A blog about the magical powers of magic mushrooms to heal yourself from physical, mental and emotional trauma (photo by the very talented Phyllis Ma).

“I took some mushrooms yesterday”, I said. “For dinner?”… my friend asked. Haha. No. Not for dinner. I’m not talking about the mushrooms you’d sauté with garlic and salt and add to your risotto. I’m talking about what many people would call magic mushrooms, or psilocybin - their official name. These are the mushrooms that taste really terrible (I wouldn’t recommend adding them in that risotto, for more than 1 reason). But they do super cool stuff with your brain and subconscious mind! Some call ‘m drugs, because you can take these mushrooms for ‘fun’ or to escape your troubles for an evening or so. But more and more people - including myself! - start to learn about the deeper power of these mushrooms and how they can support in healing physical, mental and emotional trauma and reconnecting with your true essence. These mushrooms aren’t drugs: they’re psychedelics!

Amplifying brain connections

So let’s talk psychedelics! Psychedelics are a type of hallucinogens or psychoactive substance that can produce changes in your perception, mood and cognitive processes. They trigger non-ordinary states of consciousness, affect all your senses and can change your thinking, sense of time, bodily sensations and emotions. Wow, that’s a mouthful, I know! To keep it simple: we call this ‘tripping’ (I bet you’ve heard that term before, ha!). When you trip, the psychedelics can make you hallucinate, which so many people believe is a really scary thing but is actually nothing more than seeing or feeling things that we cannot see or experience in our ‘normal’ 3-D world. But these things are always there, they just exist on ‘another dimension’ so we cannot see them all the time. This other dimension is not something that we make up, it’s real. We are just unable to experience it with the senses that we have available to us in our normal human state. So these psychedelics allow you to access a different part of our world and our consciousness. In simple language, what the mushrooms do is they amplify a few wires in your brain and allow you to experience the 3-D world as we know it in a different way, maybe on a 6-,7-or even 8-D level! Sounds pretty cool, right?

You were never in control anyways

However, many people find the thought of psychedelics more scary than ‘normal’ drugs, because they are afraid of losing control. I have quite a few friends who would take XTC without a single thought, but are really scared to try psychedelics.

Funny, right?! Because normal drugs can have pretty detrimental effects on your health, whereas mushrooms are plants, so all natural! And they’ve been used for thousands of years by ancient tribes as plant medicine (just like Ayahuasca for example, another psychedelic). Mushrooms are quite gentle and they only bring you to places your soul wanted to go anyways.

But I get it! Because in all honesty, you ARE losing control - a little bit. Yup, you read that right. And no, I’m not saying this to scare you off. I’m saying this because it’s the whole point of psychedelics! Letting go of control is exactly the beauty of these plants and what they can teach you. For me, this has been the key lesson from doing these trips. It’s an illusion that we are ever in control in life. We never were and never will be. The mushrooms teach me how to let go and allow things to unfold without me trying to control and change them. It’s about acceptance and trusting that a higher energy (I think this is my soul) will do the right thing for me. Somehow I have always intuitively trusted these mushrooms, so even if it gets uncomfortable at times, I can still trust that this is supposed to happen and all will be ok.

So your challenge is to not resist whatever happens in your trip. The mushrooms take between 4-6 hours to stop working, so resistance might get uncomfortable. Resistance can turn a beautiful trip into a bad trip. Once you are able to allow whatever comes up in your trip, you really get to the most fascinating and beautiful places with yourself. It’s such a special experience. I will do my best in this post to describe it, but it’s actually impossible to put it into words.

A cuppa tea

There is a bunch of other psychedelics, but in this blog I’ll only talk about my experience with magic mushrooms. If I take mushrooms for fun, I would take a small dose, which means anything between 0.5 and 1 gram. But when I take them to do a healing trip with myself, I take a triple dose which is something between 2-3 grams. Some people take even more. The intensity of your trip also depends on the quality and type of mushrooms, your mood, what you’ve eaten and what time in the day you do it.

I usually make a cuppa ‘tea’ with them. I chop them very finely and then add them to hot water and let them soak for a little. You could eat them raw if you want, but I really find the taste terrible and struggle to get them down when I do it like that. Haha! So tea it is. The other way is when they come ‘hidden’ in chocolate. It’s the tastiest way! So if you find a supplier that delivers like that, great. But I somehow enjoy taking the mushrooms in a way that I recognize them as mushrooms. They look magical, you know. It helps me to get in the mood and to appreciate nature’s gift.

Something I found out only recently, is that doing your trip in the morning on a completely empty stomach takes you to places even Aladdin has never been on his magic carpet! Wowie. It may feel a little weird to do something like this when you just wake up, because ‘drugs’ are more associated with evening rituals. But trust me, you will go so much deeper and you will have time by the end of the day to go for a walk, reflect and properly come out before you go to bed again.

