Author Archive
Religious Leaders Tripping on Magic Mushrooms for Science
Among traditional cultures, psychedelic plants and fungi have long been viewed as spiritual medicines. Indeed, why partake of sacraments such as mushrooms, ayahuasca, or peyote cacti if not for their spiritual power? Yet in the West, where “spirituality” has long been conflated with religion — and where few sacraments aside from communion wafers and a bit of wine are acknowledged — these visionary plants have been viewed with suspicion. That’s all changing. Among progressive scientists, psychedelics are now all the rage. Psilocybin, the active component of “magic” mushrooms, has shown promise in pilot studies for a wide range of applications,...
The Best Psychedelic Tattoos on the Planet
Have you ever had a psychedelic experience so intense that you felt it would change your life forever? Did you wish you could immortalize the experience — say, by emblazoning swirling, psychedelic visions upon your skin forever? Okay, neither have I. But a few rare souls must have felt that way, because the tattoos below are undoubtedly psychedelic. From geometric blackwork to cosmic scenes, Alex Grey paintings to peyote cacti, there’s a trippy tat for all tastes. I’ve scoured the Internet to find the 15 coolest psychedelic tattoos on the planet. ...
Why Dr. Bronner’s Soaps Is Donating $5 Million to MAPS
This essay by David Bronner, CEO of Dr. Bronner’s and Board Member of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, was first published in the MAPS Bulletin and on drbronner.com. Our family company, Dr. Bronner’s, donates a lot of resources to social justice NGOs and campaigns, including over $1 million to various state-level cannabis legalization campaigns in 2016. Collectively, well north of $40 million was raised in the 2016 election cycle alone to end prohibition and stop the enormous waste of taxpayer and law enforcement resources from ruining the lives of upstanding citizens and their families. Even with the Trump...
“Getting Higher”: A Conversation with Author and Occultist Julian Vayne
Julian Vayne is the author of Getting Higher: The Manual of Psychedelic Ceremony — a guide for exploring the use of psychedelic substances in the contexts of spirituality, self-transformation and magic. It’s out now, via the incredible independent publisher, Psychedelic Press UK. I caught up with Julian about why, exactly, psychedelic explorers would want to get even higher, and what it means to be a warlock in the information age. Hi Julian, thanks very much for joining me. I know I’m not supposed to judge a book by its cover, but I have to say Getting Higher looks fascinating....
Hand in Hand: How Psychedelic Harm Reduction Is Making a Difference Now
This essay by Shannon Clare Petitt was originally published in the MAPS Bulletin, Winter 2016 edition. If you believe in MAPS’ mission of furthering psychedelic medicine while promoting harm reduction, please donate to their cause. The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) continues to make huge strides towards the goal of establishing psychedelics as legal medicines. In advancing the cause of psychedelic therapy, the organization has also become a repository for experience and techniques essential for assisting people journeying through difficult psychedelic experiences. Psychedelic harm reduction is the practice of creating safe spaces in environments where the use...
The Walls Come Tumbling Down My First MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy Session
This story by Andy Gold first appeared in the MAPS Bulletin, Winter 2016 edition. I went for my first MDMA-assisted psychotherapy session on November 30, 2015, the Monday after Thanksgiving. Was it really a coincidence that the colonoscopy which found a malignant tumor in my colon some years earlier had also taken place on the Monday after Thanksgiving? I think not. Full circle, indeed. I arrived at the site in Marin County, Calif., where the session was to take place, at 9:30 in the morning. One of the study requirements is that you do the sessions while fasting. Someone also...
Deleted “Avatar” Scene Shows Hallucinogenic Vision Quest
Did you know the script of James Cameron’s Avatar, the 3D blockbuster from 2009, originally called for a full-on psychedelic vision quest? The scene must have gotten cut fairly late in production, because it was filmed with live actors and animation had already begun. The CGI renders were left in a blocky, unfinished state, but it’s easy to tell what’s going on. Titled “The Dream Hunt,” the scene is a fascinating glimpse into the spirituality of Pandora’s native Na’vi culture. The main character, Jake Sulley, agrees to take part in the initiation ceremony, in which he must take potent psychedelics in...
Mesmerizing Gifs by Hexeosis Are a Trip All By Themselves
Gifs may be best known as a format for eminently shareable memes, drawn from films, TV shows, and YouTube videos and shared around the Web as bite-size reactions to every possible situation. But in the past few years, a few creators have raised them to the level of art form. And some of those artists appear to have gone deep down the psychedelic rabbit hole, because their colorful, ever-looping creations speak the visual language known by every tripper. One such gif artist is Hexeosis, who has been producing animations at the intersection of mathematics and psychedelia since 2013....
New Study: Psychedelics Really Do Produce a Higher State of Consciousness
Trippers, researchers, and abstainers alike have casually referred to the psychedelic experience as an “expanded” state of mind for many years. Even the terminology of being “high” implies a somehow raised form of consciousness. Now, for the first time ever, researchers have found neurological evidence to support that view. In a study conducted at the University of Sussex and Imperial College, London, scientists discovered that psychedelics like LSD, psilocybin, and even the dissociative ketamine all produce a “higher” state of consciousness. But what does that mean? Previous research has shown that measures of “neural signal diversity” in the brain change...
Dream Worlds: The Visionary Art of Adam Scott Miller
As an artist, I’ve had this sense of being an explorer- sailing into unknown territory to bring back maps to share of lands we are not yet in, or aware of. Adam Scott Miller, an American-born artist who lives and works in Queensland, Australia, has always been something of a visionary. According to an interview he gave to solpurpose.com, two childhood events profoundly shaped his perception of the world — and, in turn, his art. Around age ten, for a year or so, I regularly experienced night terrors where I would wake up in the middle of a...
Psilocybin Healing How Mushrooms Cured an Artist's Depression and Anxiety
While traveling in Italy and Greece in 2006 I developed a sinus infection that got so bad that once back in the US it ruptured the lining of my sinuses and allowed a strep infection to travel unchecked into my brain and spinal column. Bacterial meningitis ravaged my brain as a 107° fever raged out of control. I spent a week in the hospital unconscious and on life support before my folks whisked me off to their farm for lots of rest and lots of organic food from their gardens. Years of challenging recovery led to more and...
Psychedelics in American Religious Experience
How important are psychedelics in the religious experience of the United States? We know drugs like LSD and psilocybin can occasion powerful, life-changing experiences of awe and renewal. We also know psychedelics have been used by millions of people since the 1960s. But no one has ever tried to count the number of people who’ve had psychedelic-related mystical experiences. I ran a survey of over 6,000 people to get an answer. Background: Walter ‘Wally’ Pahnke and psychedelic mysticism Fifty-one years ago, a massive 9.2 Richter scale earthquake shook Alaska. At the same time, Wally Pahnke was experiencing another...