There are some smokers who are convinced that "good
use" of marijuana is by definition infrequent use. "You have just so much stoned energy," says a Philadelphia lawyer, "so you should really give some thought as to how you want to use it." Lenny is convinced that a person's capacity for getting stoned is at its height in the morning hours, after body and mind have been well rested. And although Claire loves to get high, she limits herself to two joints a month. "I want to make it something special each time I smoke," she says. "The best way to do that is to smoke only when I have a lot of time, and when I can fully respond to the experience. I usually find that if I have gone about two weeks without smoking, the time is probably right to get high again."For Andrew Weil, the first sign of responsible drug use is the clear recognition that one is using a drug in the first place, whether it be alcohol, coffee, tobacco, marijuana or heroin. Weil stresses that all drugs contain an enormous potential for abuse, with cigarettes and coffee representing a special danger because their users so often refuse to recognize that they're using a drug at all. "It becomes commonplace," he says. "And there's often a loss of awareness about it. To me, that's the start of a negative relationship with drugs."
With regard to marijuana, Weil points to users who develop a bad cough and refuse to consider that it may be because they smoke too much. He also speaks of users who smoke marijuana so frequently that they no longer get high and compensate by smoking still more often, or trying to find more powerful grass. These actions will usually backfire, according to Weil, for although stronger marijuana may work temporarily, the search soon becomes an endless cycle, and at some point the next level of potency will not be available. Weil's advice for smokers in this situation is to abstain completely for a time. Then, if they wish, they may resume smoking less potent material and less often, since psychoactive drugs are most effective when used in moderation.
Disturbed about the casual way in which so many people use drugs, Weil advises users to ask themselves some hard questions:
First of all, they must be aware that they are using a drug. Then they should ask what they are getting out of it. Are they getting out of it what they got when they initially began using it? Are they getting something real and specific that they like and can use in their lives? If you look at people who are in bad relationships with drugs, often you find that they're merely getting relief from negative things. The addicted coffee drinker takes coffee in the morning not so much because it makes him feel good, but because he won't feel good without it. That's very different from what he got when he first started using coffee, which was, presumably, a positive feeling.
In his book The Natural Mind, Weil outlines four ways in
which drugs can be used well. First, he states that natural substances are
preferable to synthetic ones. Second, he suggests that drugs be used ritually
and deliberately, even if the ritual is subtle and almost unconscious. Next, he
advises drug users to seek advice and information from people who know what
they are talking about. He laments the fact that those scientists who have used
drugs are often discredited by their peers for allegedly losing their
objectivity; this leaves the responsibility for dispensing drug information in
the hands of people who are often not sufficiently informed on the subject.
Weil's fourth and final rule is that drugs ought to be used for positive rather
than negative reasons; that is, to get high rather than to avoid being low.