Drum Circle

[aresian]

Tobacco as I know it comes in the form of shisha and the peace pipe ceremony I was a part of along time ago. The tobacco wasn't the only thing in the peace pipe but it was clearly the main ingredient. I felt it worked and works well in "prayer" ceremony.

I joined a small group back in 2003 up until 2004. Every full moon we had a drum circle that passed the peace pipe during part of the ritual. I find it worked nicely and am reminded of it when I smoke shisha. I smoke a hookah about once a week. I feel it is very relaxing and spirirtual to me. I can elaborate another time. Gotta go now.

[Alice]

I've always wondered how that came about.

May you find what you seek,
Alice

[aresian]

I smoke shisha as a social sharing experience. It is not as "bad for me" as even one cigarette. It is still smoking tobacco and probably has all the risks of smoking anything has. It can affect the lungs if done in excess and has nicotine. Although, there was a study on pure nicotine and they found that chemical alone was not the harmful ingredient in cigarettes it is the rest of the chemicals they add to the cigarette that makes them bad (ammonia, arsenic, other "preservatives). Shisha is as close to homemade as you can buy from a store (depending on the brand I personally smoke Layalina brand as it feels the most pure). Shisha tobacco is traditionally created by putting fruits with tobacco and curing it together with molasses and it is placed in a hookah bowl with a coal sitting on a covering (usually tinfoil) that keeps the coal from igniting the shisha so it only slowly boils the ingredients (taste and tobacco) from the shisha. It is drawn through a water base to cool the smoke and bring out the flavoring in the shisha. If done properly the shisha hookah experience can be pleasant. If done incorrectly or if you are among the silly that add other substances to the shisha then your experience is going to suck. Keep it to what the hookah was designed for and you won't have a problem. Sure there is always a way to make different blends work but I do not wish to go through such work. I use the tobacco shisha or the herbal shisha (non-tobacco). I like the flavors and since I've been able to go months at a time without a single puff I consider hookahs to be a lot less addicting than cigarettes were for me. I mean I can sit for hours on end smoking shisha and not feel like I've been smoking at all versus having one cigarette is just awful to me.

That being said I've attached my hookah experiences with some spiritual ones from my nostalgia attached to the full moon drum circle ceremonies we used to do. Also it is truly a social thing I visit with a whole group of friends at the hookah place. Sometimes I go alone so I can just sit and go over the book I wrote. It's meditative.