Greg: What’s going on everyone. It is Matt and Greg here. Project Unbroken. And we’ve come out for a lot of videos for addiction related stuff. Health related stuff. Taking people through our heroin addiction. Other types of drug addiction. Alcohol abuse. All the way to where we are now. Which is more successful part of life. So make sure you subscribe to below. We’ve got plenty of videos coming.
Greg: Today we’re going to be talking about magic mushrooms. Or, you can call ‘me shrooms. Pretty interesting drug, because, well, I’m scared to death of magic mushrooms these day. But, I did my share of them. But, I think it’s an interesting topic because, a lot of people use magic mushrooms like a spiritual thing. You know what I mean.
Matt: Yeah.
Greg: So, what’s your, what do you think of magic mushrooms?
Matt: It’s weird man. When we first started messing around with them. I remember you and I specifically were super excited to do those. I think we were just in it, I’d say, in the early stages of experimenting with drugs. We were smoking weed fairly regularly. Towards the tail end of high school. And, Greg ended up doing mushrooms before I did. And, when we did them back then, it was strictly for like a, we were trying to party. Or just get fucked up in a different way than we were used to. And mushrooms really did the job there.
Matt: Now, later on in life, as I learned more about mushrooms. And you just see stuff in the news, even, about how mushrooms can help with depression or PTSD, or essentially they say, can reset a lot of things in the minds. I don’t know the science behind that at all. But, there some very reputable studies going on. I know Johns Hopkins did an end of life study with mushrooms that, it helps take away the anxiety for terminally ill patients. Has a lot to do with spirituality. Covers again, but I think it really depends on all drugs, kind of, what your approach is with it.
Matt: Again, if you’re taking mushrooms in an effort to party, you’ll get tore up. But, it also, dude, I remember, we would be taking mushrooms to party. I remember one time specifically, it was you, me and another guy, we were out, of course, driving around on mushrooms, which is not a good idea. And, we stopped at convenient store to pick something up, and we were pretty toasted at this point. And, the guy came back from the store, and he was like, “Dude, I was in there and I started crying.” We were like, and I was like, “Man, I almost started crying too, and I don’t even know why.” They’ll mess with your head.
Greg: Yeah.
Matt: You got to be careful.
Greg: Yeah. So, the first time I did them, part of the videos is, what do they feel like, and also just our views on them. So, as far as what they feel like, I remember the first time, it was down the beach. I think like, senior year, probably down the, they call it Senior Week. Where you go down to the beach and kind of party. And, I was at a friends house, and 10 fairly close friends, and we took what are called chocolates. So, it was basically like a piece of chocolate and the mushrooms were in the middle. You never know how strong they’re going to be, because, you don’t know how much is in them.
Greg: Rolls of chocolate. And they’re fairly strong. And, it took, I don’t know, half hour, hour to kick. I remember, I used to smoke cigarettes back then, and I was sitting on the deck, and I was kind of leaning back, smoking, smoking a cigarette. And I went and flicked it once, and I saw my fucking ash like jump away like a rabbit. The ashes kept jumping away. So literally, it’s like an hour. I was sitting there smoking cigarettes and just making sure I kept ash, I would watch my ash jump away. I could visually see it jumping away. It’s crazy.
Greg: So, visually, you can really, things will pop out at you. You like … One time, we were sitting on a couch, I don’t know if took acid or, magic mushrooms that time, but I was sitting on the couch, and there was a Jimi Hendrix poster. And his hair, I started seeing snakes coming out of it.
Matt: Yeah.
Greg: So, visually, you can see stuff visually. Stuff moves. Things are crazy. But also, your mind frame is totally different. It can totally turn around your mind, which can be a good or bad thing. It can lead you down things that are very interesting, and you, it kind of opens up your mind and things, and you just think down a rabbit hole. Or, if it goes a bad way, it can get bad.
Matt: It can spiral out of control.
Greg: Yeah. I’ve had bad rips where you just totally freak out. You know that you’re stuck in the trip for a while, so, if you start having a bad one, it can be a really bad experience.
Matt: Yeah. You do have to be very careful. So, while Greg is a 100% right. Like, the visual stuff can be a lot of fun. You just see shit, and you’re like, “Oh my god. This looks crazy.” But, that’s what I thought it was all about before I took them.
Greg: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Matt: You quickly learn that the mental aspect of mushrooms is by and large the most powerful thing about that drug. It can really go in either direction. So, you’ll hear a lot of people talk about, set and setting. We used to take them just like, whatever.
Greg: Drive around.
