Magic Mushrooms Can Literally ‘Reset’ Brains of Depressed People, Study Finds

[Bubu]

"A groundbreaking new study shows that magic mushrooms may actually be an effective treatment for people with depression. Researchers from Imperial College London found that patients taking psilocybin, the psychoactive compound that occurs naturally in magic mushrooms, showed reduced symptoms weeks after treatment following a “reset” of their brains.

In the clinical trials, patients with treatment-resistant depression received two doses of psilocybin — 10 mg followed by 25 mg, one-week apart — while researchers focused on changes in brain function before and after treatment with the drug. The findings showed that the treatment produced “rapid and sustained antidepressant effects.”



Brain scans show a reset of brain connectivity and blood flow.
Comparisons of images of patients’ brains before and after treatment with psilocybin showed reduced blood flow in areas of the brain responsible for processing emotional responses like stress and fear. Researchers found increased stability in another brain network that has been previously linked to psilocybin’s immediate effects, as well as to depression itself.

The small study of 19 people was led by Head of Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London Dr. Robin Carhart-Harris, who said:

“We have shown for the first time clear changes in brain activity in depressed people treated with psilocybin after failing to respond to conventional treatments.


“Several of our patients described feeling ‘reset’ after the treatment and often used computer analogies. For example, one said he felt like his brain had been ‘defragged’ like a computer hard drive, and another said he felt ‘rebooted.’

“Psilocybin may be giving these individuals the temporary ‘kick start’ they need to break out of their depressive states and these imaging results do tentatively support a ‘reset’ analogy. Similar brain effects to these have been seen with electroconvulsive therapy.”

In addition, the trials revealed that patients scoring highest on “peak” or “mystical” experience showed a more significant change. This is consistent with findings from previous studies that have shown that such experiences can lead to long-term changes in the behaviors, attitudes, and values of patients treated with psilocybin.

http://theantimedia.org/magic-mushro...zen.yandex.com

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https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-13282-7

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https://sputniknews.com/science/2017...zen.yandex.com

[dynamo]

Posted by Bubu (here)
...“Several of our patients described feeling ‘reset’ after the treatment and often used computer analogies. For example, one said he felt like his brain had been ‘defragged’ like a computer hard drive, and another said he felt ‘rebooted.’
...

Clinical studies have shown that not watching CNN had similar, positive effects.
My apologies, couldn't resist!

[DeDukshyn]

Posted by dynamo (here)

Posted by Bubu (here)
...“Several of our patients described feeling ‘reset’ after the treatment and often used computer analogies. For example, one said he felt like his brain had been ‘defragged’ like a computer hard drive, and another said he felt ‘rebooted.’
...

Clinical studies have shown that not watching CNN had similar, positive effects.
My apologies, couldn't resist!

Ah but why just single out CNN? I think "News Media" was the term you were looking for, if you want to be accurate and expand the ability for the audience members to relate. This is after all, a comedy club.

Back to topic ...
I will say that I have "dabbled" in psilocybin adventures in my past, and can mostly concur with the article as to how I feel afterwards. I did once however, mix some incredibly powerful mushrooms with some marijuana once, and that allowed fear / paranoia to creep in. Not Good. It's hard to know how powerful they are and they should be done in a comfortable, peaceful setting (for those willing). There's a big difference in the hallucinogenic effects between very high dose and a low dose, however, only a low dose is needed to get the longer term benefits for the mind.

[Sue (Ayt)]

There has been much medical research buzzing around lately about the use of this, along with other substances to reset thinking. The mainstream is picking up on this, likely as the public may have reached a peak of sheer exhaustion with the overuse of psych drugs.

Yet the public still loves the idea of a magic pill to solve problems all problems, so big pharma will likely try to capitalize on this as usual.

Psilocybin may bring greater long-term depression symptom relief than SSRIs
Written by Corrie Pelc on September 26, 2024 — Fact checked by Jill Seladi-Schulman, Ph.D.



Researchers estimate that 5% of adultsTrusted Source around the world live with depression — a mental health condition that causes a person to feel sad, hopeless, and/or unable to experience joy.

In addition to psychological counseling, there are several types of antidepressant medications available to treat depression. One of the most commonly prescribed are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)Trusted Source.

As with all medications, SSRIs have side effects that can include nervousness or anxiety, headache, nausea, dry mouth, sleeping issues, and loss of libido. Additionally, past studies show that SSRIs do not work for about 30% of people with depression.

Now, researchers from Imperial College London in the United Kingdom say that psilocybin — a psychedelic compound found in certain types of mushrooms — provides similar improvement of depression symptoms as an SSRI, as well as better psychosocial functioning and other long-term benefits.

The study was recently published in the journal Lancet eClinical MedicineTrusted Source and presented at the 37th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress.
article continues at link:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/art...ief-than-ssris

[Paul D.]

Posted by Sue (Ayt) (here)
There has been much medical research buzzing around lately about the use of this, along with other substances to reset thinking. The mainstream is picking up on this, likely as the public may have reached a peak of sheer exhaustion with the overuse of psych drugs.

