OLD TRIP: Visiting the Gods

20221112

This is the first of three old trip reports that I want to get into my blog record, which happened BEFORE I had the blog set up. This was the first time I had a *real* trip - one that went beyond "look at the pretty colors" and into "I'm able to do deep work on my psyche." The mushroom chocolates were given to us by a friend; they were the first time I ever got to experience Psilocybe cubensis mushrooms. I had experienced two light single-gram trips from them previously, one with my husband.

Protocol: I had fasted the day before, and no food in the morning. Around 1 PM, I mixed a chocolate containing: [.75 g of dried crumbled psilocybin mushroom and .25 g of powdered decarbed cannabis] into a cup of hot water to make a tea, and drank it. The effects were moderate, with both body sensation and visuals, but I was unable to get into the trip very far; the visuals were more of a suggestion, pleasant but not awe-inspiring. Around 3 PM, feeling like the trip was fading, I took another dose of the same, and within about half an hour intense close-eyed visuals started. I laid down in bed in a darkened room. 

The visuals were very bright and lovely in color; there were complex designs of interlacing thin lines, like bronze gates or the bright leading of stained glass, against a backdrop of constantly shifting pale sunset-like or raku-like colors. Everything was in shades of pale rose, gold, blue, orange, and golden olive. For a while, I just laid in darkness and observed the visuals. The physical sensation was quite strong; the feeling of being pressed gently and rhythmically, like waves or being rolled with a rolling pin, moved mostly from my feet toward my head, but sometimes around in other directions. 

I listened to a Michael Sealey sleep hypnosis script called "Meet Your Spirit Guides." His voice and the new-age atmospheric music were a good accompaniment, and his frequent reminders that all the entities I see wish me well, that the journey is safe and good for me, etc., made me feel comfortable and I never had any sense of unease or anxiety. I felt overwhelmed with awe at the beauty of the experience, and for the entire hour of his talking, tears streamed down my face. The only substantial drawback I noticed from this, was that it made me congested, and I had to breathe through my mouth. Despite feeling very involved in the action of the visuals and the unfolding story, I was also aware of the fact that I was lying in bed, my nose was stuffed up, I was breathing, the dogs were lying pressed against me on either side. 

Sealey’s script led me to visualize rowing a small boat across a body of water, and stepping out of my canoe and walking ashore, then meeting a man and a woman in a beautiful lush garden. They are archetypal figures, almost like statues, and blindingly bright. The mushroom visuals definitely served up beautiful imagery. The faces of the figures were mostly too bright for my eyes to resolve, but at some moments I was able to see them, lit from within, and see their expressions. At one point I remember looking at the man’s face, and seeing that every line and shadow of his face was made up of tiny designs, which looked like letters (more like Devanagari than anything, but I couldn’t read it) but then resolved to tiny beings, always moving. 

A couple of times, the dogs were distracted by something outside - I think a cat was in the creek - and I got up and called them back in and quieted them down. I chatted with Husband some, giving him updates on my experience. My reports were mostly about how beautiful the whole experience was; the colors, the designs, and the whole sense of being in the presence of such powerful entities made me feel awed, humbled, blessed, and opened. The feeling of motion continued throughout, although the sense of it being pressing down on me shifted - it was almost more like the fabric of reality was rippling, like the surface of a thick boiling liquid. Boiling isn’t the right word - it was more… playful? And rhythmic - but that sense of bubbles rising and subsiding was there. I’ve learned that it’s called morphing, which makes sense. If you were to take a Starburst candy, and squeeze it top to bottom so that it’s squished up short but wide, and then squeeze it side to side so that it’s narrow but tall… and imagine the whole sensory plane is made of tesselated squares all moving like that but in alternating patterns, so that one square is compressing vertically while the ones above and beside it are compressing horizontally… that’s what it felt like, all over my body, in big pieces, and sometimes in smaller pieces. It reminds me a little of a TENS unit setting that makes your muscles contract.  

A couple of things I sent in texts to Husband: 

Everything is made of tiny little living things. Like the face of a man when I lean closer, I can see tiny lines of moving creatures making up every line and shadow, some of them are dancing, some are walking in lines like ants.

I feel like I can sense the cycle of things decaying... Going back to the earth like compost. I think that makes sense for mushrooms. Like I can occasionally see my hands and think about the skeleton inside me, and how it will remain after my life goes, and how the joints with their angles and their attachments shape the arabesque of every movement.

The guiding script tells you to ask questions of the spirit guides, and to receive their answers, and notes that the answers may come in words, or they may come in other forms, or they may just come in an understanding. He said the questions twice; the second time, I said them along with him. It seemed important to use my physical breath and my will to shape the words. 

I spoke the questions aloud, here in the room... But when they answered, it was like a book being pushed into my mind, page by page, and some of the appendices were colored diagrams, but others were songs or shapes of the wind... And each page flashed briefly as it was pushed in, as it crossed the interface of my being. After each answer, my body went through a ripple... It started above my left eye and rippled through my head and then my body, like I was taking in that volume of knowledge. 

The sense of the book-like answers being communicated was very distinct. In one visual, it was held up like a big illuminated manuscript, ornate and colorful, filled with tiny writing, and pushed flat toward me, cover-first. The book wasn’t opened, but it’s like it was read or transferred, page by page, as it went through a membrane in the air. 

Then another question.

And he would say it, and I would say it, and the process repeated.

The colors. My God, the colors. And the kindness.

After the four questions, he gives you a space for your own questions.

I asked for how to understand [Husband] better and not to fight with him so much, but to help him feel loved and cared for and protected. The answer came with such a sad smile. None of it feels like it comes with words. It's all like code language... But I feel like it's downloading into a subconscious part of my mind.

Then I asked for how to reconnect with my creative power, and I felt like I was flying in the wind. Now the closed eye visuals look like peyote beadwork, swirling in patterns.

Of course when I find the image to illustrate... It's from Interweave Press, the same people I've published several times with.

Part of me says, "Again, Again!!" and most of me says, "Holy shit, that's a lot of reading material that just got shoved into my brain," and the responsible side knows it's time to get up and walk the dogs. And blow my nose.

When the script says that it’s time to drift off to sleep (these scripts are designed for bedtime meditative/visualization practice; they’re not really designed for hallucinogenic journeys, but I don’t think I could have custom-ordered a better one) I opened my eyes and knew it was time to get up, eat something, walk and feed the dogs, and return to ordinary life.