Mushroom Medicine, The Healing Power of Psilocybin & Sacred Entheogen History

Great book on a great subject. Helped my to understand them wonderful fungi and replace my nasty NHS medications with natural mushroom extract tablets.

Very pleased

Mushroom Medicine: The Healing Power of Psilocybin & Sacred Entheogen History Brian A. JacksonGenre: non fictionReview from Jeannie Zelos book reviewsWell...A long title for a relatively short read, but it’s amazingly apt.Brian has a history of severe depression for which conventional medicine doesn’t seem to be working. He’s not alone in that, any medicine can have adverse side effects and anti depressants commonly cause a kind of “zombie” effect, where people feel set aside from real life. I’ve had friends who’ve felt that, one was on them for 20 years before a change of doctor and a new regime. She told me she felt as if she’d lost all those years of her family growing, she’d passed through them and remembered them in a kind of fog. That’s really sad to me. Of course for many users they are perfect, and let them live a full and energising life but my view is that just as we are individuals so medicine isn’t a “one sixe fits all” solution. Brian writes this book in a kind of autobiographical way, and I get the feeling that where the mushrooms have helped is that they have allowed him to look at his life with a different perspective – albeit in psychedelic colours at times! Its kind of the way cognitive behaviour therapy works as I understand it, and something I think is far better that the pop a pill solution often proposed. After all we have to learn to live with life and all its imperfections, no one lives the perfect life. By seeing the problems with fresh eyes he was able to see where he’d been holding back, and change his behaviour – if I’ve read it right. That’s the way it seems to me. Under the tailored solutions to a problems format where medicine is treated as different for each individual ( a bit like the ancient eastern philosophies, and many non conventional holistic therapies, where the focus is on the whole person not the ailment) then clearly mushrooms have apart to play in recovery and learning to work forward to a better life. They aren’t a magic key, but a tool and need to be considered as such. Sadly mention magic mushrooms and too many still associate them with the sixties drug and pot imagery, when for centuries they’ve played a part with many other herbal/non conventional medicines. A word of caution though; just because a medicine/food is natural doesn’t mean its harmless, and Brian’s use of a watcher, someone to stay drug free to check for adverse reactions is a very wise one.I’ve always been interested in alternative medicines, how and what people used in past times, and especially the link between mental and physical problems. I’m not going to go the dead mouse in a warm scarf for a sore throat way, but things where science has since proven a solid link to remedies are interesting to me. Honey for wounds and anti bacterials, gold and silver in wound dressings have all been taken up in recent years, and incorporated into conventional wound treatments. Even maggots are now sometimes used to remove dead flesh as in past times, as they can do it with far less damage than a scalpel. Aspirin was originally derived from Willow bark, and many others current treatments found from old remedies, so the blend of old tales and new science can give us even more medicines so long as we’re open minded. Its an interesting read, and with some solid science to back up what’s often regarded as simple gimmickry, just a fun and cheap way to get high. Used properly I’m sure this could be a solution for many mental ailments.Stars: Stars: Four, an interesting read.