Matt: Yeah. It’s not a good idea, because everything, your mind starts to really warp what is really there. And you can become confused pretty quickly. And you don’t understand, is this real life? Am I tripping? Where am I at? And once that confusion sets in, if you’re not familiar with that feeling, and you start to think, “Oh my god. I just ate these things. I’m going to be tripping for another six hours.” Shit can fucking spiral out of control real quickly.
Greg: Yeah.
Matt: And it can really be an unpleasant experience. I would suggest, if you are thinking about taking magic mushrooms, there’s a couple of things you need to put in check really quickly. If you have any history with depression or anxiety, right off the bat, I would say, it’s not a good idea. If you are in addiction with different drug, if you’re an alcoholic, if you’re a heroin addict, do not mess with mushrooms right now. I think, if you are interested in taking that path … There’s studies out there. There are even, there’s clinics and shamans that will kind of, or like, guides that will explain the most beneficial way for you to go through an experience with something with magic mushrooms.
Matt: I wouldn’t just eat them and expect everything to work out okay. You’re really puttin’ your minds in a completely different place that it’s ever been before. And it can be dangerous if you’re not kind of, prepared with somebody who’s 100% sober, to make sure that you don’t put yourself in a dangerous situation.
Greg: Yeah. For me, I know, if someone’s snuck mushrooms into my food right now or something, I would flip. I would freak out. I’m at a place right now, where I don’t want to take mushroom. I don’t want to take any drugs. Even like, I barely take Tylenol and stuff like that, just Because, I came out of addiction, so I don’t like relying on anything. Sometimes I get a headache, I’ll take some Tylenol.
Greg: And I remember one night, I took some NyQuil, and I started getting dizzy. And I started getting anxiety, just Because I didn’t feel like myself. So, I know damn well, if I took mushrooms, I’d be freaking out. You know what I mean?
Matt: Yeah.
Greg: So, you got to be really, really careful, because, if you have a bad trip, you’re going to trip for at least a few hours, and it’s going to be bad. They can go really bad.
Matt: There are a couple of things that can help. I remember that last time that I tripped, which was probably about, I don’t know, five years ago I guess. This was 100% in an effort for me to, I knew what I was getting myself into. I was trying to give myself, basically, an experience to grow through this, what we, some people refer to mushrooms as a plant medicine. So, I had a, setting was all very dialed in. I was in the safety of my own home. I was in my room, I was very aware of my surrounds, my circumstance. I didn’t have my daughter at the time. I was in no relationship. Nothing I had to really be concerned about, being worried about for kind of getting outside my head for this.
Matt: So, I wrote down my intentions for what I was hoping to get out of the experience. And I actually made a tea out of it. And I drank the tea. And, when we ate them before, sometimes it would like, 30 minutes, 40 minutes. And, you would start to feel the stuff coming on. So, I drank this tea, and, I’m not joking, three minutes later, it was like wrrrr.
Greg: Yeah. Boy.
Matt: It started hitting, started hitting me really quick, and in my head, I was like, “Fuck.” I wasn’t ready yet. I was going to. And so-
Greg: You were probably, “If it’s hit me this hard already. What’s coming in half an hour?”
Matt: Exactly. Already I’m feeling it. So, right away, my first thought was, “What the fuck did you just get yourself into.” Because, this was a long time since I had messed with anything like mushrooms. And, just, I completely underestimated, and forgot how powerful they were. And, it was a really quick reminder. I hit me like this, and I was like, “You fucked up.”
Matt: As soon as I thought that, my head started to spiral out of control. So, in an effort to kind of steer this ship and get my thoughts back in place, in my head, I was like, I said, I was talking to myself. And I was like, “You set the right intentions. Just take a deep breath. Everything will be okay.”
Matt: And then, I couldn’t stop talk, I couldn’t stop that thought loop in my head. So then, it was to the brink where I was completely ready to freak the fuck out. And it was funny, because I heard something on a Buddhist podcast, in passing, years before. And it was about, when you have anxiety, there were saying just to say this mantra in your head. When you breath out, when you breath in. So, the mantra, just randomly enough was, “I am love and awareness.” Means nothing to me. I don’t really understand what the hell it means. But, that was the only thing I had to do. Because I was basically having an anxiety attack driven by mushrooms.
Greg: Not fun.
Matt: I was freaking out. And, I drank this tea, I’m already freaking out five minutes later. Usually a trip lasts like, four to six hours.
Greg: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Matt: Depending on what you eat. So, I was like, I got to fucking try something. So, I started to say this chant in my head. Every breath out, I am love and awareness. Every breath in, I am love and awareness. And I’m not joking, like, in. Probably two minutes, my heart rate slowed down, I was back to normal.
