DOSE:

3.5 g

oral

Mushrooms

(dried)

BODY WEIGHT:

165 lb

Life, Death, God, Acceptance:
The story of an intelligent novice explorer who learned about himself, love, religion, and the Universe.

Pre-Prequel: There should have been a label on that bag that read: Warning, may contain the most powerful single experience of a lifetime, the answer to all religion, Everything. Side affects may include a feeling of pride and love for one’s family, a greater sense of belonging and identification with the human race, Everthing.

Prequel: A brief description of my life in ways relevant to my experience described here in these paragraphs.

I am (or was at the time this was written, anyway) an 18 year old male born and raised in Florida. I spent the first 8ish years of my life living in a home with 2 brothers and both parents, living a regular Christian lifestyle. We went to a Christian private school, went to church on Sunday, and prayed at dinner and before bed. When I was 8 we moved to Pembroke Pines (from Ft. Myers). For some reason, with this transition to public school for the first time in my and my brothers lives, my parents decided this was the time to let us experience religious freedom, and to let us figure out God for ourselves. I did not realize then that it would be 10 more years before I completely understood my place in the Universe, religiously. Over time I decided that logically there were so many religions, so many conflicting “stories” that no one could be completely true. That was my mindset, my perspective. At least until February 16, 2009. This is what they call, a “Bad” trip.

It all started on a sunny Monday afternoon, around 12 p.m. My friends and I had the day off of school, and decided to take some shrooms we had purchased a few days back. Luis decided to sit us (first time sitter), and Chris and Manny and I took about an eighth each of some home grown sh*t. Nice, pretty white stems, twisting into large golden brown caps. We had an eighth grade union to attend at 3p.m., but I wasn’t worried. If anything it would be fun to see my friends from 4 years ago on while on shrooms. I had tripped for the first time on some field picked mushrooms a month before, and had no concerns about controlling the trip. I got cocky. We ate up with peanut butter in the car, and headed out to the store to pick up supplies for the picnic reunion. Chris took his share about 30 minutes before Manuel and I, and said on the way to the store that the reunion just wasn’t happening. Luis said, “Chill man, we have to go”. Feeling nothing yet, Manuel and I agreed with him. Luis and I walked through the store picking up chicken, pies, etc. On the way to the last item on our list, a gallon of lemonade, it hit me. Luis suddenly appeared 5 times further away, and the isle stretched a football-field length away from me. I quickly called out, “Hey Luis, slow down.” This was the beginning of a long, very harsh trip.

Luis laughed and walked back over to me, and we proceeded to the check out where I gave the cashier a very loopy look, and walked out. It all came on so quick. We got in the car and started heading toward our friend CJ’s to smoke a bowl and chill out before it was time to go to the park for the reunion. We (the trippers) protested further, but Luis insisted that we had to go, pointing out that we had already bought the food. CJ had a trampoline, and we all came up laying down and watching the sun explode from the clouds, somehow turning the dark, cloudy day into a bright, breathing, and alive surrounding. It was shortly time to leave, and as we walked out the door of CJ’s house I waved goodbye to him, and, unknowingly, my sanity.

I looked down at my skin. My hairs, they were growing… So fast… Too fast? I looked over at my comrades. Facial hair seemed bushier and somewhat alive, and Chris was a slight tint of forest green. I looked out the window; we were driving beside a white car. All of the sudden, it was blue. I was startled and my breath quickened and heart began to race a little. In a short time all cars around me were changing color randomly. I spoke aloud, “Chris is right, we can’t do this picnic.” Luis, slightly frustrated, replied again, “We are almost there”. Goodbye.

I’m not really sure if I had stopped breathing, but based on my observations and my experiences as a kid playing the choking game, or California Dreamin’, I would now assume so. I don’t remember what I saw/heard/thought when I passed out, but it was in no way comforting. “Taylor, Taylor, Taylor!!!” Life support kicked back in at the sound of the yelling from my friends in the car. I looked up. “Take me home, now”. My heart was still racing, and repeatedly failing attempts at breath was not helping the situation. Luis declined, and everyone told me to just chill out. I could not. I was too far gone. “I am dying man, please just take me home.” As soon as the words came out of my mouth, the fate was sealed. I picked up the phone and called the most experienced tripper I know, the man I know I can always trust, an incredibly brilliant man, and the man I was most afraid of facing at the time: my father.

“Dad, I took some shrooms, I’m on my way home, and I am dying.” I’m not sure what he replied but I hung up soon after and looked Luis the face and said, with every ounce of strength I had left, “Take me home, now”. I lived right next to the park, so it shouldn’t have been that much of a problem. He complained, and my fellow trippers looked on with concern. I’m sure it’s not a good idea to yell at someone who is freaking out on a bad shroom trip, but Luis obviously had not done his homework. I didn’t and still do not blame him for any of the events that took place that day.

After an eternity of arguing and blur, the image of my home finally appeared in my view. I ran towards the door, feeling the fabric of my very sanity being torn down at the edges. My dad flung the door open before I could grab the handle, and for a brief moment I thought I could be saved. No such luck. I had predicted death, and so it would come.

I regrettably do not remember the next couple of hours of my trip in its entirety, but I will make an attempt at summarization. I ran around the house, babbling, refusing attempts to be calmed down by my father. I ripped my clothes off and was ordered to put them back on many times, as was later confirmed by my parents. My dad tried telling me to puke, tried making me take a hot both, tried putting me in my bed. Nothing could stop the ride; I was peaking, and there was not an end in sight.

