A Long, Strange Trip

Reflections on taking psychedelic mushrooms

A few weeks ago I journeyed with psilocybin mushrooms, for the first time in nearly three years. The last time I did this, in the basement of our house, in the middle of the day, while my husband watched the kids upstairs… I saw clowns. The whole first half - over two hours - was dark and disturbing and I had to face a hundred inner demons. I wasn’t sure I’d ever consciously choose that journey again.

For a long time, I wasn’t convinced about the use of any substance, however seemingly natural, for accessing other dimensions of consciousness. I was formed by the rigidity of a mystical tradition which taught daily meditation as the only holy path to increased consciousness. Anything else was a cheat. Then my husband, a therapist by day, started reading psilocybin research studies from places like Johns Hopkins, indicating significant psychological healing for addiction, anxiety, depression, and ease of transition for folks facing a terminal diagnosis.

We wondered if the mushrooms could assist us in our own psycho-spiritual processes, and set out to make our own discoveries.

I wasn’t exactly a newbie. Before my spiritual conversion at age 20, I’d tried a lot of things and, in so many ways, mushrooms were my first initiation into the oneness of all reality. While still in high school, I chewed up a few stems that revealed to me the glistening threads which hold everything together in a cosmic unity. It wouldn’t be too strong a statement to say this vision, stumbled upon at a party, inspired the sixteen years of spiritual seeking that came after.

On one of Andrew’s early trips, he encountered Source as a great, groaning, granite-faced mountain, under whose loving shadow he was eternally sheltered. He also experienced himself as the mycelium of God, rising to mushroomness for a moment, and then returning again to the always-utterly-okayness that is the foundation of all the worlds. For the first time in his life, he felt safe on every level of his being. He’s never been the same since.

Eventually, I elected to come alongside other psilocybin-curious folks who wished to have this experience for themselves. In bearing witness to dozens of different journeys and in proximity to dozens more, I’ve verified the profundity of healing, growth, and enduring change found therein. As a result, I’ve had to reconsider my earlier suspicions, release my own self-righteousness, and accept the overwhelming evidence that responsible, supported use of psilocybin for those properly prepared and committed to their inner work is - in many cases - achieving similar outcomes as years of spiritual practice.

Thus. I felt the time coming for me to choose my own journey once again.

It was as hard as I expected, maybe harder. Anyone who hasn’t experienced mushrooms can be quick to compare its effects to the consciousness-altering substances they are familiar with - usually alcohol or marijuana - and assume there is always some kind of blissful euphoria. While this can often be true at low doses, any dose considered “high” by research standards is inevitably going to require you to wrestle with your concept of reality, your inner multiplicity, your suppressed emotions and memories, probably your parents, and, likely, the dawning realization that you are okay, wholly and eternally.

This time, among many major themes, I was invited to see more closely the part of myself that always wants to leave. Before the trip even began, this part showed up and tried to back out. Andrew and I had planned this experience for weeks and made all the arrangements so I would feel safe and spacious; for months, I had discerned my readiness to receive the medicine again. Then when the moment came, I tried to refuse, to rationalize all the good reasons I did not need to submit myself to this experience again.

Despite the resistance, I consented. And this became an overarching lesson of my journey. The first three and half hours - spent alternating between a pillow pallet on the porch and the big, blue couch in the living room - were extraordinarily difficult to endure, with an intensity of sensory effects beyond the descriptors of English. My visual, auditory, and feeling perceptions were increased and compounded 500-fold such that everything I could see, hear, or feel - eyes closed or open - was a kaleidoscopic phantasmagoria of multi-dimensional color and vibration. It was breathtakingly beautiful and terrible all at once. Over and over again, I wished for it to end, and over and over again, I consented to feel it all; to be in the experience completely, to release the tension in my body, to find my breath or feet, and to let go.

I was reminded of an exchange with monk and spiritual teacher Thomas Keating in which a person in great pain came to him seeking advice and he said: “You can feel this.” He meant, you are sufficient to bear the suffering and empowered to deliver yourself to the other side. You have what it takes to move through this.

