This entire thread is brilliant.
Thanks.
From my pre-purchase research I've come to the conclusion that most of it is common sense diet wise - Spinach, Broccoli, Legumes, Asparagus, chicken, mushrooms, green leaf veggies, rice, eggs, beef.
( 1 ) Do you have any experience here you could share?
I haven't really looked into, or tried, augmenting my choline intake via diet. I imagine it would be something similar to taking choline bitartrate, but would not be as efficient as taking alpha-GPC or centrophenoxine.
As for my approach to Nootropics themselves, I plan on introducing them one at a time in hopes of finding a suitable stack for my biochemistry.
Although I want to dive in headfirst and frolic, Im starting with Piracetam.
Yep; it's important to take your time, and not change too many things at once, or you won't be sure which change caused which effect.
( 2 ) How long should I make my trial periods before I branch out and experiment with other supplements?
This depends on what you want to achieve, and what you want to determine. Most nootropic supplements should be at least somewhat apparent in their effects within the first few days. As such, a week may be sufficient time before testing a new supplement instead of, or alongside, your current stack. However, if you're interested in long-term effects, you could wait a month, a year, or longer. Reasonably, between a week and a month should be quite sufficient.
( 3 ) You get granular with the effects of each 'racetam' - ie Piracetam good for multi-tasking and maintaining multiple trains of thought. Based on your experience can you highlight what these are for; Piracetam, Aniracetam, Pramiracetam and Oxiracetam?
In my experience:
Piracetam - Improved multitasking; ability to carry multiple, simultaneous 'trains of thought'; ability to solve problems I was previously unable to solve (seemingly, due to improved creativity and altered analytical processes)
Aniracetam - Increased focus and single-minded concentration (whether desired or not, and at the cost of decreased multitasking ability); inhibition of anxiety (and a Spock-like dulling of all emotion, for better or worse, including a lack of empathy for others); increased vividity of color perception (I would catch myself staring at the leaves on a tree blowing in the wind, and find it mesmerizing)
Pramiracetam - I've never tried it.
Oxiracetam - Increased motivation and ambition to accomplish tasks (perhaps mildly increased energy, though this might just be due to increased desire to achieve); improved mood (not euphoria, just a sense of well-being and the desire to smile and take things in stride); increased interest in and appreciation for music; generally increased interest in almost everything - this is my favorite nootropic, and has been since I began taking it. Also, it seems to greatly inhibit the effects of alcohol, as I mentioned above (which, I later discovered, makes sense, given that it's a neuro-protectant which was proven to help mice survive poisons which killed mice that weren't given oxiracetam).
( 4 ) With an emphasis on the above, would 24 hours be enough to shift racetams to maximize on each strength? Ie. I want Piracetam 90% of the time due to requirement to manage multiple projects but one day I want to read through an entire book. Could I shift to Aniracetam that morning? The day before? to achieve the single-task focus its renowned for? Thoughts?
Unfortunately, I can't avoid being a little vague in answering this, because there are so many variables. My advice: look up the half-life of each supplement you're taking, and consider that, after that duration of time, the amount of the substance in question in your system has been halved; at twice that time, the amount is only 25% of what it was; at three times that time, it is only 12.5%; and so on. Depending on the potency of effect (subjectively), modulate the time you take Supplement A so that by the time you take Supplement B, you have a fairly insignificant amount of Supplement A still floating around in your system (perhaps, 12.5%). This will be different for each substance, and different for each person that takes a given substance...and different depending on how large a dose you take. If you take twice as much as your optimal dose of a given supplement (and your optimal dose is something you must discover), you might find that you get the best effect at about the same time it's hit its half-life (as in, it's finally dropped to 50% of its original amount in your brain). Incidentally, this would imply that you should decrease, perhaps by 50%, your normal dose.
That being said, I found that aniracetam seems to trump piracetam in terms of the dominant effect. When I took piracetam, whether I took aniracetam afterward or at the same time, I mostly felt the effects of aniracetam only. If this seems to occur in the same way for you, you might not need to worry about cessation of piracetam before aniracetam - but the opposite should then be meticulously planned, if necessary.
( 5 ) Do you think it would be doable to increase natural choline intake to avoid having to supplement? IE. Spinach, Eggs, Rice, Kale, Broc, Beef etc?
Although I don't have any personal experience in this regard, I think it is definitely possible, and a good idea to investigate. There are some people who don't seem to require any choline supplementation at all, and these people are likely receiving their choline from food. This will save you time and money (although both these gains could be a wash if you spend too much time and money working on the perfect choline diet).
Hopefully my responses were of some use. I've given a friend of mine a small batch of oxiracetam and alpha-GPC, and he's loving it. I did the same for another friend, and he's not sure if he's noticed a difference at all, other than a subjective feeling of increased lucidity (and as always, this could simply be placebo). This could be due to too much or not enough oxiracetam, too much or not enough alpha-GPC, or he could simply be a non-responder to oxiracetam (in which case, according to some people, he's likely to respond well to aniracetam). Nonetheless, I'd be happy to help someone improve their mental faculties.
Edited by LBGSHI, 11 December 2012 - 05:39 PM.