My First Intense Trip

So, it all started when my friend (we'll call him John) and I decided to buy an ounce of shroom chocolates for $115. They were 3 grams of Golden Teachers each, and we got 8 of them. We live in Colorado and wanted our first insane psychedelic experience, and planned to eat half of those shrooms together in the mountains. We drove up to Boulder where John's older brother (we'll call him Ben) lived with a few roommates. Ben had built a meditation pod and lived 5 minutes from some hiking trails (The Flatirons), so we thought it'd be a perfect place to go. The meditation pod was about 4 feet tall and 4 feet wide, made out of organic wooden panels. In it was a humidifier shaped like a big green frog, and a light which shined against the wood and cycled through colours. That'll come back into play later.

So, we go up to Boulder and sleep there, then get up at 6 AM to get going early and see the sunrise from the mountains. We went down to 7-11 so John could get some coffee, then ate the first chocolate. We went back to the house to get Ben (who stayed sober), and went on our way up the mountain.

PART 1

It was an absolutely beautiful day, although it was the middle of January, and I was really excited for them to start kicking in. As we were going, John and I were both hit by a wave of something weird, almost like the feeling you get when you smoke weed. But it subsided after a few seconds. From that point on, I started getting really giggly, and the browns and greens in everything around us seemed to be popping out a lot more, as well as the reds in the ground we were walking on.

We were planning to go to the top of a peak we had seen before, where there are stone chairs set out and an amazing view of all of Colorado, but somehow we missed the turn, and ended up going another way. We came up to a point where the trail curved around a corner, and was flat against a steep hill, with the trees leaning outwards. Seeing that made me feel weird, like my gravity was being shifted to fit the direction of the trees, and I started stumbling quite a bit, and couldn't help but laugh at that feeling and how ridiculous I must have looked to my friends. We continued walking as more of the body high was increasing, and came across a person walking with their dog. We said hi and pet it, and I couldn't help but giggle at how goofy the dog looked with it's tongue out, looking at me. The guy walked on and we decided to slide down the path a little bit, because it was a bit steep where we were. So we sat down and slid down on our butts, and that felt crazy, like a dragon had blown a gust of wind into my face.

As we walked on, we came across a clearing, and there were about 10 deer standing there, two of them male with big antlers. At this point both Jack and I were feeling especially goofy, like an outdoor LSD trip with a lot of silliness and plain dorkiness involved, and joked about being impaled by their horns and how good and bad that would feel. Then I said I hope they don't lick me, and instead I want to lick them. Ben laughed at this, and then John started saying we need to be very quiet, so the deer don't charge us. We shouldn't do any bear calls, because we could come off as imbeciles to them. So we tiptoed past the deer, trying to be absolutely quiet, but of course the deer were just looking at us like "the fuck".

At this point we had been hiking for 2 hours, so John and I decided to have our second chocolate. From here on out, I was expecting kaleidoscoping geometric patterns on the trees, reality breaking down in front of me, losing my mind, etc. I mean, it's almost a 4th of shrooms, and the most I had ever taken was 3 grams a few months ago. But that's not at all what happened. Instead, it intensified the body high, and made me far more giggly and goofy. It was like the body feeling of 5 hits of acid, with a very earthy tone to it, in the middle of the most hilarious circus show you have ever seen, while loving everything around you in nature.

So we got to the top of that hill, and there was a clearing that had a stunning view of the plains of Colorado. I felt like I could see the entire Earth from this one point. I remember thinking about what the Earth must look like from the moon if it were this awesome from down here, and added to my bucket list to be on the moon on acid sometime. Fuckin' awesome. Anyways, we sat down in this clearing and looked beyond. I said out loud that Colorado looked like a giant marsh, but instead of water and grass, it was spotted with forest and cities, as they were all waving back and forth harmoniously. Ben closed his eyes to meditate, and before I joined him, I said "I'm going to close my eyes now, and it'll be wonderful", and smiled. I then closed my eyes and was instantly hit by a spectacle of flashing rainbow colours, spiraling around and forming ribbons of eyes around my body. These eyes started spinning in very quick circles, and became mouths. I then thought to myself that this is my contact with Gaia, the force of the Earth, and I said hello to her. The mouths smiled at me, and I said "Thank you for taking me on this wonderful journey." She smiled again and began to show me insane images of snakes soaring through the sky, becoming formless birds covered in eyes, etc. and this went on for a long time. Probably only 5 minutes realistically, but it felt like hours. I finally opened my eyes and told John and Ben that I wanted to go exploring. John was down to come with, but Ben was tired and wanted to meditate and nap in the sun, so John and I left and told him we'd be back in a bit.

