In 1957, when Wall Street banker R. Gordon Wasson wrote in Life Magazine about his and photographer Allan Richardson’s experience as “the first white men in recorded history to eat the divine mushroom,” he likely didn’t anticipate the counterculture they would create and the debate they would spark within it. After being introduced to sacred […]
After five years of paranoia so debilitating that he’d linger by the window, waiting for someone to bust into his home, Gabriel Martin finally had hope for a cure. But if he wanted a chance at it, he only had 24 hours to come up with $800. Just four days prior, Martin had applied to […]
Thanks to the sex positivity movement, play parties, or sex parties, are no longer confined to Eyes Wide Shut elite or the swinger scene. They’re trendy, they’re less taboo, and if you haven’t been to one already, you’re probably at least curious. At the same time, the psychedelic movement, too, has become more mainstream, with […]
Gregory Wells has been out of the closet since he was 16, but the process of coming out, he says, is never really over. Last year, he was reminded of that at Horizons, the largest and longest-running conference in the psychedelic world. After one of the presentations, in a room of more than 1000 people, […]
Kevin Matthews let out a laugh when asked if psilocybin—the primary psychoactive component in magic mushrooms—had ever helped him. “It saved my life,” he says. The former cadet had high hopes for his time at West Point, one of the world’s finest military academies, but service-related depression forced him to be honorably discharged. It wasn’t […]
When Dr. Erica Zelfand began her family medical practice, she didn’t have to write many prescriptions for antidepressant and anxiolytic drugs before she realized she needed to find something else. The long list of serious side effects from these drugs, coupled with the length of time it takes for some antidepressants to kick in, means […]
On the Northern California coast, just south of downtown Carmel, poet Robinson Jeffers built a stone house in 1918 resembling a Tudor barn. It sheltered him for four decades while he wrote epic narrative verse exploring how humans might find their proper place within the natural world. Jeffers’ haven is now surrounded by houses worth […]
The Oregon Psilocybin Society launched a signature drive today (September 20) for its 2020 ballot initiative to legalize psilocybin for therapeutic use. The launch of this new round of signature collection came with a boost from Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps, which pledged to donate $150,000 to the campaign. The OPS has to gather 112,200 signatures […]
A Canadian company will announce on Monday (September 16) the development of a synthetic drug based on the chemical structure of ibogaine, a psychedelic with a long history of ceremonial use. Mind Medicine Inc. (“Mindmed”) is betting that 18-MC (18-methoxycoronaridine) will be a powerful tool to fight addiction and opioid use disorder. The potent dissociative […]
Dana Larsen is anything but discreet about his business—and that’s exactly the point. “I’m definitely not the first person to sell mushrooms online,” he says. “But I might be the first to put my name, face, and reputation on the line for it.” Larsen’s worked in the cannabis industry for 30 years, but from the […]
