Flesh of the Gods — A Psychedelic Memoir

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The Parables

19 min readNov 27, 2020

“Be joyful, though you have considered all the facts.”
— Wendell Berry

Over the past couple of years, the world of psychedelics has been piquing my interest. First, because of the stigma. They’ve gotten a bad wrap for decades, and like most stigmatized things, there’s more to the story. Their reputation as a wonder drug that makes you go crazy while damaging your chromosomes and lowering your IQ is, for the most part, fabricated. They definitely have an interesting history and it’s worth looking into.

Secondly, I am interested in the medical science, old and new, that has been showing unbelievable results when treating healthy normals, life-long addicts, and terminal-cancer patients.

Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly for me personally, I’m interested in what the psychology pioneer, William James, referred to as “mystical states of consciousness.” Which are states of consciousness that aren’t accessible by humans in everyday life.

These states are characterized by four markers, as put forth by James:

Ineffability — the inability to describe the experience with words. This is the idea of “you just had to be there.” Words do not suffice to convey the actual experience. To put words to a mystical experience is to enact a violence on it, to chop it up in order to make it fit into a receivable package.
A Noetic Quality — the idea of being revealed a truth. Almost like an epiphany: when it hits you, you wonder why you hadn’t known it before. It seems obvious. But in a mystical state, these obvious, often deeply profound truths go deeper than the intellect. They’re more felt than they are known.
Transiency — they don’t last long, and they’re hard to remember. But when they happen again, like coming home again, it feels familiar and recognizable.
Passivity — James writes: “the mystic feels as if his own will were in abeyance, and indeed sometimes as if he were grasped and held by a superior power.” In my opinion, what James is referring to is what is now called ‘ego dissolution.’ The idea that the boundaries between who you are and what everything else is diminish, and sometimes dissolve completely. Your ego disappears and you feel as if you are one with everything.

Psychedelics are known to occasion mystical experiences in people. But psychedelics aren’t the only ways to shift our consciousness. Certain forms of meditation can achieve such states, as well as different, highly focused ways of breathing.

Mystical experiences are thought to be simply different forms of consciousness. Suggesting the idea that our consciousness isn’t created and held by our brain, but rather that consciousness exists outside our brains. Perhaps in an infinite number of ways. And our brains were designed by evolution to be tuned into only one form at a time.

Kind of like a radio antenna. And perhaps, a mystical experience is simply our brains “tuning in” to a different state of consciousness.

This suggests the idea that mystical states of consciousness are as old as our species. That we’ve been accessing these realms for millennia. And that there’s something important we can learn from that realm. Truths we’re not privy to in normal-waking consciousness.

Psychedelics can induce these states much more quickly than a lifetime of meditating, and can be much more powerful than breathing.

So I, forever following my curiosity, decided to explore this world for myself. I wanted to know what all the hype was about with regard to these wonder drugs. I wanted to see outer space from the comfort of my own home. I wanted to surrender myself over to another realm of consciousness and see what happens.

And I’ll say this here: my life will never be the same.

DISCLAIMER:

Psychedelics can be extremely dangerous substances if not used correctly. The horror stories you hear are mostly false, but some are true. You should not take a high dose of a psychedelic drug without first at the very least reading as much literature as you can find on the subject, then ask people that you know about their experiences, then read the literature again, and then proceed with caution.

I can’t tell you what to do with your life, but I hope to convey here a little of what I’ve experienced. But I’ve got a lifetime of fucked-up in my luggage, and I’m a bit of an idiot when it comes to trying new and dangerous things, so I’m willing to put myself at risk in order to write about it. But I do not advise you do the same before seeking counsel on the subject.

Plus, these substances are illegal or whatever. But that’s another story for another time.

Okay, let’s get into it.

So I took some mushrooms about a couple weeks ago. And It’s normally a good time. Normally, I’m in the woods, on the top of a tree, watching a river flow below me. It’s a beautiful day, sunshine, birds, the whole nine. I think of things like relationships, writing, art, nature.

There’s always this point, when I take mushrooms in the woods, where I know they’re kicking in: the tree canopies seem to rise a little. The branches will literally lift with the wind. Like a wave, as if to say: “Howdy, Alex. Welcome to our realm of consciousness.”

This time, things were different. I was not in the woods, I was in my apartment, and I took a higher dose than usual. Just to see if I could find something interesting.

The fungus did not disappoint.

After I downed what could be the foulest-tasting thing ever grown by mother nature, I sat back and thought, Two grams is what I normally take, because I always have to drive home later. I thought, I’m already at home. Let’s go a skosh deeper.

