Interesting question, one I'm not sure I'm fully prepared to answer, but I'll try.

One thing I've learned is that when it comes down to it, I ultimately only have myself to rely on, and that I am reliable if I can get over my apprehensions. I typically would go into the woods at night. Once I found myself far out from camp in a fairly heavy blizzard. I never could resist the temptation to get intentionally lost in those situations, and I had done it this time. I was far enough out that my loudest yells to hear return shouts were futile. The alternative to trusting my navigational ability was hypothermia or worse.

Before I had resolved the question to myself if it was an innate ability I had to get back, or if the things I had learned that let me know how to do it, I came up on the campfire.



I tended to get really introspective, and that plays on the ego dampening characteristics of the experience. I saw things about my own personality that I had never seen before. A different view of my own thoughts showed me how selfish and arrogant my mindset was. TBH, I think this accounts for a great deal of the "weird feeling" that many people find and dislike with psychedelics. There are ugly thoughts in the recesses of my mind (I don't think I'm alone in this respect), and I am happy that I am more fully aware of them.

As a rule, yes, buildings of almost any sort are too confining.

The crappy experiences (I'm not really sure how we're defining a bad trip) almost always happened indoors, or in some sort of built landscape.

Yes, music would be the primary exception to that rule for me (painting or drawing as well). There have been times when I've locked myself in a room with a guitar...

That particular night we happened to have a few guitars, a clarinet and a djembe. If nothing else, you could say we were dedicated. We got a pretty good late-late-night jam going.

Heat is essential, houses can be a nice thing to have nearby if it's cold. The same can be accomplished with a fire though. We had a really good setup with tents circled around a fire in a semi circle, with a very good tarp setup (we were professionals). A small wall of firewood reflected ground level heat back into the camp area. As in any other situation that involves extreme elements, I'd advise some level of caution. You need to be prepared.

I don't know of any empirical tests, but I did once see a guy learn mandolin (at least enough to jam) in the span of about an hour. He only had a very limited understanding of guitar (hadn't really learned many chords yet even).

IMO, there is something inherently musical about the experience.

I doubt an accurate and/or independent empirical study has been conducted that had anything to do with reality and hallucinogens. Hallucinogens are a door to a world that had not been officially "investigated" or "explored". The human brain is more the 'frontier' of my generation than space.