I did it. I tripped. After a year and a half of researching the psychedelic experience and worrying and stewing about overwhelming nausea, bad trips, HPPD, ad nauseum, last weekend I finally laid my fears to rest and it felt good and right to eat the mushroom.
From all the trip reports I've read, I expected to feel insane and psychotic. I imagined it would be one 'fucked up' experience. I must say, although my previous drug experiences involve a few joints of cannabis and a fair number of experiences with MDMA, this was one of the most singularly beautiful and profound journeys of my human existence.
The mushroom reached deep into my psyche, took me gently by the hand and led me on a trip into the ethereal climes of pure innocence and sweetness that had an organic, natural feel that MDMA has never come close to touching.
What follows is a bit of a summary of some highlights of the experience:
Dosage: 1.6 grams of dry, potent mushrooms
Setting: My 9th floor apartment
Set: A tripping partner who had never previously tripped, the screen door and windows flung wide open, an array of childhood stuffed animals placed strategically around the room so that everywhere I looked I would see something familiar and comforting, numerous votive candles scattered around the room, chilled fruit juice, the room dark with the exception of a dim blue light in one corner and a selection of music loaded into the CD player.
At 9:00 p.m. my partner and I went for a forty minute walk around a tranquil pond located right next to the Pacific Ocean and took in the beauty of nature in the gloaming late evening summer sunshine in these northern climes.
After we arrived home, we chopped up our respective bits of mushrooms into small pieces. I initially tried to eat mine straight up, but it was unpleasant. We finished them off with a chocolate bar, and they went down easily. At this point I took a big piece of white paper and drew a big smiley face on it with this message, You took a safe dosage of mushrooms at 9:45 p.m. RELAX! ENJOY! and posted this on the fridge.
Twenty minutes later as I sat on the couch reading over the Psychedelic FAQ at The Shroomery for a quick review, something begin to happen. It was a sense of euphoria, no, actually more of a 'happy' energy that begin to collect deep in my stomach. It was comforting and felt good.
I began to feel an upset stomach. It wasn't the nausea that I had feared it would be, the kind of flu-ish nausea where it washes over you in sickening waves. This was more of a "we better sit really still or the stomach will suddenly turn inside out without warning." So there I sat, quasi-nauseous but deeply comfortable. So much for the blasting off feeling and wanting to jump around the room that The Shroomery described.
Whoa!!!! I'm going somewhere and getting there fast. The euphoria has turned into pure energy deep in my gut, and I'm lifting off as if the stars are my destination. I look outside in time to see the apartment buildings outside the window sway violently back and forth and the clouds in the now nearly dark sky swirl around. I can't sit still. Nervous energy drives me to the balcony to make a closer inspection. As I grab onto the balcony rails, suddenly my arms begin to melt and I'm falling forward. This precipitates a rather hasty retreat back inside with some uttered comment about "deciding the balcony is off limits."
The come-up is definitely not without its anxiety and uncomfortable moments. As I sit on the couch to ride it out, it comes in waves. It is incoherent. Everything is moving, but not in the 'breathing' sense that I imagined. It is random movement without rhyme or reason. I am disconcerted. Mostly I focus on staying relaxed and dealing with the anxiety. This part of the experience felt more like the confusion and randomness of a cannabis high.
Then, it happens. Clarity. I cannot stop moving. I walk in circles around the apartment with wide eyes. I am like a child. No, I am a child. I am seeing everything for the first time. The leaves of my poinsettia plant are alive. I can stare at them forever. Then the little bowl of decorative rocks I have beside the plant catches my eye. I never give them a second thought, but now I want to take them out and play with them, touch them, line them up and push them around. Suddenly I realise I've been standing in front of a floor length mirror making stupid faces and waving my arms with childish wonderment. Every filter from my brain is gone and every bit of information floods my brain with unadulterated clarity. At the same time I am trying to talk to my partner, I am also taking in 7 votive candles scattered all around the room, hearing the noise of the wind outside, seeing every brilliant colour and hearing the television as if it were my sole focus.
Then it became a trip of pure innocence and beauty. Slowly adult concepts such as relationships, work, sex and personal stresses were erased. Not only were they gone, but there were no memories of them. I did not know what they were. I gazed down into a small rug by the entry door to the apartment. It has Aztec designs on it, and I stood there watching colours and patterns ripple and stream through it. I think that was when I got the concept of 'tripping over an object.' I stared transfixed and became a puppet controlled by an invisible puppeteer. I stood there and my arms and fingers slowly rose and fell as I became lost in the carpet. Strings were attached to my hands and fingers and they moved in slow motion of their own accord. A sudden, "what the hell are you doing" from my partner brought me lurching back to reality.
