Krunkie McKrunkface
Kava Connoisseur
I think I'm really getting a handle on conceptualizing my kava experience and I really see it as a matter of the Health/Joy Axis.
It's certainly not a dichotomy or even a spectrum but really an axis. More health means more joy and more joy also means more health, but it is possible to focus more on one than the other, and that is what we are always doing.
In water temperature, for example, regardless of hot or cold water, you're going to get health benefits and you're going to get pleasurable effects, but I find that for krunking, I need cold water, because I think it emphasizes the krunk lactones and and the krunk lactones synergies. But hot water will extract the greatest amount and variety of lactones so you get the fullest value for your money in health effects. And some health effects, aprhrodisiac effects, e.g., I can only get using warm water and the Manoa prep. And that's also why I think grog rules. The candy and the concentrate are wonderful, but that's because they supplement and enhance and even refine the effects from grog, not replace them. But to get those lactones, and their synergies, you have to drink grog. And if you drink grog, you don't really need anything else, although icing on that cupcake can be very nice.
The beauty is, you don't have to go for health, you can just go for joy, and kava's going to give you a bunch of health along with it. And vice versa, go for health and you will get joy from it. And at any given time you can focus on one or the other if you want, but it's strictly facultative, whatever YOU want.
I'm finding subtleties with this, too. e.g. the Manoa prep makes a litre of grog out of 6 TBS root (I go 400/300/300ml on the washes now) and if you just want strictly health doses that's a week's worth of 4 oz daily shots or half a week double dose (at about $13/$26 a month, certainly affordable to prevent anxiety and insomnia and give great dreams and work as an anti-inflammatory, possibly one of the greatest health bargains on the planet). OTOH, if you make it with cold water instead of hot water, you and your partner can split a litre on a Friday night while watching a movie or playing video games or going to a party or whatever, maybe supplement with a concentrate cocktail or a candy or two, and have a really pleasant evening, mildly buzzed, without getting krunk. Plus you get all those darn health benefits from it and no emabrassing foolishness or hangovers. Yet another bargain compared to booze or drugs.
So for me there's only 4 different "doses" of kava, weak, medium, strong and krunk, but there are two different focuses from the Health/Joy Axis. So there's a medium Joy dose and a medium Health dose. I can also, if I want, Health dose through the day and Joy dose at night. I can go for all Health or all Joy or mix it up depending on demands of my day or my mood or just flipping a coin. Or let kava decide, listen to the kava and she'll tell me what I need.
Yeah yeah, I know, cosmic gibberish. I should have remembered to put "At the risk of sounding weird" at the beginning of the post but I like to think by now it's just assumed.
It's certainly not a dichotomy or even a spectrum but really an axis. More health means more joy and more joy also means more health, but it is possible to focus more on one than the other, and that is what we are always doing.
In water temperature, for example, regardless of hot or cold water, you're going to get health benefits and you're going to get pleasurable effects, but I find that for krunking, I need cold water, because I think it emphasizes the krunk lactones and and the krunk lactones synergies. But hot water will extract the greatest amount and variety of lactones so you get the fullest value for your money in health effects. And some health effects, aprhrodisiac effects, e.g., I can only get using warm water and the Manoa prep. And that's also why I think grog rules. The candy and the concentrate are wonderful, but that's because they supplement and enhance and even refine the effects from grog, not replace them. But to get those lactones, and their synergies, you have to drink grog. And if you drink grog, you don't really need anything else, although icing on that cupcake can be very nice.
The beauty is, you don't have to go for health, you can just go for joy, and kava's going to give you a bunch of health along with it. And vice versa, go for health and you will get joy from it. And at any given time you can focus on one or the other if you want, but it's strictly facultative, whatever YOU want.
I'm finding subtleties with this, too. e.g. the Manoa prep makes a litre of grog out of 6 TBS root (I go 400/300/300ml on the washes now) and if you just want strictly health doses that's a week's worth of 4 oz daily shots or half a week double dose (at about $13/$26 a month, certainly affordable to prevent anxiety and insomnia and give great dreams and work as an anti-inflammatory, possibly one of the greatest health bargains on the planet). OTOH, if you make it with cold water instead of hot water, you and your partner can split a litre on a Friday night while watching a movie or playing video games or going to a party or whatever, maybe supplement with a concentrate cocktail or a candy or two, and have a really pleasant evening, mildly buzzed, without getting krunk. Plus you get all those darn health benefits from it and no emabrassing foolishness or hangovers. Yet another bargain compared to booze or drugs.
So for me there's only 4 different "doses" of kava, weak, medium, strong and krunk, but there are two different focuses from the Health/Joy Axis. So there's a medium Joy dose and a medium Health dose. I can also, if I want, Health dose through the day and Joy dose at night. I can go for all Health or all Joy or mix it up depending on demands of my day or my mood or just flipping a coin. Or let kava decide, listen to the kava and she'll tell me what I need.
Yeah yeah, I know, cosmic gibberish. I should have remembered to put "At the risk of sounding weird" at the beginning of the post but I like to think by now it's just assumed.