So I take another gram or two. Here we go.

I grabbed a book and began reading until lift-off. It takes thirty to thirty-five minutes for that. So I kick back and wait. I don’t pay much attention to the book, I am too apprehensive about the journey ahead of me.

I remember the idea of setting an intention with regard to what you’re looking to get out of the experience. It’s almost as if you’re asking the universe to show you certain things while you have access to this other realm of consciousness. I didn’t exactly have a specific intention for this trip, but I sit back and breathe. I come back to the present and focus on my breath. When in doubt on what to do in a given situation, just pay attention to your breath.

So, I’m sitting in bed, then it starts. Colors start to change. Everything turns to a velvety pastel and it’s beautiful. The world softens. If there were trees in my bedroom, they would have begun waving at this point.

The science says that psilocybin actually does have a softening effect on your brain, physiologically speaking. Neuroplasticity is the idea. Which is the idea that your brain is malleable. It says that you can develop neural pathways by repeated actions and thought patterns. This is the reason for motor skills that can be learned to the point of operation without conscious effort.

Think about it. When’s the last time you thought about how to brush your teeth.

In the same way, thoughts and rewards can develop these same paths. For example, every day I get home from work, I feel like I need to smoke a cigarette. Neural pathway.

Every time I finish a meal, my brain says, time for a smoke, pard. Pathway.

As well. This is the reason for some people’s automatic responses to certain emotions.

For example. There are those among us who feel the need for revenge on those who have committed traffic atrocities. These are the ones who, when in traffic and someone cuts them off, their first response is to get so fucking fired up and drive in such a way that even Richard Petty would shake in his cowboy boots.

It’s me. I am this person. I’m not proud of it, but it’s true. Pathway.

But it’s an automatic response to certain stimuli. Meaning, I’ve gotten pissed off and acted erratically enough times now, that I don’t even have to think about it.

Next thing I know, I’m screaming obscenities out my window at some guy I’ve never met, who’s likely just trying to get home to his family.

My point is this: psilocybin mushrooms literally soften your brain to the point where those pathways aren’t as deeply grooved anymore.

Johns Hopkins University has been leading the world in the field of psychedelic research. And they’ve shown how the drugs can aid in quitting smoking and quitting drinking, showing unbelievable results.

So here I am, the world is velvet and I know it’s time. Trees are waving outside my window. I greet the mushrooms warmly and prepare myself to surrender my consciousness for the next four to six hours.

I lay back, head on my pillow, eyes closed. The sunlight coming into my room is unbearably white. White walls, nightstand, comforter, pillowcases. All of it was wonderfully bright. I’m normally thankful to be in here this time of day, but today it’s too much. Too sterile.

So I cover my face with my pillow, I want it black.

I started out in this maze of hallways. Except it was more like an ice cave. It was dark. I’m not sure what I was doing there, but I knew I had to go deeper. It seemed like the further I went, the brighter it got. The more into the mystical I was going, the more welcoming it became. So I walked.

Soon, I end up in the house of my ninth-grade girlfriend. Okay, I think, I haven’t been here in a long time.

It’s Christmas time. The one Christmas I spent with her and her family was one of my favorite Christmases ever, so I’m pretty stoked. Everything seems normal. We’re all hanging out, having a good time, I suppose.

I get this feeling of knowing how messed up I was as a fifteen-year-old. I projected onto that family all the issues I had in my own family, thinking all families were like mine.

Cut yourself some slack, the mushroom says, you were just a kid.

You’re right, I think, let’s move on.

So.

I’m in the house, hanging, having a good time. Then on the other side of the living room is a dark hallway, so I move toward it.

A word to the wise and future mushroom user: the key to not having a bad trip is 1) Be in the right set and setting (another post, another time). And 2) Don’t resist what’s happening; trust the trajectory, as the experts say. Let go and let god, if you will; god being the mushroom, of course (another time).

Meaning, if you see a door, open it. When you see a big scary monster, approach it. When you see a dark hallway, go down it. Not a bad philosophy for everyday life, if you ask me.

On mushrooms, just as in life, the things you need to see are on the other side of these things that seems scary.

Take the case of the big scary monster. When you see one, you’re only seeing the creature that your mind has created as the spokesperson for an idea. The big scary monster, or the dangerous-looking door, is usually just a representation of something you’ve had stored away in your noggin for a long time, avoiding it.