We wandered down the other side of the hill, and came upon the path again. But at that area there was a large metal... THING. I looked like a giant green whoopie cushion inflated so far that it became almost square. On it there was a closed hatch, and a lot of graffiti. So intrigued by this thing, we went up to it and started poking it. Every time we hit it, it made a strange sound, like lasers being fired from a cannon. Feeling super goofy and needing to pee, we joked about "peeing shrooms" on it, as in peeing the shape of a mushroom onto it and letting mushrooms grow from that point. Yeah, I don't know. We were tripping.

But we continued exploring past that and crossed over the fallen part of a wood log fence. To the left on another hill we saw a large pink building, and wanted to get a better view of it. There was another clearing where we went, but to the right was a cliff edge, a good 20-30 foot drop. So, we talked for a bit and then decided to climb down the cliff. There were some ways down I saw, and we slowly climbed down about halfway, where we sat down and looked into the mountain valley. It was a three way gully, formed from three different mountains coming to an end in that one area. Below were other paths and we saw people walking around on them. John said he felt very safe up here, hidden from all those people. I joked and said I would love to run up and hug every single one of them. Then, being so damn GOOFY, I smiled with only my upper teeth, giggled, and thought I looked like a beaver. So I said, "Hey John. I'm a beaver! Ninininini!" and pretended I was gnawing on something in the air. He looked at me extremely confused, then said that I am very camouflaged into this hill. I told him that I felt very camouflaged, but also that I was a part of the hill. The rock I was sitting on and I were one, and I loved it. So I hugged the rock. John said, "Bro, why would you merge with a rock? I would rather merge with that tree there." And he went up and hugged the tree. I yelled at him to not judge me and my beautiful rock, and laughed. Then we decided it was time to head back to Ben.

We climbed back up the cliff and hiked back to where Ben was. He was curled up in a ball and sleeping in the sun. On the way to him, though, John and I really started talking about who we are as people, and who everyone is. John spoke of the primal animal side inside all of us, and how everyone is just a wolf in their pack. He wishes to hunt and provide for his pack, and wants me to join him, rather than lay back like the little puppy I always am. Then it just clicked in my head. We are all WOLVES. Everyone. Wolves in their own packs, working together, providing, living, sharing, and fighting. Anger is only a form of self defense, and it's OK to let that go sometimes. I was a little brown puppy with an orange and brown colour assigned to my aura, and John was a striking blue, a very goal oriented person who did what he had to to get his shit done in life. Ben was a red quizzical and analytic wolf, who saw things like a computer where you can search things and question things and find the answers. When we woke Ben up, we told him what we had done, and suddenly I was hit by a wave of serious nausea. All energy left my body, and I had to lay down. So I lied down right as we got Ben up. God damn it. John was explaining his primal prowess to Ben, and Ben questioned everything he said to get him thinking even deeper, like he always does, as I was left thinking about my little puppy self. I realised how everyone has their own colours assigned to them, telling them who they are as a person and what paths they have open to them, depending on how they act. I saw everyone as unique and I was ok with it. But also scared by pleasure, and addictions. I realised how easy it is for me to become so caught up in just doing what I enjoy that I would eventually lead myself to a life of destruction. I saw my older wolf self succumbed to addictive substances, lolling on the ground with my tongue out, and it scared me. I saw how regardless of what colour wolf you are, everyone is susceptible to addiction. So I chose to make a change in my life, and not fall into that. I aged through my entire wolf life and saw everything that could happen to everyone, and when the nausea subsided, I stood back up.

All three of us decided it was time to head back down, and we kept on talking about who we are as people and how other people are as well. I came to an understanding and respect for every life style, even business men and people running the government, and I was OK with it. From that point, I have such a respect for how everyone lives, and I know now that it's not my place to be angry at them simply because I disagree with how they live their lives. It's important to let people do what they want to do. Especially in the case of a mothers' love, where she wants to control the child to keep them safe and live a perfect life, but even she must learn to let her child go eventually.