And so it was I was a child. When I hugged my stuffed animals I felt like I would explode with happiness. When my partner laughed, I laughed spontaneously without even knowing what I was laughing about. Since my partner was not tripping (too low of a dose for him) and had never tripped, he didn't quite understand my headspace and what was occuring. He turned on loud rock music and I was terrified. I whimpered. When the drums crashed, I cringed. He teased me and ran at me making a face, and so it was I threw up my hands in front of my face in childish terror because he was a demon. Then he hugged me and gave me a stuffed teddy bear to hug, and it was over and forgotten.
By this time, my head felt clear. This was maybe an hour and a half after taking the drug, and I thought perhaps the dosage was too low and it was wearing off already. HA! HA! HA! All I'll say is that an attempt to locate a CD from the CD rack, load it into the CD player, and actually make the damn thing play was almost too much for the mind. When I actually tried to plug in the headphones, it proved to be too much. I looked at the plug on the headphones and stared at it. Although my head was crystal clear, there was absolutely no cognitive process as to what I was doing or what this thing was I was looking at. I didn't even know it was a plug at that time. It looked like some foreign object and I knew enough to know it had some significance to wanting to hear music.
It makes me all excited to relive this trip through a trip report because I can see more clearly than ever for me how this trip was just like being a child.
Finally, Ben helped me get settled on the couch with the music. It was Delerium's Karma. I sat there with my eyes closed and began to listen to music. That was one of the best decisions of my entire life. The mood of the music took the childlike innocence and sweetness to a spiritual plane the likes of which I can never put into words. Beautiful multi-coloured patterns flowed and morphed as I watched them from closed eyelids. As the sweet lyrics and soothing melodies flooded my brain, the mushroom led me skipping and jumping through green meadows filled with the happy laughter of children. Every pleasant and good memory of childhood amalgamated into one. The wind blew in my face as I stretched out my arms and ran headlong through the soft grass until I was no longer a living being.
I became the essence of love and purity. I became all that was right and good. And it was sweet.....oh so sweet. It was soaring effortlessly for an eternity on eagle wings over the vast expanses of towering snow capped mountain peaks. It was the 'peace that passeth all understanding.' It was being free from an earthly body of clay. It was unchained melodies and ten thousand angels melding into the divine. It was freedom from guilt with the blotches of unhappiness and the smears of the ugly gone forever. And as I sat there on the couch with my arms outstretched to the heavens with my head rolled back and groans of ecstasy coming from my lips, the mushroom delivered this simple message: IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE!
And I opened my eyes and fairly shouted over and over, "IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE!" And it was. For the first time in my life something I've always heard became living, ringing truth. IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE! The message that had eluded me through years of growing up under the dominating auspices of a conservative religion finally came shining through. The mushroom showed me what MDMA had only dreamed of doing through its awesome but forced synthetic happiness, bliss & euphoria. MDMA had always made it okay to be alive, but the mushroom let me see that it really was okay to be alive.
So it was that I opened my mouth and began to laugh: a deep, organic, mirthful laugh from the depths of my very soul. It was full of life & hope. I was no longer a child but I was a grown man who has realised he is worthy of life. And it was good.
And suddenly I, someone who has not an artistic bone in his body, someone who butchers a stick man, someone who couldn't draw a square box to save his life, had the overwhelming urge to pick up a pen and paper and begin to express himself. So it was that I spent probably twenty minutes just trying to do the simple task of getting a pen and paper.
I decided to write words, but that didn't work. There were no words, plus I didn't really know how to write words. But as I sat there listening to music and let the pen go, my pen begin to move and create designs and patterns. I stared dumbfounded as my hand would hover over the paper and then drop and a new loop, swirl, square or curve would appear. Intricate patterns and layer upon layer of perspective began to emerge.
Before long, I began to come down. It was harder than any MDMA comedown in the sense that I had such a wistfulness and a sense of longing for what I could feel slipping through my fingertips. Although I have learned a lot from the experience, that tangible feeling of wrapping my fingers around a concrete truth and its magnificent implications is somewhat elusive.