When you approach them, you realize it’s merely a facade. Usually a weak one, at that. As you approach the door, or the hallway, or the monster, you might be shitting your pants. It’s likely to scare you the closer you get. But you quickly realize that it has rubber teeth. All bark, no bite. Not dangerous.

Scary, but not dangerous. Big difference.

So I go down the hallway. I’m not exactly sure what happens next, because I’m thrown into a frenzy of shapes and colors and visuals that can only be found in this realm. If you’ve ever seen psychedelic art, picture that.

That’s where I’m going. Lifting off, fast as hell. O! the rush.

There’s a feeling that you get when tripping on psychedelics that is unlike any other form of consciousness. William James called it the noetic effect. Saying that, “[mystical experiences] are experienced as states that allow direct insight into depths of truth that are unplumbed by our mere intellects.”

This is my favorite part of taking mushrooms. You get the feeling that you’re being shown the answers to mysteries of the universe. And these truths that you’re being let in on, as profound as they can be, feel more like reminders of things you already knew. You get more answers than questions, answers with durability and sturdiness. James said that these answers, “as a rule, carry a curious sense of authority.”

I call this the unrelenting truth. Because it’s often things you’re not hyped about knowing. That’s not to say they should be avoided, but let’s admit it, there are some unpleasant truths that come along with the human experience. But the mushroom, and the mystical realm of consciousness it allows you into, cannot lie to you. It only exists on the plane of what simply is. No judgement, no grafting onto truths your own ego and story, nothing. Just what is.

Anyway, after a while of revisiting old flames with a pillow over my face, my dog boops me with his nose. I know that when I take the pillow away from my face, the world is going to be startlingly bright.

I remove the pillow. Wow. The room is glowing white. Book-of-Revelation, Cherubim white. I look at my dog.

He’s a glowing white wolf with deep, black eyes. His face is pure love and innocence. Emanating from this wonderful beast is the desire to love me without condition. I see him without my ego, what he is without regard to myself. A canine being all his own, his own consciousness. He’s pure. Beautiful. And he has to pee.

Okay.

We go out, and it was the longest ten minutes of my life. As I walk around my apartment complex, I’m seeing colors and shapes unlike anything I’ve seen before. Confident that everyone on their balconies or out walking their dogs can see that I’m tripping balls right now. Holy shit, get me back inside.

Back inside, it’s time for the majestic canine creature to eat dinner. So I put a can of factory farm, d-grade beef slop into his bowl. What are we doing to the earth? I think.

Unrelenting truth.

Bon appétit, chien.

I get some water and go take a leak. This is when the real fun starts.

I decided to look in the mirror, which I’m told can be an awful experience on psychedelics. If this were my first trip, I’d have stayed away. But.

Big scary monster, so I approach it.

It’s not bad at first. I see me with fresh eyes, as if meeting someone who looked like me for the first time, me never having known what I looked like. Interesting.

“Nice mustache,” I say.

And then it happens.

I see him, aged.

He’s right there, but he’s me.

What?

Oh no. This can’t be.

It’s my father.

I see my father’s face in my own face. I see his mustache, his shaggy brown hair.

Then I change to his brother, then his other brother.

Unrelenting truth.

I’m getting older, I realize. My youth is fading from me more and more every day.

Oh, no, this hurts.

I’m going to be as old as my father one day.

No, stop, this doesn’t feel good.

But the mushroom can’t lie. Dark and dangerous hallway, go down it.

I lean on the counter and stare deep into my own eyes, determined not to leave this bathroom until I’ve reckoned with whatever’s going on here.

“You’re getting old,” I say. “You look just like your father, and his brothers.”

I look at my dad and uncles for a little while longer, wondering why I’m being shown this.

Then I realize. What I see in my two uncles is essentially what I do not want to become. I’ll spare you details, but suffice it to say that I put onto my dad’s brothers the idea of the quintessential what-I-almost-was kind of guy.

More informed by the town we all grew up in, I decided early on that I wasn’t going to be washed up in my middle age, like so many people I knew. Growing up, I saw person after person with stories of what I almost was.

Uh-uh, I thought, Not me.

Except now I was on mushrooms, in a different realm, and it had something to tell me.

“Look,” it said, “You have it in you to be just like that. You have every bit of what made everyone back home wash up, in you.”

“Look, see it in your face,” it said, “Your home town is in your face. That place is a part of you.”

Yikes, I thought, I gotta cut my hair.

