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A Shock To My Heart
Mushrooms - P. cubensis
Citation:   Essence. "A Shock To My Heart: An Experience with Mushrooms - P. cubensis (exp82402)". Erowid.org. Nov 29, 2022. erowid.org/exp/82402

 
DOSE:
2.5 - 3.0 g oral Mushrooms - P. cubensis (tea)
BODY WEIGHT: 63 kg
My girlfriend and I had this session planned for several weeks now and I was looking forward to try my new stash of dried Philippine Psilocybe cubensis. After we had prepared for the session by semi-fasting during the day (I myself had had only light foods that day), I started with weighing out the amount needed for our session. We both agreed that after several sessions doing always just one “portion” per person, we were ready to try and take some more. Eight grams equals more than 3 “common” portions. I set out to fill up the thermo-flask with hot (80 oC) water and a teabag of one of my favourite herbal teas.

While doing this I got into a little argument with my girlfriend. For a minute there I was unsure about proceeding with the whole thing. It was already getting pretty late (22.30 hrs) and I didn’t want to enter the mushroom state with this atmosphere and mindset. We didn’t have a big fight, but tension between us was definitely still there. The funny thing is that later, while the experience unfolded, this was becoming more and more clear.

After letting the mushrooms and teabag infuse for about 30 minutes I poured the tea into two glasses. We toasted and there we went. The on-set was remarkably fast with these mushrooms: 15 minutes or so. Especially my girlfriend could already feel the first symptoms after about 10 minutes! She disclosed to me what was going on and that she was beginning to feel very relaxed. I actually noticed that I was reacting kind of annoyed to the fact that she was already feeling al these things and I was still feeling uptight and irritated (which also had to do with me having very little food that day…).

One thing lead to another and we again got into this discussion about how I thought she used language in a disrespectful way. The whole thing in retrospect really didn’t make sense and I can only conclude that it was an ego-fueled thing. I can remember that a certain thought came through my mind as the mushrooms were coming on: ,,So this is what they call an ego-trip.” Of course this wasn’t active thinking and I was amazed at how this information entered my thought realm.

The discussion went on for about 15 to 20 minutes I guess. The more I got intoxicated by the mushrooms the more I could feel this passive observer in me observing my behaviour. I suddenly noticed myself acting really foolish and unreasonable towards my girlfriend. I was really arguing over nothing just to legitimize my irritation and spearhead my negative tensions. The more I got aware of this whole stupid ego-fueled behaviour, the more I could seem to let go and stop my annoying behaviour.
The more I got aware of this whole stupid ego-fueled behaviour, the more I could seem to let go and stop my annoying behaviour.
My girlfriend all handled this really well and she knew that all this was coming out because I was coming into such a relaxed state induced by, of course, the mushrooms.

By this time I had drunk two cups of the tea. I remember closing my eyes to check if the Closed Eye Visuals had already started to emanate. I actually saw a picture at that moment that resembled a painting that used to be in my mother’s house. It was made out of greenish “energy-particles” as I would call them. I can compare it to what Neo sees in the movie The Matrix when he can see through The Matrix: all that greenish looking information/energy forming the image.

(T 1:00) All of a sudden a piece of squashed fruit against the outside of my bedroom window was a very interesting object. In my perception it kind of moved and hovered over my window and it really did remind me of the moth figure you see in the movie “The Mothman Prophecies”. About 60 to 90 minutes had passed now and the mushrooms were really beginning to get a hold of me. I remember lying on my bed with my girlfriend sitting just next to me. When she moved just a few centimetres I could really feel the energy and warmth she emanated, changing. I was so sensitive to this that I immediately urged her to come back and lay down next to me. By this time I could suddenly feel all these spheres or presences as I call them moving “through” me. I still can’t really pinpoint how I would best describe this phenomenon, but you could think of them as really strong noticeable emotion-like energies, but with a life form touch to them. So, in the middle of this one conversation I could suddenly feel one of my roommates, who was away on a holiday, “go through me”. At the same time I had real problems with feeling where my body actually ended and where it began. Physical barriers were evidently beginning to dissolve. I notified my girlfriend of what was happening to me and I mentioned it felt as if I was “channelling” this roommate of mine. For the record, I have always had a hard time believing the phenomenon of channelling people. Actually I still rationally can’t get my head around it, but I just know now for sure that this phenomenon is possible.

The way this roommate was coming “through me” was me speaking in exactly the same way as she always does. She also has this pretty unique feature where when she is very excited and tells something it sometimes looks as if she is running out of air because in her excitement she forgets to breathe. I have exactly felt how this was for her, it’s not that I imagined HOW this was or that I empathised with her, I could FEEL it as she probably feels it herself. In other words, my own personality was falling apart and apparently other personalities began to come through me! It no longer was self-evident that I was my normal myself. I could just not conceptualize it anymore. I told my girlfriend that this was all really weird and I emphasized that I was beginning to worry about ever turning normal again. This was triggered by the fact that I no longer could conceptualize things like “tomorrow” or “later”. It was like trying to let a 3 year old realize that in 20 years he will be a grown-up.

