When you’re higher than you planned, paranoia is the real enemy. Five cannabis users share their best techniques for surviving the moment you cross from private to public.
Let’s be honest: nothing ruins a good high faster than the sudden panic of having to interact with the world and pretend you’re sober. Your head floats in slow motion and your movements become a little off-key. After a few puffs, you walk through the door and the lights of the office or the family dinner party feel like the lights of a CIA interrogation room. Suddenly, due to some mental vortex, you’re convinced there’s a huge neon sign flashing across your forehead that reads, “I’m transcendentally stoned.”
But let’s not fall into those traps and take it one step at a time. In an ideal world, we’d be celebrating the expansion of consciousness, the positive health benefits, and a whole host of other things, but as long as the stigma remains, pretending you’re not high becomes a matter of honor and, sometimes, even of professional, marital, or parental survival. Of course, there’s a breaking point that every cannabis user knows all too well: that instant when you cross the threshold from private to public and, between astonishment and paranoia, you realize you’re much higher than you wanted or far more baked than you imagined.
Suddenly, the outside world demands a sobriety that you, at that precise moment, can’t guarantee. Ouch! So, in that scenario, social survival depends on a mix of psychology, methodical performance, and sometimes a little hot sauce or some other gimmick to disguise the situation.
Step one: know where you stand
In fact, Lindsay MaHarry, journalist and cannabis advocate, offers a crystal-clear guide to getting out …
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Author: Hernán Panessi / High Times