I keep looking, searching for a reconciliation. After a while, I realize that I don’t have to end up that way. It’s still up to me to be what I wanna be instead of going back to Podunk, South Carolina to tell stories about who I used to be.

Unrelenting truth.

I don’t know how long I stand there. Time doesn’t exist in this realm. An hour, maybe? Two?

I feel fine about that train of thought. But I get the feeling that something big is coming. I better go back and lay down, I think.

The unrelenting truth is still with me, as I leave the bathroom. I sit on the edge of the bed and begin to cry. Tears flowing.

Suddenly, I’m flying over the country. Not in a plane, but like, just me. Flying. And not so much flying as much as I’m just moving across the landscape of the United States.

Somewhere above Missouri, everywhere, I hear a noise. A low murmur of a distant crowd. I look down as I’m flying and I see the noise. It’s like a low, shin-high, smoke covering the stage at a pop concert.

Occasionally, around big cities, I see the level of noise is a little higher. The bigger the town, the higher the level of noise.

We’re screaming into nothing, I think. Everyone wants to be heard and therefore is screaming and therefore, I think, no one is going to be heard. We can scream as loud as we want, but we’ll never rise above this level of noise.

I lay back, this feels heavy. I couldn’t stand up if I tried.

Oh no, I think, something big is coming… There’s a dark cloud rolling in.

My heart rate increases, my chest tightens. I sit back in anticipation.

Where’s my pillow?

Here’s where I’ll let you read some of what I posted on Instagram that night. This seems more straight from the horse’s mouth, seeing how I was in the middle of tripping when I wrote it:

Mushroom thoughts:
We’re all desperate people. Like the fish in the net at the end of Finding Nemo.
We’re all panicked. Trying not to die. Trying like hell to resist the inevitability of death.
Screaming into the noise, trying for the life of us to be heard.
“Will someone hear me please?”
“Someone remember me please!”
“I can’t stand the thought of slipping into the void having not left my mark.”

It began washing over me, wave after wave of world-view-altering realization.

Boom, boom, boom.

Unrelenting truth after unrelenting truth.

The cloud rolling in.

Truths about myself, right to the chest.

Boom.

My place in society, right upside the head.

Boom.

The whole of the human race, in the keister.

Boom.

No one is listening.

Boom.

We’re all screaming, but no one is listening.

Boom.

Nothing matters. Everything is futile.

Boom.

I roll over and clutched my pillow tightly, peering into the abyss of unrelenting truth. It’s dark. It’s endless.

“Fuuuuck,” I groan. “Oh my god,” I say, “we’re all doomed to be forgotten.”

Boom.

My stomach is dropping, further and further away from me as I see what the mushroom has to show me.

I am bottomless. Alone. Utterly desolate. Dismal.

I groan again, looking up into the lamp beside my bed, grasping for light. Needing relief.

“Ohhhh,” I say, “It’s so dark. Fuuuuuck.”

Before me, there was everyone I knew and loved, and had ever known and loved, disappearing before me. Vanishing into the darkness.

My brother, gone. Girlfriend, slipped away. Best friend, vanished. My dog, sucked into nothingness.

Myself. Right there in front of me. Zip. Gone forever.

This is where it’s all headed, the mushroom said, Everything and everyone you know and love is destined for the void.

“Uggggh,” I groaned. “No!”

This is the unrelenting truth, said the fungus, this is the other side.

I put the pillow over my face and began to sob again.

Unrelenting truth. The mushroom can’t lie.

This went on for a while, then it eased off. For how long? Well, time is relative, so no one knows. The mushroom began to lower me back down to earth. This is commonly known as the “rebirth” after having a mystical experience.

But I was hungry.

I looked in the fridge. Left-over salad. Nope.

So I grabbed two Maybelle mini cheese wheels and went to back to my room.

Wasn’t that nuts, the mushroom said, all that out there?

I began to laugh. I mean from down in the belly, laughing.

What began to wash over me now was this overwhelming sense of relief. Like when a fever breaks, or a migraine subsides, the relief is a joyous delight. This is part of the “rebirth.”

That’s okay, said the fungus, See, you went there and came back and everything is okay.

Even better, I thought. Everything is even better now.

Of course we’re going to die. And it’s okay.

Of course we’re going to scream and not be heard. And it’s okay.

We will age, youth will abandon us. And that’s okay.

This is important to point out: though the time I spent staring into the void, although it was scary, not once did I ever feel in danger. Though I could clearly see the other side, noetically knowing it was the vast emptiness that makes up most of our universe, there was an underlying feeling of love and acceptance. Yes, the void was vast, dark, and terrifying to my ego, but I somehow knew that I was one with it. I was a part of the void, and there was no maliciousness present.

