Thanks, everybody, for your insightful responses. I thought really hard about all of them. I am still not 100% sure what I will do, but one quote really spoke volumes for me...

Originally posted by Ev
I
Lucid dreaming definitely has 1000 times the potential of any drug
This was from somebody who has done DMT, and it hits the nail on the head with what I was looking for. The part of my research that really sticks out is what is said in Terrence McKenna's book The Archaic Revival. He was one of the leading experts in psychedelic experiences. He talks about DMT like it is far different from any other type of hallucinogen and says that it presents a very specific dimension that is ultimately mind expanding in very specific ways. He said that the danger with DMT is that the user might "die of astonishment." If DMT presents big time angles on reality and understandings that could not be discovered by lucid dreaming alone, then I want to try it, even at the risk of experiencing horror. McKenna did admit that he was not even a novice at lucid dreaming. He had a few, but he didn't say anything emphatic about them and said that he had no idea how to have them on command. I know how to have them on command and say that lucid dreaming is hands down the most mind expanding practice I have ever engaged in. It has infinite imagination potential, astoundingly deep emotional potential, and infinite potential for warping and twisting the basic principles of reality and conceptualization. With that being the case, I don't quite understand how DMT could do anything lucid dreaming cannot. I can't concieve of any state of consciousness (positive ones at least) that can't, in theory, be reached in a lucid dream. If I read about DMT experiences and then make reality do the same thing in a lucid dream, wouldn't I get the same perspectives?

Ev, would you say that there is any SPECIFIC thing DMT can do that lucid dreaming cannot do other than scare the hell out of people?

Plobable said that it killed some people in his/her town. I read that DMT can't kill you, but I read about the threat of death too, particularly by making breathing stop. If that's the case, screw DMT. I've had friends die of drug overdoses, and there is no way I'm going out like that.