Light hearted news, fun and trippy. The less serious side of psilocybin.
Numinus Wellness (NUMI) is launching a series of ceremonial concerts called Music As Medicine to explore the role that music plays in psychedelic therapy.
The events will feature meditative and ambient musicians such as Jon Hopkins, East Forest and Superposition, as well as multimedia art and immersive guided meditations.
The first event will be in LA on May 21 – learn more here.
The Golden Teacher is a “grey-area research facility” and mushroom dispensary in Ottawa that wants to make bad trips obsolete.
Owner Jordan Armstrong aims to understand how magic mushrooms affect individuals differently by surveying each customer. The goal is gather data to regulate the fungi properly.
Ottawa’s second mushroom dispensary, Shroomyz, will be opening on May 1st!
Medicinal Genomics Corp. launched Psilocydia, a public database containing genetic information of 80+ strains of psilocybin mushrooms. Psilocydia will help cultivators discover genetic traits, select genes of interest, and distinguish beneficial mushrooms from poisonous ones.
Steve struggled with depression for 30 years. Traditional antidepressants numbed both his highs and lows, leaving him feeling like a “functional zombie”.
Things finally changed when he volunteered for a psilocybin trial at Imperial College London.
“With the first dose, I felt joy like I’ve never experienced – and more like myself than I’ve ever felt… It took from not knowing myself at all to having a sense of what my place was in the greater scheme of things,” he said.
The second dose was much more challenging, but “therapeutically more useful,” as it forced him to deal with suppressed emotions.
“The drug gives us part of a healing process. It exposes you to different possibilities – another way of being,” Steve explains.
Retreat Guru has the world’s largest selection of wellness retreats, many of which include guided psychedelic journeys and healing ceremonies.
Whether you want to take magic mushrooms in a serene forest in the Netherlands or join an ayahuasca ceremony on the beach in Costa Rica, you’re bound to find your ideal experience.
Explore retreats across the globe here.
“I am a completely different person then versus now. My PTSD will always live inside of me, but it’s no longer taking over my life,” says Sarah, one of the participants in MAPS’ MDMA trial.
Sarah endured a traumatic sexual assault that gave her painful flashbacks.
Over three MDMA therapy sessions, she was able to go back to the experience and fill in the gaps in her memory to fully process what had happened in a safe environment. In the final session, she confronted her attacker and was able to find forgiveness for them.
“I felt like I was given freedom from the trauma,” she explains.
MAPS developed the first validated method of synthesizing MDMA on an industrial scale while meeting Good Manufacturing Practices. And better yet, they are placing the process in the public domain to promote scientific advances and patient access.
The 4-step process produces up to 5 kg of MDMA (or roughly 30,000 doses) with 99.9% purity.
With MDMA expected to be FDA-approved next year, this advancement comes at the perfect time to meet the growing demand for the drug 👏
Today is MAPS’ 36th birthday 🥳 See all that they’ve accomplished here.
We’d love to hear what PETA thinks of this idea…
Alistair McTaggart, a University of Queensland researcher, discovered what he believes is a new species of psychedelic mushroom in one of Australia’s biggest national parks.
When interviewed on the finding, he brought attention to an “under-explored” use of psilocybin: animal welfare.
“Psilocybin has use in [treating] anxiety in humans, we don’t understand the effects of psilocybin on animals very well, but I think of slaughterhouses and what this could mean for the meat [processing] industry,” McTaggart explains.
Who knows, maybe we’ll start seeing beef advertised as “shroom-fed” 🤷♀️
A new Johns Hopkins study found that mystical psychedelic experiences are linked to changes in peoples’ beliefs about consciousness.
After a single psychedelic experience, people were much more likely to attribute consciousness to animals, insects, fungi, plants, and even inanimate objects. However, psychedelics had no effect on beliefs about free will or superstition.
What do you think — do mushrooms have consciousness?
One in four young adults contemplated suicide last year.
Clearly, something needs to change. Could ketamine be the solution?
A study last month found that ketamine was well-tolerated in adolescents aged 13-17 and significantly reduced their depression symptoms.
76% of participants had at least a 50% reduction in depression scores within 3 days of receiving a ketamine infusion, compared to 35% of the placebo group.
The teens had tried between 1 and 7 antidepressants without success prior to the treatment. They all remained on their medications during the trial (SSRIs, non-SSRI antidepressants, mood stabilizers, or lithium) with no serious adverse side effects.