Doing your trip in the morning on a completely empty stomach takes you to places even Aladdin has never been on his magic carpet!

I received many questions on where I do it. Many people love doing it while they are in nature. Which is so true, but when I trip I go really deep and things can get personal, raw and loud. And I just don’t feel comfortable enough outside to fully let go. I’d be constantly somewhat on the lookout if there’s people coming or someone would hear or see me. My home feels like the safest place and is the only place where I can fully let go. So if you plan your first trip, feel into this for yourself and what might be best for you.

If you’re a psychedelic virgin…

If you’ve never tripped on the high dose with mushrooms before, it’s a great idea to have someone close to you whom you trust. Someone who has done it before so this person knows what’s coming and can comfort you in case you get scared or uncomfortable. This person can help you to ease the resistance in case it comes up. That’s what I did, and even though I didn’t feel scared in the first place, it was a very safe feeling to know that there was someone close by. Then a next time you know what to expect so you won’t feel scared to do it on your own. Animals are also really comforting. They intuitively understand that you’re going through something and will be there to soothe your experience, so don’t hesitate to keep your cat or dog close. I once had my friend’s dog around when I tripped, and she was the absolute cutest: licking my face when I got really sad and poking her head against me every now and then to just let me know I was still here on planet earth. It helped me so much!

Your experience will also depend on your state of mind, which is why it’s important to be conscious of how you’re feeling and why you’re taking them in that particular moment. If you’re already feeling super anxious for example, then maybe today is not the day and it’s better to decide to postpone your trip.

Ritual and ceremony

The outcome of your trip may as much depend on the mushrooms itself as on the ceremonial aspect around it. Whenever I do a trip, I don’t ‘just’ take the mushrooms and see where it goes. I prepare. I create a quiet and serene space. Usually this is my bedroom. I make sure my room is tidy and aired out. I take lots of pillows and blankets to make my bed as comfortable as possible. I have crystals placed next to my bed to support my journey. I light as many candles as I can find and I cleanse my space with sage or palo santo. I make it a really cozy, clean and calming space. It’s so important and I also just love going through that ritual of preparation.

Then, when I start boiling the water for my mushroom tea, I take out my journal and I take a few moments to sit in silence with my eyes closed and feel into the intention for my journey. Setting an intention will help guiding your subconscious towards the areas where you need healing. Just like with any other spiritual experience such as a retreat, a breathwork circle or cacao ceremony, it just helps if you set an intention. Once you’re tripping, you can let go of this intention, no need to keep thinking about it. Your subconscious will know and you can just drift off onto your journey. So then I take my tea, and I keep journaling a bit and within 10-20 minutes you will notice that you start to feel a little weird…Yeah, that’s the right word: weird. Those first minutes you can’t really explain what’s going on but something feels a little off. Haha! Well, nothing to worry about. It just means your trip is starting! And it’s your sign to lay down, close your eyes (I always use an eye pillow), curl up under a blanket and allow the mushrooms to do their magic.

Golden rainbows and unicorns

When you decide to have mushrooms for fun with friends on a night out or on a nature hike, it’s really just to amplify your experience of life. It’s great! You see the world with more colour, more light, more love, sharper and everything is just a little prettier. You relax more and you can really be in the moment. All your worries fade away and they just don’t matter so much.

But when you decide to take them with a deeper intention, your experience will be different. Let me tell you what usually happens to me…

I’ve lived 10 lifetimes in a few hours

My body is usually pretty calm. I don’t toss or turn a lot. But I do feel a little nauseous during a trip. A little pressure on my chest, cramp in my jaw and shoulders. But it’s nothing too bad and I know for me that it’s part of it. You may experience other physical symptoms! Don’t worry though, once you’re out these symptoms will go away. The only thing I often have as a ‘leftover’ from the trip is a little headache on the day and sometimes the day after as well. Drinking lots of water afterwards helps!

Your mind is a different story. You literally go on a trip around the universe. I’ve seen rainbows, colourful galaxies, beautiful forests full of birds and butterflies and I’ve seen dark clouds, scary figures and big spaces where I would get lost. Some things make sense, some things don’t. I hallucinate, but I also see things that are very real. There are people (or just souls/energies) that I have met before, and there are people I don’t know. I’ve seen generational trauma from my family and previous lives. I’ve seen myself in the future. It’s all ok and normal. There is so much that happens in just a few hours, I can’t even describe. I literally feel like I’ve lived 10 lifetimes in less than a day.

