Breathing and psychoactive chemicals

From the book...
Pursuit of Ecstasy: The MDMA Experience.
Beck, Jerome, and Rosenbaum, Marsha. (1994).
Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

A 24-year-old Bhakti yoga practitioner explained how MDMA helped guide her on a spiritual path:

"Bhakti is the yoga of devotion, and I'm trying to see every experience in life as leading us closer to God and bringing out a more loving, harmonious way of being with other people and generally just having a devotional attitude. ... MDMA's been very useful from a Bhakti yoga perspective, because it's very heart-opening and that's what you try to do in Bhakti yoga. So I think that it could have potential for people who want to learn to do that who don't already know how, especially."

I'm glad that your yogic breathing helped you and you got home safely, and I definitely agree that pranayama can be very helpful to people who suffer from panic attacks.

But, I feel like the best decision in a case like this one would be to pull off the road. You could have caused an accident, which is contrary to the principle of ahimsa (non-harming).

I find these reactions interesting.

personally, i don't see why it should matter if he was still feeling the effects of MDMA, having a panic attack or a bad case of the hiccups. His situation in that moment was dictated by the choice to either freak-out (which would increase the odds of something horrific happening) or to center himself and reconnect with the flow. I think he wisely recognized the gravity of his predicament and made the appropriate action to remedy the situation.

This reminds me of a time when I came upon a mother whose young son (5-6yo) had mistakenly eaten some 'special' mushroom chocolate his father had carelessly left in the family car from a weekend outing with his friends. One course of action would have been to panic, rush him to the hospital and submit the tripping child to the trauma of a hospital examination and potential bureaucratic interventions. However, having been a tripsitter many times in my past, I calmly consulted with the mother and child, helping them become more relaxed about their situation.

I still run into that mom from time to time and she still thanks me for helping them through that little crisis. In the end, the two of them went home where she made the house mellow and prepared some healthy treats. She said that though he was aware his reality was substantially distorted, he did fine, mostly just giggling and playing the rest of the day and sleeping in longer than usual the next day. Certainly the father was reprimanded by the mother for his carelessness, but what's more important was how to handle the situation in the moment rather than to dwell on how the situation came to be. Lastly, with this situation and the former one, it is also important to learn from the choices made so as to know how better to deal with future situations.

The idea that death "sets us free" seems like a very Christian idea to me, not a yogic one. My understanding is that in most versions of yogic philosophies the core concept is that Enlightenment sets one free. And certainly in any reincarnation theology death does not set one free and only enlightenment has that power. I've never seen murder advocated in yogic philosophies or the idea that one shouldn't be conscious of or responsible for one's actions.