practice (and why that's something I recommend so heavily). After that post, I will continue the entheogens series with a deep dive into Kava.
As always, I'd love to discuss these topics further and make sure this publication is beneficial to your life. If there is something you'd like me to share on this newsletter, or if you have your own experiences or questions, please feel free to leave a comment or send me an email.
Notes:
- Source
- While I have not yet attempted the cultivation of this flower, we have plans to potentially engage in some aquacultural pursuits in a few more years when our land is more ready for it. However, it is apparently also possible to cultivate Nymphaea nuchali or Nymphaea caerulea indoors, with the right equipment and some botanical knowledge. I suppose the point is that it is not like some other substances, which are nearly impossible to cultivate outside of their native region, and because of the variety of water lilies that seem to contain the same alkaloids as caerulea, I would imagine that there is some experimentation that could be done with crossbreeding and adapting flowers to your specific region and needs.
- Ecological sustainability is dependent on the specific flower being ingested and its source. Home production would, of course, be the most sustainable, with some close seconds being use of that which is being produced ethically as locally as possible, and the third bring the purchasing of lilies cultivated in other countries (many suppliers are in Australia) with the most ethical methods possible where no local source is available.