My body is gone and I forgot my name

I feel disidentified from my existence in this world. What I mean with that is that I lose the feeling of who I am. In terms of the ‘Myrthe’ as I and you know me. In terms of the woman that I am. My body. I don’t feel my body anymore. As if it doesn’t exist and it’s just me and my mind (or is it my soul?). I touch myself then, kind of to check if it’s all still there, haha! Which is always the case ;-) During my last trip, I had a new experience that I had never felt before. I wasn’t sure anymore whether I was a man or a woman. I forgot my name. I was just a soul wondering around. At first that scared me, but then I realised how beautiful that actually is! I believe we are all just souls that got stuck in a physical body we didn’t pick (or maybe we did?!). The mushrooms take all the physical away and allow you to return to your essence, your source. Without the identity of gender, name, job title or body shape. Some people would call this ego death. Your ego and identity ‘die’ for some time, and allow you to access your soul beyond the ego.

Xena is my alter ego

There’s a common thread in my trips. Tribal figures. There are always dark, tanned women or men with lots of colour and feathers and beads around their necks and wrists (like Indians or Xena type women if you ever watched that show, haha!). They’re strong and fit and look like real fighters. At first they seem scary, but then it feels like they are actually there to protect me and guide me through life. I’m not sure, but they might be spirit guides.

I cry for myself

I try not to analyse what happens while I trip (even though that’s really hard for a thinker like me!). I just go with the flow of where the mushrooms take me. And it literally is a flow. It’s hard to describe in words what it looks like in my head, but it’s kind of as if I’m riding or gliding over pathways in a big galaxy. From one situation or story into the next, everything melting together. My brain going on top speed. It’s something so out of this world, yet so close and connected. It’s beautiful. I cry a lot. And I mean, A LOT! Like all-the-fucking-time almost, haha. There is a lot of sadness within me that finally comes to the surface during a trip. Sadness because I know I am not yet fully accepting of who I am. So I cry for myself because I know who I am deep down, but I can’t seem to access it in a conscious state. I cry for how stuck I am in social conditioning and beliefs that block me from becoming the best version of me. I cry for my fear to not fit in and not be accepted. I cry for the generations before me that have passed on so much trauma that I still feel. I cry for the earth and humanity and all the destruction that’s happening.

Peeing in the right pot

To keep things a little lighter, I also have a lot of fun with myself during trips! I laugh a lot. I giggle in between my tears. Because it’s really funny to realise how high you are. Spacing, woohoo! And I have my moments where I’m kind of ‘conscious’ while tripping and I realise how fucking cool this is and how brave that I try and face this. Those are the moments that I feel really proud of myself and who I’ve become. Even though I have so much to heal within myself, my insecurities and a low self confidence, I do know that I am on the right path and that my success is inevitable. These trips give me trust and confidence, on the subconscious level.

During my last trip, I really had to go to the bathroom. Not the best idea! When I opened my eyes, my vision was super blurred because of the 8-D reflection of all the shapes in my room! Good luck finding the way to the bathroom then and peeing in the right pot (lol!). Don’t worry though, I managed and no post-trip bathroom clean was needed. Just a little reminder to not try and do anything important while you trip, just chill and lay down.

Coming home

The one feeling that’s always there in every trip is one of coming home. In my first trip ever, I felt like I arrived in a place where I had been a million times before but I just didn’t remember when or how. It felt so normal, yet completely abnormal. It’s a feeling of peace. Of alignment. Of knowing that all is fine. That I’m ok and that I’m enough just as I am. That everything in my life is exactly how it should be. In the end, that’s our biggest life struggle. The feeling of not being worthy and always chasing bigger and better things. The mushrooms make you appreciate everything that’s already here again.

Trusting the plants

The one thing I find hardest about these trips, is that while you’re in it you really believe you’re going to change your world and do a bunch of things differently. You will never worry again about X and you will let go of Y. But once you’re out and the mushrooms have worn off, your conscious mind goes right back to your ‘normal ‘ daily shit. I find that very frustrating. The other funny thing is, I forget most of what happened during my trip. I forget most of the insights and visions and ideas. It’s like a dream and then waking up and knowing you’ve travelled the world in that dream but you can’t remember the details.

It’s like a dream and you have forgotten the details once you wake up

This is where you need to trust the process. Mushrooms work on the subconscious level of your mind, which means that once you’re back to ‘conscious’ it’s quite hard to access what happened on the subconscious. It’s ok! Because underneath the surface it will do its work, even after your trip. You can have insights days or even weeks after a trip. Often you won’t even recognize these as a post-trip-insight, but it is. I trust the plants that they do what they have to do. Without you consciously noticing, your life and your beliefs are changing. And that’s the beauty of it.

What I do once I come out of my trip

I usually trip for about 4/5 hours. But I always need another hour to fully come back to normal ;-) That last hour is actually really funny. You think you’re good to go and then when you get up and try to walk or talk to someone, you’re like ‘uhm, nooooo’, haha! Take it easy.

