You're taking a ferry ride on Starnberger See. You're surrounded by this incredible scenery, but you can't seem to appreciate it. You'll be gone soon; it's just a short trip. Even so, you can't bring yourself to be present. You're trapped in your own head, like a prisoner looking at the world through bars. You're not free; something's missing. Something you can't quite name yet.
Not yet.
Who's holding you captive? You're in one of the most beautiful places in the world, but the breathtaking views of the mountains, the forests, the vast lake leave you cold. The most absurd, irrelevant thoughts surface in your mind, clouding it like mold, making it murky.
What for?
It was before midday. We were sitting on a sofa in my friend's room. In front of us stood a coffee table upon which lay two open boxes of Magic truffles that I brought from Venlo.
"Are you ready to change your life forever?" I asked my friend in a whisper with a somewhat conspiratorial look.
"Hopefully for the better?"
"Wherever it takes you," I answered with the confidence of a novice psychonaut that already had a few trips behind his belt.
"What do you hope to gain from this?"
"Somehow, life has to go on, the question is just how. I want to explore my mind and find an answer within myself. I don't want to rush into things headfirst anymore, not when I lack a clear understanding of the relationship between available and required strengths and abilities. I want to know exactly which tasks I'm up to and which ones I should still set aside."
Then we gorged down on the small pieces of fungi.
"They don't have a terrible taste," he said, reassured.
"Just like chewing on rotten wood, bearable."
We sat and waited. A knot of anxiety tightened in my stomach as I watched my friend. His face grew pale, his lips tightened, and he kept swallowing hard. A wave of guilt washed over me; had I poisoned him? He abruptly stood and stumbled towards the bathroom. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. The cramped room, the lurking presence of his older sister—none of it was conducive to a peaceful trip. We didn't want her to catch us doing something crazy, or worse, dangerous.
My friend hurried to the bathroom. As he returned, he crossed paths with his sister in the hallway. Seeing his red eyes and slack face, she gave him a stern look, but he managed to excuse himself and rejoined me. I felt a pang of guilt, afraid to fall out of his sister's favor. She could easily conclude that I was the one who had poisoned her brother, turning me from a welcome guest into an irresponsible junkie dealing with illicit substances without a thought for the consequences.
I was slowly sensing myself being drawn into another dimension, a swirling kaleidoscope of colors and shapes where sounds morphed into visual patterns appeared before my eyes as my eyelids fell shut. II felt a twinge of regret for not taking my friend on this journey with me.
'Did I just puke the whole stuff out? It's not gonna work, is it?' my friend inquired, his voice laced with disappointment. He looked exhausted.
'Psilocybin is converted into psilocin as it gets digested,' I explained, trying to reassure him. 'But it's not the psilocybin that caused the nausea.'
It's true what they say about psychedelics: they do to your face the same thing they do to the faces of others. They can make it appear as ugly as hell or as beautiful as heaven. As I looked at my face in the bathroom mirror, I wasn't exactly pleased by its sight. A few fresh zits dotted my skin, but I didn't care much.
I was more concerned about what my friend's sister would think of my state. She wasn't familiar with altered states of consciousness or the psychedelic effects of shrooms, and I feared she might misinterpret my unusual behavior. My friend assured me that she'd buy into the idea of me being high after just having smoked one too many joints. No further explanation would be needed.
It took me some time to stop giggling and muster up the courage to leave my friend's room. I tried to maintain a straight face as I made my way to the kitchen, but it was no easy feat. My eyes filled with tears of suppressed laughter before I even reached the kitchen table.
I settled at the table and began loading my plate, only to find the food resembled the badly damaged plastic playthings of a child's kitchen. It had a strange, almost metallic taste that coated my tongue with an unpleasant film. 'Are we supposed to eat this?' I thought, glancing at my friend with raised eyebrows.
Unable to contain my amusement, I finally asked, 'What happened to our food? Why is it so burnt, greasy, and rubbery? This is absurd!' I gestured towards the plate with my fork, a grin spreading across my face.
My friend shrugged nonchalantly, seemingly unfazed. 'Just have some bread then. I actually kind of like it this way.' He took a large bite of his eggs, seemingly oblivious to their rubbery texture.
Resigned and bemused, I took a few slices of bread, buttered them, and added cheese. With each bite, I became hyper-aware of the mechanics of eating. My teeth pierced the crust, delving into the soft interior. Never before had the act of eating felt so purely mechanical, so devoid of pleasure, and so...hilarious! I burst into laughter between bites, the sheer absurdity of my robotic consumption fueling my amusement.
'Are you alright?' my friend asked, a flicker of concern in his eyes.
'I think I've lost a screw,' I muttered, still chuckling. 'This must be what it's like to perceive the world in a way that baffles everyone else, yet makes perfect sense to you. It's not our fault, though... just a different perspective.'
My friend nodded sagely. 'There's always someone who'll label you insane, someone whose perception clashes with yours. But if you're alone, you can live quite happily in your own reality.'"
I wasn't sure I was sober enough to face the outside world, but my friend assured me that my internal state would go unnoticed. Despite my warped perception, I still maintained an outward appearance of normalcy.
He sent me downstairs to wait while he grabbed his coffee. I stood there, statue-like, careful not to draw any attention. I could have waited an eternity, oblivious to the passing seconds, minutes, hours—time had lost all meaning. Unburdened by schedules or appointments, I was simply present, and it was glorious.
After an undefined interval, my friend joined me, and we set off down a path winding through vineyards. Music from his Bluetooth speaker filled the air, like a movie soundtrack accompanying my life.