This is the mystical experience I had that night. It may not be profound, but this night was the first time I’d felt the idea of dying instead of just knowing it. I saw it happen to me, and I had to reconcile with it.

No wonder 80 percent of study participants say it was in their top five most meaningful and spiritually significant experiences.

Knowing that I’m aging, that I’m dying, and accepting it, I’m free.

When I accept that I’m not going to be heard by the whole world about anything, I realize that I wouldn’t want that anyway. And, again, I’m free.

As it turns out, my mind needed something to break it out of its normal way of thinking. I needed something to allow my mind to go outside the box. Fear of dying, of losing my youth, and the desire for everyone to hear what I have to say and think I’m smart, they’re gone. I don’t have those things holding back my mind anymore. I’m free from the thought prisons I’d built for myself. I’m liberated to go and do and be whoever the hell I want.

In my room, I realized I’d had my wireless headphones in all day to act as a sort of earplug. To keep the world out of my psilocybin experience. So it seemed necessary at this point to put on some music.

Oh, I thought, I bet Bach’s cello suites would sound amazing on mushrooms.

I found the playlist and hit shuffle.

Then, this classical music which had given me motivation on inspiration at many points in my adult life suddenly sounded … rigid.

What? I thought, I can’t listen to this.

It’s too square, I thought, It’s too … white.

I immediately stopped the song and started scrolling again. There it was.

Perfect, I thought, Not rigid at all: Jazz.

I hit shuffle and Charles Lloyd’s Requiem — Live started playing. The saxophone began running up and down the scale, trying to find the right way to tell the audience about this mysterious woman Charles had met. She sounded beautiful, powerful. She put Charles into a bit of a frenzy.

Or at least that’s what it felt like listening while on mushrooms.

Suddenly I was off, sailing away on the notes. I was in a jazz club. Then I was driving a taxi down a dark rainy street in Manhattan and the year was 1974.

Then I was in a packed, smoky room with clinking glasses and a low level of chatter. Then I saw her across the room. Stunning. Chocolate skin, bright red lips, shoulder-length curls. I was taken.

Then my dog nudged my arm again. I opened my eyes, but he wasn’t glowing like he was before. I was pretty much back to normal, visually speaking. He just wanted some pets. So I obliged.

I’d like to revisit the quote by Wendell Berry I have at the top of the page:

“Be joyful, though you have considered all the facts.”

This was yet another takeaway I had from this trip. I understood the concept that night, but didn’t read the quote until later that week, when I found it in a book.

On my journey in and out of the darkness, the mushrooms showed me that only one thing matters: that’s the love you have in the world around you. This includes people, animals, books, anything where magic can be found. You love them and you let them love you. You grow and change for these things, with these things, and because you love these things.

This takes practice to pay attention to, but it can be achieved.

In the jazz lounge in my mind, I realize that there are some very unpopular, very uncomfortable truths that come along with the human experience. The mushroom has taken me to see them. Being who I am, I feel the need to stand on the mountain top and tell everyone about what I saw.

Don’t forget, the mushroom says, That knowing this unrelenting truth makes choosing to be joyful more difficult.

Don’t forget, says the fungus, That knowing this unrelenting truth makes choosing to be joyful more necessary than ever.

Don’t forget, the mushroom says, You don’t know what you’re talking about.

Okay, mushroom, thanks.

So that’s my trip on mushrooms. I slept like a baby that night. Later that week, I was able to choose not to spiral into a fit of childish road rage. What Michael Pollan calls a relaxing of the ego’s trigger-happy reactions.

I’m able to come home from work now and not feel the need to smoke a bunch of cigarettes. And when I get home from a hard day, and there’s no whiskey for me to medicate with, I’m only bummed for a second. Then I can forget about it. That’s big for me (another post, another time).

I can choose to be joyful, though the fact in front of me is standstill traffic. I can choose to be joyful, though the fact in front of me is that I’m out of my sweet brown nectar. I can choose to be joyful, though the facts are in front of me that in the grand scheme of things, I don’t matter all that much.

I can choose to be joyful, because now I’m free to be whoever I want and do whatever I please.

Oh, and don’t call them “shrooms.” These are not party drugs, they’re a precious resource we’ve been given by nature. Treat them accordingly.

So I hope you enjoyed reading this.

Flesh of the Gods — A Psychedelic Memoir

Written by Alex Horne