Once I come out of my trip, I take my time to slowly sit back up and get out of bed. I walk around, look out of the window (trees, birds, clouds, colors, shapes, it will all look beauuuutiful!). Usually I am hungry as FU%#, because I haven’t eaten since the night before so I have something to eat and I drink lots of water. Eating helps to fully wear of the effects of the mushrooms. This is actually good to remember in case you do end up having a bad trip. Eat, eat, eat! It will at least speed up the process of coming out.

I like to go on a walk once I feel clear enough to go out of the house. Make sure you’re really ready, because partaking in traffic (even as a pedestrian) and maybe running into someone you know can get really awkward or dangerous if you’re still half tripping (ok, it might also just be really funny haha). Walk slowly, look around you and enjoy! You will notice that the world is just a little brighter.

That same evening, I would take out my journal again and write about my experience. Whatever I can remember and feel, I will write down. It helps to process. But like I said before, a lot of your insights will come later. And that’s ok.

Raw and real

The photos below are me right after two different trips. I wasn’t sure whether to put these out here on the internet, because they are very real and raw. It’s me in a very vulnerable moment. But maybe it helps you. My face looks different. Swollen from crying, yet also lighter. More open and shiny. As if something lifted off my shoulders. What do you see?

We are the pioneers

I remember telling my parents that I had taken mushrooms for the first time. I try to include them in things that are really big for me. But I can’t say they were very enthusiastic. Haha! And I understand. That generation didn’t grow up learning about these things and considers it all drugs. Plus, the concept of ‘healing’ and that there is stuff to heal for all of us is a new concept for them in the first place. The cool thing is, our generation in the West is figuring this all out. We’re at the start of a new era and we get to be the pioneers. We’re breaking through old generational trauma by finding new ways to connect with these traumas and heal them from the inside out, instead of ignoring and suppressing them.

Even your darkest corners are a part of you. Don’t be afraid of the dark.

And like I said before, I know quite some people who take hard drugs without a single thought but are somehow ‘against’ psychedelics. To those people and everyone else who is afraid of it, I’d say: look at yourself in the mirror. There’s a big chance that you are judging mushrooms because you know deep down that these will take you to a level deeper within yourself that may feel very scary. But it’s all part of YOU. Even your darkest corners. It requires bravery to go and explore these dark corners. It’s not easy. You come across unknown and weird things. You are confronted with your own shadow. But the beauty and the awareness on the other side are so so so worth it. Don’t be afraid of the dark! Light can’t exist without the dark.

But I understand that this is not for everyone and that’s totally fine! It’s ok if this is not for you (yet). Whatever you choose to do with this information, I know you will choose what’s right for you in this moment.

To me, they’re one of the most beautiful tools we have available to us to access our subconscious, heal trauma, reconnect and learn to love all parts of ourselves. And they play a huge part in my healing and inner work journey. I hope they may do the same for you one day! I am only sharing this to make it a topic more openly discussed so everyone can make up their own mind if it’s something they want to try.

I’m happy to help you with preparing yourself. So I’d love to offer you a FREE gift. Download my FREE Trip Check List by clicking here! Pssst, there’s an epic playlist included that will keep you trippin’ for hours!

It’s a freakin’ exciting journey that never stops

But it doesn’t end with one trip. Just one trip won’t solve all your problems and heal all your shit. It’s about the little changes that will happen with every step you take on your journey to becoming more whole, more yourself, more connected. It’s a regular practice of using mushrooms, but also meditating, journaling, breathwork, movement, nature, yoga, eating healthy and all the other tools available to us. It’s a process. And what excites me the most is that every practice I do, every book I read, every session I have…I grow. I learn something. I heal something. I let something go. The Myrthe I am today, is not the Myrthe that I will be in 1 or 5 or 10 years. Because I will always keep growing. I will keep working on myself. And that constant evolution is so freakin’ exciting. The process of growth is one that I can get high on in itself. I hope you feel that too!

If reading this triggered a little spark in you…

If you want to learn more tools to reconnect with your body and your deeper self…

If you are ready to start prioritizing yourself, your health and your life again…

…then my upcoming Group Program Root To Rise might be just for you.

I’m launching my Root To Rise Group Program very soon!

This program is the journey back ‘home’ towards yourself. I support you and a like minded group of people to ‘clear out the fog’ in your body and brain through all kinds of healthy practices, so you can connect with your true essence and create the life you’ve always wanted. Send me a message here for more info and to book your complimentary connection call!

Lots of love and healing,

Myrthe

P.s. Want to talk about this in a 1:1 setting? I offer 30-minute laser coaching sessions for EUR75

Word of caution: this article is in no way expert advice for how to use magic mushrooms. I am only sharing my own experience and so I cannot be held responsible for any unwanted effects you may experience. Preparing yourself well is your own responsibility. But I’m happy to help you with that.