I had never considered myself to be a spiritual person in fact I had grown up with no idea about any Gods or spiritual beliefs in any form. I unsure if my parents were atheist or agnostic or just if the whole idea of religions or supernatural phenomena was just not a part of our lives. I guess I could say I come from an indifferent kinda background but have always enjoyed questioning everything.
My supernatural experience starts when I was extremely depressed while working as a intelligence linguist in the Australian Air Force. My job entailed sitting at a desk for 12 hours listening for barely readable communications filled with static under an extreme amount of pressure. There was a very real possibility of going to jail if I stuffed anything up. I liken it to listen to the radio, just off tune so it's 95% static, for 12 hours a day. This led me to many suicidal thoughts and I believe my first saving grace was that I discovered marijuana helped me to enjoy life more. I had never really experienced marijuana throughout my teenage years, having just a puff once or twice in my live, but having met another intelligence linguist in the Air Force who seemed to a different aura around him made me question what it was that made him so calm in the face of very difficult circumstances. He explained this was initially due to his experiences with psychedelics which then led to his discovery of Buddhism and the practices of meditation, mindfulness and yoga.
Shortly after meeting this friend I visited his house and listened to soulful music while indulging in some Cannabis buds. The very next day I was randomly drug tested and quickly discharged from the military. I could not believe what had happened. I had almost never done any kind of drug in my entire life and the 1 time I embrace it and feel the loving effects it can have I get tested! To this day I feel like it was meant to happen. Unfortunately at the time I broke down. I sat in my car contemplating how fast I would need to crash into a tree to end my life. I phoned my wife but could barely even talk to her. 4 years in a high paying, high status job and I'd thrown in away. This made me sink so low into depression, even though I already felt as low as I could go while in the job.
I spoke to my friend about what had happened and he told me just to let life happen. I did not know anything about Buddhism, meditation or mindfulness at the time and had no idea how this could possibly help being in such a dark place. How could I just "let life happen"? I started looking for new jobs but more importantly something help claw myself out of the darkness I was in. Without knowing anything about it, Buddhism just seemed like another organised religion to me, so I was more inclined to try and find what psychedelics could do to help my psych and to help find happiness within myself. I honestly just thought a psychedelic experience would be like getting drunk but seeing lots of swirly colours, boy was I wrong!
I did some research about purchasing psilocybin mushrooms on the Silk Road (also how I became to know about Bitcoin way back in the day) and after reading many stories about the mushroom experience making you feel like you are going through a death experience, I made the choice to learn to grow them for myself instead of buying them off a stranger. If I was going to experience death, I was going to do it on my terms. I patiently waited weeks for them to grow and while waiting I learnt more about what I was getting myself into, trying my best to understand the philosophy of 'set and setting'. I will tell you now, nothing can prepare you for what you're about to experience.
Once they were grown and I ate approximately 2 dried grams of the mushrooms (Peruvian psilocybe cubensis) ready to embrace the experience. At about 45mins after ingestion I remember walking down the side of my house when reality wobbled and I felt like I had step through an invisible wall through time. I stopped in my tracks.... "oh shit... what have I done". I went inside the house and spoke to my wife who I felt could keep me calm through whatever I was about to go through. She radiated with beauty that I had never noticed, not in a physical sense but an aura of 'love energy' surrounded her. I smiled like I never have before, basking in the beauty of another human being. I could see the sunlight pouring through the slats in the blinds as if God himself was shining a torch through my window. It was not at all what I expected it would be. This is not a hallucinogen either. I was very lucid throughout and fully aware of everything, just very much more real and every atom in my body felt connected to the entirety of life. I thought there would be swirling colours but there was none of that at all. The only visuals I got was more a brightness of everything that already was. Like reality showing me it is perfect just the way it is. "Hey you! Look at how perfect life is!"
I went outside and laid on the grass looking at the clouds. I saw many cloud shapes that were insanely detailed as though my mind was that of a child seeing dragons and birds and fish in the cloud shapes. Again, it was like reality was showing me a beautiful spectacle of nothing more than what is already there. I was suddenly overwhelmed with the feeling that life is just a ride and it was all that as though the Universe was telling me I should enjoy this experience with every ounce of my being. Like we are a cosmic joke that spend so much time of our lives stressing over nothing instead of enjoying the moment. I felt it in my mind, in my body, in my soul. I should love others more. I should love the planet more. I should love the animals more. I should also love myself more.
Some may say this is not a supernatural experience in the sense of the word. However, I looked up the definition and would absolutely say it is. A manifestation or event attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature. What I felt that day was beyond anything I could ever explain in our limited human language. It made me acutely aware off the connection that runs between each other and our existence, that we are all going to die one day and that everything is ok and meant to be. I will admit, this still terrifies me. It terrifies me to know I will lose my Mum. It terrifies me to know I will lose my brothers. It terrifies me to know I will lose my wife. It terrifies me to know I will lose my kids. It terrifies me that one day they will lose me. But it is what it is. I am now in the process of learning whatever I can to live a great life and get past living in fear and embracing love.
We will all one day have to face death. I just want to say that you should appreciate every single moment of your life. Jerry says in a video I watched last night, when his Dad died his Mum said, "I would give anything to have him back for a day, even a bad one". This truly brought me to tears and shows that despite the difficulties in life we should always still appreciate them. Even writing this story right now has me in tears because I love life so much and I love everybody I've ever met regardless of how they treated me. I don't know if there is a God or an afterlife. All I do know is that love is real and it's not a fairytale. The love that connects us all as human beings to this crazy ride we call life is for a very short time, so learn to embrace it with everything you've got.