Anyway, I learned a lot about tripping. I certainly will go into the next experience a lot more prepared as far as set and setting and packing for the trip, although I couldn't have asked for a better introduction to the world of the mushroom.
From all the trip reports I've read, I expected to feel insane and psychotic. I imagined it would be one 'fucked up' experience. I must say, although my previous drug experiences involve a few joints of cannabis and a fair number of experiences with MDMA, this was one of the most singularly beautiful and profound journeys of my human existence.
The mushroom reached deep into my psyche, took me gently by the hand and led me on a trip into the ethereal climes of pure innocence and sweetness that had an organic, natural feel that MDMA has never come close to touching.
What follows is a bit of a summary of some highlights of the experience:
Dosage: 1.6 grams of dry, potent mushrooms
Setting: My 9th floor apartment
Set: A tripping partner who had never previously tripped, the screen door and windows flung wide open, an array of childhood stuffed animals placed strategically around the room so that everywhere I looked I would see something familiar and comforting, numerous votive candles scattered around the room, chilled fruit juice, the room dark with the exception of a dim blue light in one corner and a selection of music loaded into the CD player.
At 9:00 p.m. my partner and I went for a forty minute walk around a tranquil pond located right next to the Pacific Ocean and took in the beauty of nature in the gloaming late evening summer sunshine in these northern climes.
After we arrived home, we chopped up our respective bits of mushrooms into small pieces. I initially tried to eat mine straight up, but it was unpleasant. We finished them off with a chocolate bar, and they went down easily. At this point I took a big piece of white paper and drew a big smiley face on it with this message, You took a safe dosage of mushrooms at 9:45 p.m. RELAX! ENJOY! and posted this on the fridge.
Twenty minutes later as I sat on the couch reading over the Psychedelic FAQ at The Shroomery for a quick review, something begin to happen. It was a sense of euphoria, no, actually more of a 'happy' energy that begin to collect deep in my stomach. It was comforting and felt good.
I began to feel an upset stomach. It wasn't the nausea that I had feared it would be, the kind of flu-ish nausea where it washes over you in sickening waves. This was more of a "we better sit really still or the stomach will suddenly turn inside out without warning." So there I sat, quasi-nauseous but deeply comfortable. So much for the blasting off feeling and wanting to jump around the room that The Shroomery described.
Whoa!!!! I'm going somewhere and getting there fast. The euphoria has turned into pure energy deep in my gut, and I'm lifting off as if the stars are my destination. I look outside in time to see the apartment buildings outside the window sway violently back and forth and the clouds in the now nearly dark sky swirl around. I can't sit still. Nervous energy drives me to the balcony to make a closer inspection. As I grab onto the balcony rails, suddenly my arms begin to melt and I'm falling forward. This precipitates a rather hasty retreat back inside with some uttered comment about "deciding the balcony is off limits."
The come-up is definitely not without its anxiety and uncomfortable moments. As I sit on the couch to ride it out, it comes in waves. It is incoherent. Everything is moving, but not in the 'breathing' sense that I imagined. It is random movement without rhyme or reason. I am disconcerted. Mostly I focus on staying relaxed and dealing with the anxiety. This part of the experience felt more like the confusion and randomness of a cannabis high.
Then, it happens. Clarity. I cannot stop moving. I walk in circles around the apartment with wide eyes. I am like a child. No, I am a child. I am seeing everything for the first time. The leaves of my poinsettia plant are alive. I can stare at them forever. Then the little bowl of decorative rocks I have beside the plant catches my eye. I never give them a second thought, but now I want to take them out and play with them, touch them, line them up and push them around. Suddenly I realise I've been standing in front of a floor length mirror making stupid faces and waving my arms with childish wonderment. Every filter from my brain is gone and every bit of information floods my brain with unadulterated clarity. At the same time I am trying to talk to my partner, I am also taking in 7 votive candles scattered all around the room, hearing the noise of the wind outside, seeing every brilliant colour and hearing the television as if it were my sole focus.
Then it became a trip of pure innocence and beauty. Slowly adult concepts such as relationships, work, sex and personal stresses were erased. Not only were they gone, but there were no memories of them. I did not know what they were. I gazed down into a small rug by the entry door to the apartment. It has Aztec designs on it, and I stood there watching colours and patterns ripple and stream through it. I think that was when I got the concept of 'tripping over an object.' I stared transfixed and became a puppet controlled by an invisible puppeteer. I stood there and my arms and fingers slowly rose and fell as I became lost in the carpet. Strings were attached to my hands and fingers and they moved in slow motion of their own accord. A sudden, "what the hell are you doing" from my partner brought me lurching back to reality.
