I’ve written before about my mishaps with marijuana micro-dosing, and even now, over six years later, I am still more than a little bit apprehensive about the amount of product variety I see in these categories.

On a positive note, there are many products to choose from, and an array of ailments they claim to soothe and a mind boggling amount of mood-altering abilities. But on the negative side, you’ve really got to be careful, go slow, stay low in dosages, and be mature in figuring out what works and what doesn’t for you, individually. That’s not always easy to do, at least, not for me.

These high THC concentrates, vapes, edibles, hell, they are all scary to me because of aforementioned incident (MLK weekend of 2016) where microdosing with liquid tinctures quickly turning into overdosing, for me. It was because I didn’t take it slow, nor did I go low with my dosages. And, I mixed with Pax vaping. I ended up in Langley Porter Psych ward, not making much sense. I’m still apologizing to friends and family for the fear I caused. (I wouldn’t admit to being on drugs)

But I don’t blame these brands, I just want to share my cautionary tale. In last week’s session at Oaksterdam University, we learned about the different delivery methods and how they interact with the human endocannabinoid system, which, is literally, new scientific learning in the medical community. Just look at Pub Med, which is a free database of medical studies that are peer reviewed and available to the public – and you can see how much study, learning and insights are being generated around this drug. Brands I’ve linked above are simply capitalizing on our own empirical evidence. We know what works, but everyone is different. We can’t always wait on the science, and we certainly can’t wait on the politics.

My advice? Find a buddy to share with, go slow and keep dosages low. Log your experiences in a journal, or make art while you’re high. Be careful and don’t underestimate mother nature’s gift to us; sometimes it takes a minute to take effect.