My psychedelic psilocybin trip in Haarlem

Introduction

Many thanks to Marcel. He prepared me for – and guided me during – the trip in an excellent manner.

Throughout my life, a single question has been and remains central: who am I really, and what is consciousness? I have always felt that these so-called unanswerable questions can only yield a satisfying response if one dares to equate human imagination with at least the supreme power of external sensory perception. Through paintings, poems, and dramatic philosophical texts, I have tried (and continue to try) to give expression to the imagination of deep cosmic interconnectedness. Additionally, a childhood trauma plays a role as leverage to depict (and experience) a deeper origin of consciousness and reality. Questions of meaning stemming from traumatic experiences have always made me curious about consciousness-expanding substances. Cannabis use also helps me to express my imaginations better.

The trip

I’m just taking a guess and saying that 80 percent of the trip is incomprehensible. That leaves me with 20 percent to describe. Immediately after the trip, I noted down a common thread of impressions in keywords. My trip experience follows the music playlist on Marcel’s mobile phone, his scent diffusions, and his rotating light/color sprayer.

Below follows my brief report in rough terms. After that, I will attempt to formulate what I have learned or become wiser from it.

‘A continuous pulsation of beautifully colored and undulating fields of form that swell again and subside. Fields filled with unfathomable figures and signs that continuously split, merge, separate, and then fuse again, etc. A rhythmic pumping and undulating of liquid velvet textures in brilliantly shifting streams of color with orgasmic fountains of scarlet and ultraviolet. These alternating currents contract and tear open. Then appears an infinite vertebral column of reptiles arising from a floor of series of tooth rows that ebb away again. I see the dying dragon transforming into the face of mercy. What majesty in a procession of flowing colors, a cosmic parade of forms groping for their birth. They yearn to be born. In palaces, princes and princesses are cast in gold and purple and then eaten and swallowed up in the eternal cycle of digestion. I see You, Womb-like, Mother of the Healing, Mother of the Primordial Mating, in Your holy Confirmation of purple.

For a brief moment, a rest in the pulsating fields. Then a new unrest begins. On the large board game, satyrs and clowns appear—Mickey Mouse-like figures with wicked grimaces. Then insects swarm in restless crevices, and fish and snakes hurry away. The contours of the swaying pink crimson field transform into a rapidly expanding color palette of brown tones and dark green. Something new threatens to arrive. Once again, everything is swallowed up by a great monster that subsequently dissolves and transforms itself into new formations of merciful forms. The cycle continues to repeat itself: golden children transform into beasts, swallow up, or are swallowed up and digested, etc.

Conclusion

I interpret the trip I took as an encounter with the history of my own body, which is, of course, a body like that of any living being. Presumably, the trip offers the opportunity to unlock the oldest part of the brain (the reptilian brain). My digestive system and spine formed the framework through which evolution unfolded to me cinematically (in partial visions). I beheld the hideous beast of which I myself am a part. But in the experience of this trip, I realized that this enormous beast (evolution) is simultaneously the deepest grace and possibility for further growth.

The day after the trip, I decided to take a short walk through Haarlem. I wasn't planning to visit the Teylers Museum. Yet, I walked there spontaneously. Before I knew it, I was standing face to face with essences from the trip: fossils, skeletons, shells, etc. I was particularly struck by the so-called ammonite. Unconsciously, I have been drawing and painting this form my whole life. How happy I am with my new ammonite awareness.

A few days after the trip, I made a painting (crucifixion 26) in which I incorporated my organic adventure. You can find it on my Instagram account.

Gijs Ambrosius

Edited by triptherapie

Are you curious what kind of art Gijs Ambrosius still makes? Then see:

Instagram of artist Gijs Ambrosius