Finally, we got back to the house, and John pulled out his kyanite rocks to hold against our foreheads and feel its vibrational energies. At this point we were really coming down from our trip, but I had thoroughly enjoyed it. But we looked at the clock and realised, holy shit! It's only 12! We still have half the day left! So John and I decided we should have that other half ounce for the second half of the day. We went to a Mexican Restaurant with 3 of our friends, and ate some delicious soft tacos with sweet pork in them (it was the first we had eaten all day besides the shrooms), and then had both chocolates for dessert. In a bit, it got fucking crazy.

PART 2

We came back to the house after lunch and John and I decided we should spend some time tripping in the meditation pod. We were basically sober at this point, and during this break time, a friend showed us his rock collection, which was damn cool. About 50 different rocks, all really awesome looking and each unique from the others. John giggled, and said "I think I'm returning to the world of the trippy." I didn't really feel anything at this point, but I knew it would kick in soon. So we decided to set up the meditation pod before we go balls to the wall insane. Ben helped set it up with us, and I felt that gentle rise of giggliness and strangeness come over me once again. I lied down and stared at the ceiling, laughing and smiling, and Ben said, "You look so ridiculously high right now." I burst out laughing.

When Ben got the pod set up, John and I crawled inside. I had a portable speaker with me, and John plugged in his iPod and played a 30 minute chill trap mix of songs that we've listened to high together quite a few times before. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sc5-MAeSMU

Looking at the colour changing wood grains got intense here. The wood warped to create giant floating squids with flaming red eyeballs, and they jammed out to the music. Then they shifted into a weird robotic, organic, alien creature with its arm reaching towards me. I reached back towards it and held my hand out with my ring finger curled under. Staring like that, my hand became reptilian and alien like as well, and I was a beast from another world. I was changing colours with the room, and it was almost sexually arousing. Weird, I know. Then the wood grains in the ceiling began falling towards me, and created layers of canyon like structures. I wanted to point that out to John, so I raised my arm to point and say something. But right as I did that, the entire world shifted 45 degrees to the right, and I shot me right back down to the ground. I said "Holy shit!" and was pulled into the floor. The alien canyon squids laughed and danced, and the crazy faces from the walls enveloped my vision with solid colours. I moved my body to the music, and every once in a while looked over to John, who had a big goofy smile on his face, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling.

When the mix ended, I put on an album of my own choice. Insides, by Jon Hopkins. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KctY2dlavTM

Listening to it got ridiculously deep and beautiful. We both closed our eyes to enjoy this journey. At first, it was drifting me off to another world, with the beautiful strings playing, and then it dropped me into the middle of a sand dune desert, with adventure on my side, exploring the colours in my head and flying through the land. As the album goes on, though, it gets REALLY down and dirty with electronic stuff. Listen to it, you'll hear what I mean. During that time, I saw different religious figures flashing through my head.  There's a point where it seems all the nasty shit is going away, back into beautiful chords, but it slams you right the fuck back down into it. At that point, I had seen an image of Krishna emerging as a statue, and then that drop happened, and Krishna gained sun glasses and a DJ set and shook like fucking crazy, everything bursting like hell and reality shattering into a world of awesome chaos.Then the song Insides started playing, and I saw cow heads melting into skulls and cross bones stuck together by sticks, with lots of gross greens and swaying colours floating through the air. It was pretty creepy. Then the world lit up again, and I started jamming out with the dancing mushrooms and cow people to the wonderful beats of the song Wire. 

Colour Eye then brought the mysteries of the world to me, with such a strange and alien tone to it, and it shifted everything to a crazy hue of blue I had never seen before. It was clicking and moving in such strange, untraceable ways. Then the drop came, and shit flew out of my mind. I saw my own head open up and colours spewed from my brain. Crazy. 

