The Medicine and Madness of Hallucinogenics

I have been on the planet long enough experimenting with a large variety of spiritual practices including some psychedelics and I have witnessed many other “shaman” friends on the psychedelic path. And, for me, the jury is in. There is both profound healing medicine (not to be dismissed) and madness on this path that often leads to a cliff many people are unaware of until it’s too late, and the damage had already been done. 

There is no doubt psychedelic substances such as mushrooms, ayahuasca, san pedro, DMT, and peyote can be powerful medicine for the mind, because the self limiting human mind tends to constrain and trap the soul, many people need some way to break the mind loose to experience the freedom of their soul.  Hallucinogens are one way to achieve this. I have even recommended hallucinogens as a temporary intervention to some of my most “hard headed” clients. Here, I will share examples of using plant medicine in my life.  

Many years ago I was dating a young woman who I was very in love with. We had been together 6 months, long enough for me to feel very bonded to her when she dropped me like a rock after having an affair with another man. I felt so betrayed, numb, confused,  and disconnected.  An inner voice told me that I needed to take mushrooms to feel my feelings. I went to a friend’s party, and by crazy coincidence someone offered to sell me magic mushrooms! After taking them, I first enjoyed the wild and crazy distortions of reality in the positive party atmosphere, but I knew in a deeper place in myself I was afraid to be with myself alone, and this was exactly what I needed to do. Somehow I was able to get home. I collapsed on the floor in my bedroom. I had this hallucination I was in a junk yard and I am an immovable piece of junk. I am stuck here, and there is nothing I can do about it. Then I could see dark entities sliding down the walls coming down to steal my soul. At that moment I called out to God, angels, masters, the Light!   Instantly, I can do nothing but whale out my grief. I grieved many hours into the night. When I awoke in the morning, I felt like a newborn baby, so fragile, and completely in my open hearted innocence. In this case, the mushrooms helped me open to my emotions which desperately needed to be felt. I will also note here that I deliberately called for the Light which was my real source of healing. 

On another occasion years later,  I took mushrooms while in a forest. This time I made a deliberate decision to connect with my I AM, holding in my mind, the real medicine and power being my I AM (my higher self), and the shrooms were just a catalyst. This was my best, most heart and mind expanding experience ever. I stayed super present to every leaf, rock, and the amazing flowing water of a stream I was walking through. I produced an I AM chant which I still sing today.

I have come to believe substances are only meant to be catalysts for healing and spiritual awakening but not the source.

The source of our awakening is our I AM Presence, our enlightened God Self. We don’t need a drug to experience our liberation. A substance may have been helpful if our mind was caught in too much agenda. We might have needed a catalyst to open our heart more. But it seems to me too many people see the substance as cause instead of their divine source. The final medicine is your truest essence itself. As I feel the peace, love, and joy of my divine connection to all that is to take any substance that alters my mind becomes a downer. I want others to experience this. We can become more open than any substance can take us. 

For spiritual awakening, especially in the beginning stages, we all need some kind of catalyst. That catalyst can be a hallucinogen, meeting a spiritual master, or practicing meditation or breath-work (my favorites).  The gift of hallucinogens eventually becomes their downfall. The gift is that they open us up beyond our limited construct.   We tend to get caught in our own myopic world. They blow us open to the psychic and spiritual worlds. But then it is too easy to get attached to their form as cause. They only helped us crack the shell of our human mind to open to the true medicine, the freedom of our Godself.  As we become over fascinated by the path, we can forget our way home. 

The psychic and spiritual worlds are very different, and easily confused. The psychic world is the emotional world of phenomena.  It can be the wow! of seeing florescent water while tripping on a substance, and it I can be horrific–depending if one is having a good trip or bad trip. 

The spiritual realms is pure love and light, and is the source of all healing and empowerment. Paradoxically It is not tangible to the mind, yet the most real thing in our universe. As we open ourselves to expand beyond ordinary thinking, we must pass through the psychic realm to get to the spiritual realm. Said in another way, we must open to our feelings to have a spiritual experience. First there may be pain in our emotional body, but healing cannot be initiated without allowing ourselves to feel what is there. However, our healing is not complete without connection to the universal love of our divine Source which has the effect of washing us clean, and returning us to the realization of our innocence and oneness with all. 

As people use substances repeatedly I notice they get tend to get more caught in the psychic realm. Each time we use a psychotropic substance, a hole opens in our aura as we step outside of our ordinary reality. But if that hole remains open, or gets wider, we can allow in dark energies. Our surrounding aura of light protects us. That is one of its vital purposes. Having a strong and healthy aura is key to living in sovereignty.  

Another time awhile back a friend offered me San Pedro which is a little like ayahuasca. At the time I was overworking, and I felt it would help snap my mind out of the rat race mentality. I did get profound insights and emotional healing, but afterwards I caught covid (which I really believe is mainly toxic EMF’s from the house modems and cellphone, and towers. After I turned off the modem and cellphone, I healed within 5 days.) Regardless of the cause, the fact is my immune system was down enough to become quite ill immediately after taking San Pedro.  

Even though the plant medicines are said to be grounding helping people connect to the earth and their feelings, the long term affects of repeated usage by people I witness appeared to be the opposite. Too often, I have seen people who follow the plant substance path become ungrounded, moody,  wishy-washy, unsure of self, and even paranoid of dark energies, and schizophrenic because their aura became more permanently fragmented. This is especially true with addictive usage of marijuana which has been hybridized far from its original naturally medicinal form.  The hallucinogens are not considered addictive like pot, I imagine because it’s hard to have any kind of functional life while hallucinating.  Still, there are those people who have claimed it as their spiritual path, and use very frequently. Instead of clear and sparkly, I notice their energy becomes kind of dull, oversensitive, and reactive. They usually seem blind to their predicament.  They cling onto their herbal God as the answer and become more isolated to the rest of society because their aura became too weak to be fully participating in the world. To feel safe and a sense of belonging they also may cling to their plant medicine tribal culture and their shamans as gurus.  I imagine many shamans feed on this attention, for this is what psychic energy does; it feeds on worldly phenomena. “How amazing was your experience?” We crave another “spiritual experience.”  

Pure spiritual connection can not even be labeled as an experience. It is a realization of self that needs no experiences to be validated. It is I AM that I AM. I am one with all that is. This deep knowing is beyond words, a deep peace beyond understanding, pure loving awareness, pristine consciousness, pure existence. Once you are here, you need nothing else. There is no where else to go with your mind. 

The last time I took a hallucinogenic substance, I just wanted it to be over. I just wanted to get back to my pure energy. I didn’t need a medicine because I wasn’t sick! 

Truly loving your grounded life is the greatest high of all. 

Psychedelics may open the door to this magic, but eventually you will discover the magic is none other than your Authentic Self all the time. Once you realize the magic presence is your true nature you can see and enjoy this divine magic in the outer world and in others without losing yourself.  

No doubt psychotropic substances have helped a great many people snap out of their mundane lives and open them up to more expanded realms.   And, as I become more and more open through regular practices of prayer, mediation visualization, breath-work, and emotional and mental clearing via spiritual psychology skills on a regular basis, I don’t need the “sledge hammer” approach anymore. I have found a more balanced way of being connected to my inner freedom.   And, I encourage you to consider the same.

Joa Janakoayas, MA.
joa@iam-u.net