“I can feel this. I can feel this,” I repeated like a mantra, “I can feel this.”

At one point, whilst puddling into the oversized couch, I realized my inner observer was keeping me stuck. For all the good, long work I’ve put in developing my capacity to self-observe, a time had come to soften even this faithful inner companion. The Fourth Way and the teachings from every mystical tradition I’ve studied agree - first we think we are one, then we must become two in order to observe the ways we have been conditioned and co-opted by the events and impressions of Life. Later on, by devotion, effort, and grace, we may encounter the Oneness as a reality, such that all the many parts of us, each with its own set of spectacles, cease their vigilant watch and, thus, collapse our manifold bug eyes. All that’s left is a direct perception of what is. In a singular act of Being, we are. I Am.

Over and over, the mushrooms asked me to relax and release, especially my cherished illusions about Self, God, and Time.

I also experienced an inner DJ that mixed birdsong with the incessant din of a lawn mower to extraordinary effect. I confronted my over-identifications with time, reimagined the meaning of co-creation, realized there is no director of my life but me, confronted the long-held belief that I am a burden to the people I love, accessed a deep well of compassion and appreciation for my parents, sacrificed more of my self-righteous rigidity, wondered awestruck over the sixteen-year circle I made from my first mushroom encounter to this one, and, ultimately, agreed to dance in the face of my inner darkness, existential fear, nostalgia, grief, and melancholy over the nature and temporality of life on earth. Equal to the lessons on surrender and consent, was the message that this mushroom trip, as well as life itself, are a party and the only question to really answer is: what do I want to do?

At a certain point, I thought maybe I would meet God or become God, the way some people do on psilocybin. But the narrator of my trip was very clear: this already is God, manifesting right now; there is no one to find, we’re all here. No one else is coming to determine what happens on this trip or in life - we already have you, fully equipped for that job. What if you just have a great time? It’s your party after all, what do you want to experience? Inwardly and outwardly, there was a dance floor, music, and the invitation, as I made peace with my many parts, histories, relationships, and realities, to have as much fun as I could possibly allow.

My hypothesis now is that mushrooms trips are a microcosm of life.

We are before it and we are after, but something precious is gained in the journey between those points. Everything beautiful and terrible can happen and does. We traverse the spectrum, swinging from the highest of highest to the lowest of lowest and taking every pitstop along the way. We chose our adventure to the extent our conditions allow and sometimes beyond them. Despite what arises - the wonder and horror - we can consent to have the experience. We can feel it all. Because eventually, it will end.

The end of my mushroom trip was a great relief. I sat on the back porch with Andrew before my brothers and sisters the trees, drinking the most delicious Pure LaCroix there ever was. I had a deep sense of satisfaction that in my willingness to surrender over and over again, I’d done what I set out to do. I took the journey I felt compelled to take and did not turn away. I looked over everything that’s happened and saw with perfect coherence the rainbow of my adult life, arcing from that first mushroom encounter to this one. It started with a party and it concluded with one. In fact, I have always loved to party, the only difference now is that I’m awake for it, psychologically speaking. I took the trip of life from the illusion of oneness, into twoness, and tasted the collapse.

At 34 years old, I can only postulate that the rainbow I describe is a fraction of the spiral of incarnation which coils across space-time through the dimensions of matter we call our universe. On and on it turns.

I am comforted by the prospect that I could arrive at the end of this life-trip with the same deep satisfaction of having done what I set out to do, all the way, utterly given over, still whispering yes, yes, yes. Then maybe we’ll kick back on heaven’s porch with a cold one and praise God for the long, strange journey.

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Thank you for reading. If you have questions (or concerns), don’t hesitate to comment below or reply directly by email. I do not suggest that psilocybin is for everyone, and would only suggest its use under an experienced guide in a safe, curated environment with significant preparations. This is what I chose for my party, but I recommend careful discernment for what you do at yours!