And so it was I was a child. When I hugged my stuffed animals I felt like I would explode with happiness. When my partner laughed, I laughed spontaneously without even knowing what I was laughing about. Since my partner was not tripping (too low of a dose for him) and had never tripped, he didn't quite understand my headspace and what was occuring. He turned on loud rock music and I was terrified. I whimpered. When the drums crashed, I cringed. He teased me and ran at me making a face, and so it was I threw up my hands in front of my face in childish terror because he was a demon. Then he hugged me and gave me a stuffed teddy bear to hug, and it was over and forgotten.
By this time, my head felt clear. This was maybe an hour and a half after taking the drug, and I thought perhaps the dosage was too low and it was wearing off already. HA! HA! HA! All I'll say is that an attempt to locate a CD from the CD rack, load it into the CD player, and actually make the damn thing play was almost too much for the mind. When I actually tried to plug in the headphones, it proved to be too much. I looked at the plug on the headphones and stared at it. Although my head was crystal clear, there was absolutely no cognitive process as to what I was doing or what this thing was I was looking at. I didn't even know it was a plug at that time. It looked like some foreign object and I knew enough to know it had some significance to wanting to hear music.
It makes me all excited to relive this trip through a trip report because I can see more clearly than ever for me how this trip was just like being a child.
Finally, Ben helped me get settled on the couch with the music. It was Delerium's Karma. I sat there with my eyes closed and began to listen to music. That was one of the best decisions of my entire life. The mood of the music took the childlike innocence and sweetness to a spiritual plane the likes of which I can never put into words. Beautiful multi-coloured patterns flowed and morphed as I watched them from closed eyelids. As the sweet lyrics and soothing melodies flooded my brain, the mushroom led me skipping and jumping through green meadows filled with the happy laughter of children. Every pleasant and good memory of childhood amalgamated into one. The wind blew in my face as I stretched out my arms and ran headlong through the soft grass until I was no longer a living being.
I became the essence of love and purity. I became all that was right and good. And it was sweet.....oh so sweet. It was soaring effortlessly for an eternity on eagle wings over the vast expanses of towering snow capped mountain peaks. It was the 'peace that passeth all understanding.' It was being free from an earthly body of clay. It was unchained melodies and ten thousand angels melding into the divine. It was freedom from guilt with the blotches of unhappiness and the smears of the ugly gone forever. And as I sat there on the couch with my arms outstretched to the heavens with my head rolled back and groans of ecstasy coming from my lips, the mushroom delivered this simple message: IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE!
And I opened my eyes and fairly shouted over and over, "IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE!" And it was. For the first time in my life something I've always heard became living, ringing truth. IT'S ALRIGHT TO BE ALIVE! The message that had eluded me through years of growing up under the dominating auspices of a conservative religion finally came shining through. The mushroom showed me what MDMA had only dreamed of doing through its awesome but forced synthetic happiness, bliss & euphoria. MDMA had always made it okay to be alive, but the mushroom let me see that it really was okay to be alive.
So it was that I opened my mouth and began to laugh: a deep, organic, mirthful laugh from the depths of my very soul. It was full of life & hope. I was no longer a child but I was a grown man who has realised he is worthy of life. And it was good.
And suddenly I, someone who has not an artistic bone in his body, someone who butchers a stick man, someone who couldn't draw a square box to save his life, had the overwhelming urge to pick up a pen and paper and begin to express himself. So it was that I spent probably twenty minutes just trying to do the simple task of getting a pen and paper.
I decided to write words, but that didn't work. There were no words, plus I didn't really know how to write words. But as I sat there listening to music and let the pen go, my pen begin to move and create designs and patterns. I stared dumbfounded as my hand would hover over the paper and then drop and a new loop, swirl, square or curve would appear. Intricate patterns and layer upon layer of perspective began to emerge.
Before long, I began to come down. It was harder than any MDMA comedown in the sense that I had such a wistfulness and a sense of longing for what I could feel slipping through my fingertips. Although I have learned a lot from the experience, that tangible feeling of wrapping my fingers around a concrete truth and its magnificent implications is somewhat elusive.
Anyway, I learned a lot about tripping. I certainly will go into the next experience a lot more prepared as far as set and setting and packing for the trip, although I couldn't have asked for a better introduction to the world of the mushroom.
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