I suppose the realization that I was going to die crept up on me, but hit me head on at the same time. As I lay in bed, my mother and father by my side, I asked them in a frantic semi-babble if I was dying. They repeatedly told me, “No, your not dying”, as was later confirmed by my research into the detailed dialogue/record of events catalogued by my mother of the whole ordeal (for what exact reason, I still don’t know. Maybe she was curious?). I didn’t believe them.

I babbled about a lot of things. Life, sex, past relationships, family deaths, my death, love, beauty, and everything were all primary topics of this hour-long psycho-babble. In this time the walls, my dog, my parents, and everything in general morphed in a carnival like twirl of amazing but terrifying colors, shapes and sizes.

My father walked in, again, for the last time. I looked up. “Dad, you don’t have to lie to me, am I going to die.” Finally, the answer I had gravely anticipated the whole time. “Yes Taylor, your going to die.” I appreciated his honesty, and nodded my head and curled my lips in as a few lone tears spilt from my eyes. There was a laugh, a smirk: In reality he was fed up with telling me that I was just tripping and was going to be fine. But the psilocybin had a lesson to teach me; a different path for me to take. At this decision of the psychedelic, I saw my father’s face turn to a frown and hallucinated tears falling onto his cheeks. My mother cried silently too, laying down her pencil and paper she had been scribbling on frantically for the past few hours.

Maybe the phone rang and they left the room, or maybe I transcended universes. I do know one thing: I was going to die, and I couldn’t wait any longer. I appeared in front of my across-the-street neighbor’s garage, and began my ascent, where I planned to dive spectacularly off backwards and break my neck; a possibility of my impending death I had seen a glimpse of by a random impulsive brain wave of the trip. Halfway up the pillar to my jumping place, I felt a powerful arm, more powerful than I have ever known my father to be, rip me off the wall. I speculate that the feeling of such strength had at the time some significant relation to father son bond between my father, I, all of our forefathers, and the infinite Universe.

My father dragged me back into my room, and told me to stay put. My mother was in the room again (pencil in hand), having heard the commotion. As I lie in my bed, tripping as hard as ever, my mind raced over the many possibilities of finally resting, ending the suffering: For the loss of sanity, the mind, the family, all love, all hope, and everything, is truly suffering.

That is all death had been up to this point. I didn’t believe in “God”, or an afterlife. I was certain my death was soon at hand, and just wanted it all to be over. Over, everything. Over. There was zero chance that I was coming back, I fucked up, and I was done. I curled into a ball, and listened to my heart beat. “Bump bump, bump bump.” I focused on this sound and closed my eyes. In a short time the pace slowed, transformed into that of a electronic cardiogram, and I knew then end was near. My breath slowed. “Beep beep… Beep… Beep…” “Beeeeeeeeeeeee.” Flatline.

The electronic flatline sound engulfed my entire mind and what was left of my body, my entire being. It was infinitely loud, and then, in an instant, that extreme volume simply became the most utter and complete silence. “Hello?” It was my voice. Only my voice. No feeling, no body, not even certainly a mind. A consciousness. Blackness? No, nothingness. A consciousness floating in an infinite nothingness , that was all to remain of TPCole (1991 – 2009).

(My Dialogue)
So this is it.
Nothing else?
Nobody else?
All gone.
I’m gone.
I will never get to go back to that reality.
I killed myself.
My parents.
My brothers.
My everyone.
My loves.
Beauty.
Sunrises.
All gone.

For a truly infinite amount of time (for time does not exist in this void), I contemplated my situation. And after all was said, or thought, one last idea came to me.

Okay.

There is something after death. There may be even more than this limbo, but for now, I knew one single thing: There is something. So religion was not all lies. So a body is separate from a conscious. So, I am still alive. Fully, actually. Alive and intact. I was me, and there was something after death, and I was God. God is that miracle of life inside ever person, that conscious that transcends every Universe. The name “God” means nothing, but I now understood every single religion. The feeling. That was my realization.

Bright, perfectly white light began to exist. It pierced the nothingness with the fiery intensity of a million suns all packed into a small beam, piercing the blackness with shard pearly edges. As the light grew, I felt something. A bodily something. A breeze on my face. The whiteness cleared slowly. Not a breeze, a beating. A…. Fan?

My white closet doors shot into view. I took a few deep test breaths. I was alive. I was in my room. I instinctively looked over at my desk side chair, where my mother had been sitting earlier with her pencil/paper. At first, there was nobody there. As my reality finally decided to finish buffering, my mother instantly appeared on the seat.

“Are you back”, she asked (I suppose it was obvious I had left). “I think so.” “Do you want some soup?” She posed the question timidly with much care and a little fright in her voice. I chuckled, same old concerned mom. “Definitely”.

It is Tuesday, May 19th, 2009. It has been over three months since that trip, and it has taken until now for me to get the time, the will, and believe-it-or not the courage to finally and completely archive this intense psychedelic, spiritual experience.

It is hard to die for the first time. It is hard to reconcile with one’s past, truly reconcile. It is hard to believe whole-heartedly that all of the beauty, love, and incredible experiences of one’s life may be stripped away at any point.

I don’t believe that anymore. I follow no religion, identify with no single denomination. But if you walked up to me on the street, wanting a simple answer to the most complicated question I have ever had to learn the answer to in my life, “Do you believe in God”, I would reply, just as simply, with this most intense experience in mind, “Yes.”

Exp Year: 2009	ExpID: 78859
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 18
Published: Oct 23, 2022	Views: 725
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