On January 1^st, 2019, I ingested twelve grams of fresh psilocybin mushrooms. For several years prior, I had led a disciplined lifestyle. I was a hard-core vegan, practicing yoga and meditation for hours daily. My plant-based diet consisted primarily of in-season organic local foods. On New Year’s Eve, I had ingested four grams of these shrooms to evaluate their potency. This was about to be my first time macrodosing on magic mushrooms. At daybreak, I could see rose-coloured clouds and golden light as dawn lit the morning sky. I made myself an almond butter and mushroom sandwich, which was terribly difficult to ingurgitate due to its acrid taste. My humble approach to entheogens is that I try to be careful about dosage, quality, set and setting.

Once the ordeal of absorption was complete, I lay on my bed until the psychoactive fungi began submerging my consciousness with the intensity of a tidal wave. In the familiar chaos of my messy room and with the ethereal groovy music I’d chosen, I was submerged by the intensity of rhapsodic emotions. This over-joyous ecstatic state can only be described as divine enchantment or pure bliss. In this mind-bending psychoactive state, I was seeing wondrous rainbow-coloured hallucinations which were in motion. The delightful realm of these open eye visuals (OEV) was extraordinary. The psychedelic OEV were similar in their multicoloured texture to what I have experienced during my angel birth, under intramuscular DMT experience, after the intense geometrical light portal of ego-death. The long-lasting afterglow and neuroplasticity of this mind-blowing experience were crystallised through exaltation – the powerful imprint onto the soul’s light body perfected by feelings of joyousness permeating the ritual. Oh, great mystery and wonder sacrament! Indescribable, overflowing joy is truly magical! The glory of elation cannot be praised enough. I made myself a twelve-gram tea concoction, a much more sophisticated way to absorb the magic potion, with the rest of the ounce that afternoon. After this ritual initiation, I was so grateful and inspired by my experience that I began meditating three hours per day, a practice I continue today. The ceremony fostered within me a strong connection with the divine and powerful inner space, which prepared me for the passing away of my dear mother.

I feel profound gratitude towards life for these sacred tools – entheogens, veganism, meditation, and yoga – as they have helped me through the sacred process of mourning my mother’s passing. The morning my mother died, my good friend and talented singer-songwriter Artemis woke up from a dream with a melody similar to the Ayahuasca Icaros, the sacred healing songs of the curanderos of the Amazon. Artemis said that the melody was my mother’s gift. Ten days after the passing of my mother, the structured ritual ensued: Artemis was sitting next to me while singing the healing melody she had heard in her dream. My mother’s ashes were on the altar with gifted flowers and other sacred objects. I brought my mattress from my bedroom and placed it in the middle of the living room so that I could relax on it while tripping. I prepared, once again, a twelve-gram tea concoction. I prayed and drank with reverence. My heart was broken like never before, so I prayed for guidance and healing. After drinking the tea mixture, I lied down. This profoundly sacred ritual became one of the most beautiful and most fascinating experiences in my life.