Shrooms Can Activate Your Brain’s “Dream State” Even While Awake

“…[dreams] show us the unvarnished, natural truth, and are therefore fitted, as nothing else is, to give us back an attitude that accords with our basic human nature when our consciousness has strayed too far from its foundations and run into an impasse.”

Jung also believed that one’s dreams are symbolic manifestations of the psyche and the collective unconscious. Symbols in fantasies and nightmares contain valuable insights to one’s life path. Therefore they must be studied closely by the dreamer upon waking up. However! Recapturing those brief moments of divine wisdom can be quite tricky. So, how does taking shrooms and magic truffles induce the mystical dream state, exactly, for soul-searchers like us to explore it? 

Let’s find out, shall we! 

Psilocybin Can Activate Your Brain’s Dream State During Waking Hours

A groundbreaking study published in Human Brain Mapping found solid evidence that psilocybin, the psychoactive substance in shrooms and magic truffles, can activate parts of your brain responsible for dreams even while you’re awake, specifically in the hippocampus. The scientists observed their volunteers’ brains fire up on all cylinders right after they had a psilocybin IV drip. 

“The increased…fluctuations in the hippocampus are particularly intriguing given early [brain wave tests] that recorded similar abnormalities in hippocampal activity after LSD and mescaline.”

Up until this point, tripping out on psilocybin and LSD has been described largely in abstract terms. Now there’s concrete proof that shrooms and other psychedelics can literally remove the shackles of your brain’s accepted reality. Just like when you’re dreaming! 

“The psychedelic experience produced by psilocybin…is characterised by unconstrained cognition and profound alterations in the perception of time, space and selfhood.”

Vivid Dreams and REM

Researchers from Goethe University, Imperial College London, and CONICET in Buenos Aires scanned the brains of 15 healthy subjects before, during, and after receiving full doses of psilocybin. Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), they were able to measure any “spontaneous” changes in brain waves in real time. Especially those that mimic the peculiar eye movements while you dream.

“…bursts of [extreme brain activity] have been seen in human rapid-eye movement (REM) sleep.”

The sweet spot? To see exactly how a proper shroom trip can turn on the regions of the brain responsible for vivid dreams even when you’re fully awake. 

“There is also evidence to consider similarities between the psychology and neurobiology of the psychedelic state and Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep. This is the sleep stage associated with vivid dreaming.”

Anatomy of a Dream

A total of 15 subjects were chosen. All of them had tried shrooms or magic truffles at least once but not within 6 weeks of the trial. The psilocybin study was split into two separate sessions a week apart. First a placebo drip (meaning no trace of psychedelics) followed by a full-on dose of psilocybin via IV drip. 

The scientists were able to discover two things. For starters, magic mushrooms can visibly “flick on” the brain switch for dreams. This usually happens only during deep REM sleep. Shrooms also increase the typical rate of thought-connections your brain can form at a specific time. This then expands your level of consciousness — literally. 

“…these quantities demonstrate an increase in the dynamical repertoire (i.e., new states) in the brain under psilocybin.”

You know how those dreams you get in deep sleep are often the most vividly realised and off-the-rails bonkers, with surprising twists and turns? Yep, with a full-on dose of shrooms, you won’t even have to go to bed for the same trippy experience! 

Ego Death: Doorway to the Dream World

For the study’s theory to work, the brain’s dynamic state has to be easy and effortless. Where you don’t even have to think too hard about the mind expansion process while it occurs. This is why they chose the model of a person’s brain based on its dream state. This is because it’s a space where you can access the unseen ancient emotion system without being “piloted” by active thinking. There’s an element of surrender involved, as well. Luckily psychedelic compounds such as psilocybin can greatly enhance the mind’s ability to do so.

The researchers wrote of this special ability to surrender one’s accepted reality with the aid of psychedelics. This is a process known as ego death:

“It is more likely to be relevant…that one of the most commonly reported features of an intense psychedelic experience is a compromised sense of selfhood typically described as ‘ego-dissolution’ or ‘ego disintegration’.

“The present results…may have implications for our understanding of the unconstrained, hyper-associative quality of consciousness in the psychedelic state.”

Why Shamans Use Psychedelics for Soul-Searching

For centuries, a common thread has tied ancient cultures and their shamanic rituals. The use of psychedelics, usually psilocybin, ayahuasca, peyote, or other entheogens. Although tripping out on psychoactive delights does make for a theatrical seance with ancestral guides, there’s also another purpose that is now backed by science. By taking psychedelic potions right before or during a ritual for spiritual clarity, the shaman’s brain is equipped to literally enter the dream state even while he or she is awake. 

This allows for an actual “blurring” of the conscious and subconscious to occur. Hence the recurring motifs of psychological archetypes such as animal totems, magical symbols, and spirit guides (or angels) in shamanic visions. The very same motifs that appear again and again in our dreams, as acknowledged by the theories of Jung himself.

As the researchers pointed out:

“It has long been claimed that the psychedelic (translated “mind-revealing”) state is an expanded state of consciousness on which latent psychological material can emerge into the consciousness.”

Psychedelics and Creative Genius

The seeming ability of psychedelics to help artists harness their creative genius such as the likes of Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, and the Flower Power rockstars of yore, may be explained by the compounds acting as a gateway to the well of divine creative inspiration, just buried deep in the subconscious mind. 

The researchers wrote:

“…psychedelics may be able to assist the creative process, for example, by promoting divergent thinking and remote association.”

There’s a reason why the correlation between creative genius and madness continues to exist in the cultural mindset. Simply put, painters, writers, musicians, and other artists are able to work within the liminal space between reality and dreams. A trait once considered unique to shamans who conjure magical vision quests at will. 

Explore the Subconscious Mind with Psilocybin 

Thanks to the study, psychonauts like us finally have proof that the psilocybin from shrooms and magic truffles can truly, fully expand your consciousness. Science is just starting to explore the inner workings of the mind which ancient mystics had been exploring for centuries. The mysteries of where the mind goes when it sleeps, the doorway to dreams, and how psychedelic potions can make it possible for us to enter it while we’re wide awake…