Matt: If I didn’t have that resource, or if I didn’t hear that podcast. I would have been freaking out for six fucking hours. I’m not saying that’s going to fix, if have a bad trip that, that’s going to fix it. But, I was really lucky to get out of it. Because if not, it would have been an absolute nightmare.
Greg: Yeah. I think one of the last times I tripped, I was with you. And I remember, I took them, and me and another friend we were with, we took them, and we felt it first. And you remember what happened with the sky?
Matt: Yeah. You guys were walking around like this.
Greg: I’m like, I’m walking, I’m like, “Oh my god!” And the sky-
Matt: I’m still sober. I thought they were fucking with me.
Greg: The sky was like bright, bright red. And it was like, this far from my face. So I’m like, “Holy shit. What is going on?” So, we’re trying to throw up the mushrooms, and get them out. And so, I had a bad trip for the first hour or so. Then I finally calmed down and came through.
Greg: At this point again, I’m at a time where I’m very comfortable with myself. I don’t really need that. For me personally, it’s not good. And I know that. And, my recommendation is, be very careful if you’re going to try them. And like Matt said, make sure you’re in a comfortable setting. Make sure you’re with people you’re comfortable with. Because I’ve done them with people that I don’t know that well, and it get crazy as well.
Greg: You start looking at those people, like, “Are they plotting on me?” And like, just a weird little action. If you catch someone like, looking at you and they kind of look away. Like, “What’s this motherfucker?” It can get like that really quickly.
Matt: Yeah.
Greg: It’s crazy.
Matt: You can’t trust your own mind. It sounds scary, but you start having weird thoughts. I remember one time in particular. We were all tripping at my place in Newark. I don’t know if you remember this. But, there, Greg was living in the dorms at the time, and we had a couple of our friends from back at home. And then, we invited some of Greg’s acquaintances from the dorms. And so, we all ate these mushrooms, and then, pretty quickly on, like, real clear divides started to show themselves. We were like, “We don’t know you.” They didn’t know us. Every, there was a just a real feeling of distrust in the air. Nobody did anything to make anything happen. It’s just, I would say, eating mushrooms, it’s like take any restraints off your brain, and it just kind of flies where ever the fuck it wants to.
Greg: Yeah.
Matt: And you don’t have much control over it.
Greg: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Matt: Like I said, you might be able to have some tools in your kit, to kind of steer the ship, at least, so you don’t have full-blown anxiety attack. But, the more I talk about it, the less fun it sounds.
Greg: Yeah. Look. If you’re going to be doing, just be really, really careful. I think a lotta people, if you’re going to do it, if you’ve never smoked weed, you might want to smoke weed first.
Matt: Yeah. It might be a good stepping stone.
Greg: Weed is like a very small version of that. How you feel on weed, just multiply by a lot and it’s just …
Matt: Yeah. I mean, again, unless you are on a very specific mission to have some sort of experience, or again, maybe you’re struggling with something like PTSD, or depression, or severe anxiety, and if you’re doing it for those reasons, you need to seek professional help. It’s not something that you can just do on your own, and pray for the best.
Matt: But, studies have shown that there’s really great benefits to using mushrooms in a beneficial way, but again, it’s not going to necessarily be a fun experience.
Greg: And it’s not for everyone.
Matt: It’s not for everyone at all. If it’s something that peaks your interest though, I would highly suggest that you seek out some professional help to help guide you in the right direction. Because I think, a lotta times, from what I’ve read, those things are like week long, two week long retreats where they slowly introduce you to this, and make sure that you’re in a safe place mentally to even go through with the whole process.
Matt: Getting the stuff on your own can be very unpredictable. Because again, there’s all different strains of mushrooms. Some are stronger than others. So may have more positive benefits. Some may have more negative benefits. Just need to be very careful. It’s not something to take lightly.
Greg: I was scrolling through the YouTube feeds this morning. And I saw a video, there’s a lot of these addictions come up Because of our channel. Just shows you related videos. And the topic was, “Guy gets stuck in acid trip.”
Matt: Oh.
Greg: I was like, “Oh my god! I couldn’t even fucking imagine that.”
Matt: No.
Greg: So just stuff like that. I’m like, “No. Not for me. I’m done with that shit”
Matt: Yeah. You don’t need it. Yeah. It’s … We don’t need it.
Greg: No.
Matt: Right now. It may be necessary for somebody out there, but right now, I don’t think I would enjoy it.
Greg: No. So. Hopefully that helps explain what mushrooms are like. And what we think about them. If you have any questions, let us know. Make sure you subscribe below. See y’all soon.