An epic scene unfolded before my eyes, making me want to laugh and cry at its beauty. Time stretched and became eternity. Minutes turned into hours and days. I'd forgotten where we were going, or where we came from, and it didn't seem to matter anymore. We had no final destination, or if we ever did, we'd already reached it. This was a perfect, complete moment.
People passing had the most outlandish countenances. Acting normal while on shrooms is a fine art, and I felt like an artist since none of the passersby batted an eye, while I definitely felt like an extraterrestrial that had just landed on Earth and was marveling at its unfathomable beauty. I still worried that someone might suspect my altered state.
The scenery that opened before my eyes as we strolled between the vineyards was beyond breathtaking. The vines, heavy with grapes, formed intricate patterns against the rolling hills. The sunlight filtered through the leaves, casting dappled shadows on the ground. The air was alive with the buzz of insects and the distant chirping of birds. Never in my life had I felt so much pleasure from a sight. Not even when I saw mountain ranges from the window of an airplane. I knew they were beautiful, but what was I supposed to feel? Awe? Fascination? Oneness of being? Timelessness? I felt a tinge of these sensations before, but I couldn't deny their incompleteness, and I couldn't help feeling bitterness due to my inability to fully enjoy such magnificent sights. I felt deficient in some way.
Now, though, the scene before me was something straight out of a fantasy novel. I wanted to dissolve in this beauty; any feeling of incompleteness was gone. There wasn't any barrier between me and the world, and I was overwhelmed by feelings of awe.
A bridge stretched across the valley, its sleek metallic form shimmering in the sunlight. My mouth went dry, and I gasped. This piece of infrastructure seemed so unreal that I initially thought I was hallucinating it into existence. It was like something straight out of a science fiction film, with its graceful curves and impossible angles, almost as if it were defying gravity itself. The otherworldly ambiance was palpable. It was in the vibrant hues of the sky, the ethereal quality of the light, and the sheer scale of the structure that dwarfed everything around it. I know that no superlatives of mine, however vivid and powerful, will do justice to the astounding spectacle that opened before my eyes and took my breath away.
After a walk that could have lasted hours, days, or weeks, we were finally approaching Esslingen. Suddenly, my friend veered off the sidewalk and headed towards an opening in the ground. It was choked with thick, thorny brambles that scratched at my skin as I followed him. The air was thick with the scent of damp earth and decaying leaves. Peering down, we noticed a tunnel that continued under the sidewalk, disappearing into the darkness. It definitely wasn't built for humans to walk into.
'Wait!' I started to say, my heart pounding. This seemed like a terrible idea. But before I could voice my objections, my friend was already scrambling down the wall, his footsteps echoing in the confined space. He landed with a thud on the uneven ground below.
I hesitated, fear battling with curiosity. There was no way he could climb back up alone. With a sigh of resignation, I approached the railing, got over it and jumped down, landing with a jolt that sent a shockwave through my body. The tunnel was dark, damp and cold, the air heavy with the smell of mildew. It was obvious that this place was frequented by all sorts of people, and I felt a surge of relief that we didn't encounter anyone. A discarded sleeping bag lay crumpled in a corner, the ground was strewn with used syringes and the walls were covered in graffiti, some of it disturbingly cryptic. We couldn't go back, so we marched forward, jumped over a rectangular basin filled with murky water of an unfathomable depth, climbed over a railing, and found ourselves on a narrow road on a riverbank. Not a single soul was in sight. I wondered if we were trespassing on private property.
We saw the hydroelectric station and walked another hundred meters. The sign at the gate stated quite unequivocally that trespassing was prohibited, although there was a convenient pedestrian passage that would lead us directly into the city. We took the risk and hastened to leave the premises.
In our conversations, I wasn't afraid to be vulnerable or say something I might later regret. We talked about everything and nothing—our family histories, the awkwardness of our childhoods, the challenges of moving to a foreign country and trying to fit in, the nagging feeling of inadequacy that seemed to haunt us both.
'I always feel like I'm on the outside looking in,' I confessed, 'like I'm not quite good enough, smart enough, or interesting enough.'
My friend nodded, his eyes filled with understanding. 'I know exactly what you mean,' he said. 'It's like there's this invisible barrier that separates me from everyone else.'
We shared a moment of silent empathy, the unspoken understanding passing between us like a current. As we walked, the words seemed to flow effortlessly from my lips, unfiltered and unrestrained. It was as if I were thinking out loud, the usual barriers between thought and speech dissolving into the psychedelic haze. For someone who usually evaluated every thought multiple times, turning it upside down, checking for proper grammar, and polishing it before uttering a word, this was a revelation. It felt liberating, a release from the constant self-censorship that usually governed my speech.
Our bond grew stronger with every step we took down the meandering path that wound through the picturesque hills, the valley unfolding beneath us like a painted canvas.
Aftermath
It was one of the best days of my life, one of those days that I can say with full confidence: I truly lived. Whatever labels people put on magic mushrooms—sacraments, drugs, or something else entirely—the essence of the experience transcends categorization. Whatever goals people pursue—thrill, novelty, escapism, healing, spirituality—I don't need to be in pursuit of any goal to take magic mushrooms.
They open your being to the experience of life, and that's what I wanted all along. I thought I needed to be rich, attractive, successful, powerful, smart... but in truth, I just wanted to experience life. And by not being those things to the extent of my arbitrary standards, I felt undeserving, incomplete, inadequate.
But I wasn't. All those things, while being nice, are not necessary to experience life in the moment, to be present. That day, walking through those vineyards, talking with my friend, feeling the sun on my skin and the wind in my hair, I realized that life wasn't about achieving some distant goal; it was about embracing the beauty and wonder of the present moment. And that realization, more than any fleeting pleasure or accomplishment, was the true magic of the experience.
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