By now I could feel the energy of the trip intensify and I had a clear rush of thoughts that was speeding up by the moment. It all got so intense that I had thought at two points or so, that it was going to be too much on me. I didn’t panic though and I can’t remember feeling really unpleasant or anything like that.

(T +2:30) My girlfriend pointed out that she had to go to the bathroom. Because I was so caught up with all the weird stuff that was happening inside me I apparently didn’t pay attention to the fact I also had to go, bad. We stumbled downstairs, laughing and walking like we were a bit drunk. My girlfriend went to the bathroom, but I just couldn’t hold it up any longer, so I went outside in my garden and I “watered the plants” there. My girlfriend joined me after we were both finished and we looked in awe to the beautiful full moon that was shining through thick clouds that were rushing by. I also immediately felt that some of the plants in the garden were actually communicating with me. Not in a language way, but in a telepathic, emotional way. My girlfriend said to me that she was going inside again since it was pretty chilly outside around this time. I told her that I was so excited that you have so much choice in your life: every moment is a moment of choice. I could really feel this in a very strong way, which I have never felt before. My girlfriend left me alone in my garden and I decided that I was going to lie down under a tree.

I remember looking up to the night sky and seeing some branches of the tree in front of it. I could hear the music that was playing in my upstairs bedroom, since my window was opened a bit. All of a sudden I wasn’t so comfortable anymore with being alone there on the ground and I started to call out to my girlfriend. I called her name out about 4 or 5 times, no response. I started to feel a sudden swell of panic and fear and out of nowhere something that felt like a lightning bolt of energy hits me right in the heart section and then pulsed through immediately to my left-brain hemisphere. I can still remember a very distinct taste that I immediately had, but even more the sound that the whole “lightning bolt” produced in my ears. It was as if for a few instants my hearing was gone, my ears were just ringing. For a moment there I was really disorientated, but even more, scared as hell. I immediately stood up and wanted to get away from the garden, it felt eerie there. I stumbled as fast as I could back inside and ran up the stairs to my girlfriend. I told her that I thought I just had a heart attack. She told me to relax and sit down and tell her what had happened. She made sure I calmed down a bit, but I just couldn’t ignore the stings I felt inside the left part of my chest. It was like there was a constant flow of energy flowing out of my heart. Still dazed by what had just happened I suddenly told my girlfriend I felt immensely “connected” to everything. I told her I could “feel” the neighbours on the other side of the wall! Everything all of a sudden “made sense”. That is the best description for the overwhelming feeling I was experiencing. I felt like I had just died and was granted to be reborn again, although this time with a totally different mind state. I was experiencing immense amounts of what I would call love. It felt like the mushrooms had hit a steady plateau and I felt more aware than ever before.

(T 4:00) I thought this was such an important event, that I had to notify one of my best friends who’s house is about a 25 minute walk from my place. I was still very unaware of the time factor, and I didn’t realize that by now it was 2 ‘o clock in the morning. Of course when I rang my friend he didn’t pick up the phone. My girlfriend was initially very against the plan to head out. But there was just no one who could have stopped me at this point. I was rather manic and I just HAD to go over to my friend and tell him what happened.

Up until today I consider the whole “lightning bolt” event one of the most important and amazing things ever to occur in my life.
Up until today I consider the whole “lightning bolt” event one of the most important and amazing things ever to occur in my life.


So we strapped ourselves into warm clothes and we went outside. I still felt euphoric; I felt a connection with everything, even with the dead leaves that were scattered all over the streets. The first part of the journey went just fine. My girlfriend doesn’t like to be out on the streets at night, but I did a good job at keeping her feeling secure. It was after we traversed the railroads and left my neighbourhood that things got weird. It was night, not many people on the streets and all of a sudden I could feel this eerie feeling that was trying to get a hold of me. We suddenly noticed we were walking past a cemetery and my girlfriend started to freak out, saying we had to get away from the place. My girlfriend is used to feeling and noticing non-material entities even when she is straight sober. But of course everything was much more intense at this moment. So was her ability to feel all these energies. The weird thing was that I could also feel energy coming from the cemetery; I could feel that something was there on an energy level. I got really anxious and we immediately traversed the road getting as far from the cemetery as possible. Then we encountered some traffic lights that had this click sound in them for the visually impaired. There were about 4 or 5 traffic lights all making a clicking sound at different intervals. It made the atmosphere in the street even more eerie. I decided that if I wanted to survive this insane journey, I had to start ignoring my fears that were pulling at me more intensely than they had ever done before. I took my girlfriend by the arm and kept marching in a steady pace towards my friend’s house.

We finally arrived there after 30 minutes. It was the scariest journey I had ever made! After ringing the bell for over 5 minutes one of the roommates of my friend finally woke up and opened the door. You can imagine how he looked when I briefly told him why I was there…

[Reported Dose: ''8 grams of dried “Philippine” Psilocybin Cubensis extracted in 1 litre of (tea) water of which I myself drank about 2/3rds'']

Exp Year: 2008ExpID: 82402
Gender: Male 
Age at time of experience: 24
Published: Nov 29, 2022Views: 698
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Mushrooms - P. cubensis (66) : Relationships (44), General (1), Small Group (2-9) (17)

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