When Light Through The Veins came on, I saw everything wonderful in life. All the great shit that everyone has been through, those music festivals, those moments of love and joy that every single person strives to live for. I was overcome by such a massive sense of joy and beauty that it brought me to tears. Everything good in the world was shown to me right then, and one can simply not understand that immense love that I felt at that moment unless they've already experienced it themselves. As the album went on though, and continued through the beautiful and alien world, I realised something spectacular. This album, these songs, they were taking me on a journey through life. I was aging with it, and seeing how things are in the world. You get born into an amazing and innocent world, but before long you have to look at all that nasty shit here too. Those DARK energies, that can so easily bring people to sadness. That's what I went through, those scary moments, but you can enjoy the darkness too. As long as you realise that it is absolutely necessary to thoroughly enjoy the good in life too. Which I also experienced. 

I then saw every moment in life as a silver sphere, and all of these moments are stacked up infinitely on a giant spire. I saw everything, every moment in my entire life, what has happened and what is to come, within this spire, and as the music reached it's peak, I began zooming upwards along with this spire, seeing all in my life. It was stunning and beautiful. I then realised that this must be the end of it. I had seen my life, and now I was an old man fading away from time. I knew I was about to die, and I looked back over my life, recounting all those wonderful times in my life. I cried so fucking hard from it. I had lived a great life, and looking back at it, I understood that that's all that matters. At the end of it all, when you look back at it, what will you think? That's what matters. Have you lived a great life? And I had. It was the end now, and I was ready to go. Everything faded to a slow vibration, and it was quiet and dark. 

But then, there was a piano note from the music. I thought to myself, "There's more?" And then it picked up again, and I realised, "There really is more!" I was shot out of my body and lifted upwards, beyond the spire of moments, and I saw everything. It was blue and waving and wonderful. I noticed how different this reality was from the one I came from, but I enjoyed it and felt completely at one with the universe and everything. I soared through the blue, and loved it so much. As that started to fade though, I noticed something even more spectacular. I saw my spire, and at the very top of it was a single, final silver sphere, signifying my death. But the spire rotated so from my point of view I only saw the sphere, and then that sphere joined billions of others, and I saw everyone's lives there. The horrible ones of heroin addicts who have died sad, and the great ones of people who enjoyed every moment, and the ones who lived spoiled and rich. Everyone was there in their own spheres. And these spheres then fit into slots on this massive, red, ever expanding entity. Everything belonged to this entity, and we are all here together, to see and behold it's beauty in its power to create life for us. 

I was then overcome by such an intense feeling of caring and love. I saw the Earth, and arms from it reached out to embrace me. It was Mother Earth, Gaia, holding me tight, and letting me feel the maximum limits of a mothers love for her child. And behind her was Father, who was there to love through teaching and lessons. Together, they had kept life going, and here I was with them and everyone else, in absolute, pure bliss. I cried uncontrollably, and hugged Mother back. I looked down and saw a giant blue Bhudda with a ponytail towering over me, upholding the Earth, and I understood that this was the place of people, to uphold the beauty that Mother and Father have given us. Then swirling through the beautiful chaos of everyone's lives, I saw a single silver sphere which held an old man with a long white beard and strange ponytail like hair. He was crying and smiling at me. He waved to me, and I waved back and said "Hi God." Then, even that came to an end. Everything was finished, and there was nothing but peace. 

Then, something else happened. Something mysterious that I still don't understand. The music played it's final track, and I thought that this shouldn't be here. It's over, what else could there be? What is this? There's even MORE? But I couldn't come to understand it, because I was falling back to my sphere. There's something else out there, beyond life, beyond death. I don't know what that is. I've never even heard of it, although it was beautiful. Then I sank back into my sphere and the spire collapsed to my current point in life again, and I realised that I wasn't actually dead, although I had gone beyond life. 

The music finally came to a stop, and it was silent, besides mine and John's breathing.

I lay there in silence and thought and bliss, and after about 5 minutes I opened my eyes. I was still here, in the meditation box, with my friend beside me. I got up and looked outside. Just looked. I saw the people walking down the street, doing their day to day business, living life, and I saw the trees, growing eternally here beside me, and I felt so at peace with all of it. Tears running down my cheeks, I understood what life is all about, and that I still have all of my life ahead of me. I will live it the absolute best I can. I will cherish the beautiful moments and I will endure and respect the dark ones. I will work hard for what I want in life, and I will enjoy it when I achieve it. I will respect everyone I come across, and show them as much love and understanding as is humanly possible. I will live life, and live it well. And at the end all be all, I will look back at everything once again, and be content.