🍄 A Psilocybin Experience That Proves Something

☝️ Here’s my premise, which should feel familiar to long-time readers: plant and fungi medicine represent the next phase of human health and wellness.

• I have watched countless people use cannabis as a substitute for alcohol, and thrive because of their new habits. The life comes back into their eyes

• I have watched countless people turn to cannabis over harmful pharmaceuticals for pain management, anxiety, sleep problems, etc. - and these folks also thrive

• I have watched people explore psilocybin and other entheogens - both in a microdose, daily-pill kind of dynamic, and also in an every-six-months, explore-your-psyche one. Both of these groups have reported tremendous benefit from these experiences

tl;dr: these medicines seem objectively better for treating nearly every human ailment we can think of. The big caveat?

Most of our evidence is anecdotal; because these natural medicines have historically been stigmatized and criminalized, we don’t have the kind of double-blind scientific studies that, say, Oxycontin does. 🙄

So, in the spirit of helping to normalize these miracle compounds, here is one experience from my personal life that supports the premise:

🏃 The Saturday jog through the trails

I’m anxious sometimes. I get stressed. I’m human.

One of my favorite pressure-releasers is to throw on my headphones, get a podcast going, and run in the hills surrounding my house. I do it at least 3x a week, and the vitamin D, endorphins, and overall good vibes usually knock me right back to center.

Sometimes, I’ll augment my jogs with a small dose of THC. I feel lighter and more creative; I problem-solve. It’s lovely.

On a recent Saturday, I decided to determine if a small dose of psilocybin might provide the same kind of benefits. I took a small chomp (0.12 g), waited 30 mins, then headed out.

Stage One: The Depths

The trails near my house start on high ground, then head down into a tree-protected path which runs along a creek. As I headed down into the darker, cooler environment, I did not feel lighter or happier - I felt heavy and anxious.

As I continued to journey downward, I began to think that my experiment may have been a bad idea.

I thought about all the things I was doing wrong - at work, as a parent, in social situations. Every perceived misstep invaded my thoughts. Why couldn’t I be more patient, or proactive, or attentive? Why couldn’t I just be…better?

The lower trails continue, and start to lead upward toward a waterfall. The sun peeks through a bit more.

Stage Two: The Buildup

After the waterfall, the trails take a hard right turn and ascend quickly, past the elevation of the trailhead and toward a really magnificent vista. But the ascent is difficult - it’s a few miles of steep incline, nonstop.

At this point, the sun began to hit my face, and I was sweating profusely. I was running straight uphill - not jogging, but running - and my thoughts began to transform from negative dwellings to positive affirmations.

I felt capable. I felt powerful. I experienced an objective recognition of my shortcomings - then a total release of all of them. I felt, deeply, that my good parts outweighed the bad ones. I ran harder.

Stage Three: The Release

I reached the top of the trail and saw this 👆🏼

The natural beauty struck me like a bolt of lightning. I removed my headphones and sat in the dirt, panting and dripping sweat. I cried. I sat for as long as it took - then I got up and ran home.

🍄 This is a good example of the potential of fungi medicine

This was not an intense trip with visuals and overtly scary parts. I never felt in danger, and I didn’t need a guide. Instead, I felt a gigantic weight lift off my shoulders, and when I got home, I hugged my wife and sons deeply and we went about our day.

This is the potential of plant and fungi medicine. Our brains respond in a very interesting way - creating new neural pathways and providing new perspectives that allow us to address repetitive or concerning thoughts. And often, I have found, addressing those thoughts under the power of mushrooms allows me to let them float by, for good.

🕺🏻 I talk about these things so we can stop feeling weird about talking about these things

This felt weird to write, if I’m being honest. I still worry what some of you will think about me for experimenting with “magic mushrooms.” Ultimately, I don’t care, but it’s still a consideration.

That means we haven’t done enough to normalize very healthy, wonderful things that have absolutely untapped and unlimited potential. And once we can normalize these things, we can test them. We can create elegant, deliberately-dosed products based on them. We can have conversations about them, and then we can heal.

📚 tl;dr

• Plant and fungi medicine represent the next phase of human health and wellness, but most of our evidence is anecdotal

• We need to talk about our experiences to normalize them

• I took a lil dose and a lil run, and it was a grand journey from the depths of the trails to the crest of a mountain

• It is Thursday