Yet the public still loves the idea of a magic pill to solve problems all problems, so big pharma will likely try to capitalize on this as usual.

Psilocybin may bring greater long-term depression symptom relief than SSRIs
Written by Corrie Pelc on September 26, 2024 — Fact checked by Jill Seladi-Schulman, Ph.D.



Researchers estimate that 5% of adultsTrusted Source around the world live with depression — a mental health condition that causes a person to feel sad, hopeless, and/or unable to experience joy.

In addition to psychological counseling, there are several types of antidepressant medications available to treat depression. One of the most commonly prescribed are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)Trusted Source.

As with all medications, SSRIs have side effects that can include nervousness or anxiety, headache, nausea, dry mouth, sleeping issues, and loss of libido. Additionally, past studies show that SSRIs do not work for about 30% of people with depression.

Now, researchers from Imperial College London in the United Kingdom say that psilocybin — a psychedelic compound found in certain types of mushrooms — provides similar improvement of depression symptoms as an SSRI, as well as better psychosocial functioning and other long-term benefits.

The study was recently published in the journal Lancet eClinical MedicineTrusted Source and presented at the 37th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress.
article continues at link:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/art...ief-than-ssris

If there was ever a divine gift from God, for man, it's psilocybin mushrooms .

[shaberon]

Posted by Paul D. (here)
If there was ever a divine gift from God, for man, it's psilocybin mushrooms .

Sounds like the cutting-edge research is a few thousand years behind the times.

The drawback is they are nearly indigestible, which is the reason to powderize them in a capsule or something.

My friend is in a program to get fungus-certified because, in a few places, these are already used for "death therapy", i. e. terminal cancer patients and so forth are dosed in a controlled environment with an advisor to help keep them from freaking out.

They leave the least amount of harmful residues in the body compared to almost any other substance you might consume.

It could perhaps be argued that the leading cause of depression, is that the majority of the population is not taking shrooms, which makes the world a screwed up place, which is depressing.

[Johnnycomelately]

Posted by shaberon (here)

Posted by Paul D. (here)
If there was ever a divine gift from God, for man, it's psilocybin mushrooms .

Sounds like the cutting-edge research is a few thousand years behind the times.

Hi shaberon. That is interesting. Hope you might know an answer to my shroom question.

Someone I know, has a small packet of “shrooms” in their fridge since 5 or so years. He said when bought it was solid, then over some room temp hours it got liquidy, but in the fridge ever since it feels solid.

What he wonders is, does that stuff ever go bad, something to be avoided for fungus or whatever.

Cheers, Shabs. ~8)

[Losus4]

Taking shrooms reminded me of the things I knew before I was born. Here is my trip report. TL:DR everything in the universe is a projection of the ONE.

After ingesting the shrooms which I'd mixed into yogurt, I sat down to meditate, waiting for the inevitable queasiness that begins around the 30-minute mark. It's like the dizziness you feel when standing up too quick, but pleasant more so than jarring.
Vision becomes dreamier, and simple things begin to fascinate. You might look at your hands and be amazed at the complexity that allows your intention to move them. Just how do we move our hand? How does the mind move a muscle? Where does the intention of moving the hand come from? Before you know it, just moving your hand has taken you down an existential wonder.
As I breathe, things around seem to breathe with me. Each exhalation creates ripples through the air. Are they illusions or am I seeing what is normally beyond the visual perception band?
Waves of energy pulse softly through the body. The heartbeat slows to a crawl. The mind begins to go into itself, seeking its source. Who is the thinker? Who is the witness of the thinker? Who is the witness of the witness?
A separation of ego and awareness occurs. If the ego is a painting then awareness is the canvas it was made on. You realise that our earthly identities are like an artistic project, born of a much greater awareness that animates all life throughout the cosmos.
A deep AUM begins reverberating within me. We know this as a popular meditation mantra, but unlike a mantra which is spoken repeatedly, the AUM is constant, like holding a key down on a synthesiser. It is the primordial sound of creation.

After a while basking in this pleasant state, I feel a presence emerge, though I cannot localise who or where it emanates from. I soon learn that this presence is everything around me. Every inanimate, inorganic particle was fused with a living, watchful, knowing light.
We usually have a very clear boundary of where our epidermis meets the surrounding air, but the more I beheld this presence, the more that boundary became blurred. There's a simple analogy that explains it well. Imagine you're a glass of water, and you're happy and content in your little glass. Then someone throws you into the ocean.
Put simply, we became One. I was it. It was me. Everything in the universe is both it and of it. Nothing is separate. God, I learned, was not some abstract, unknowable being. It was all of us, every living thing; every atom is infused with the spark of the Creator. There is nothing that is not it.
I appreciate that 'God' is a loaded term, and I'm in no way religious. Source would be more accurate, but it is what it is. Whatever you call it, is going to be disputed. The Taoist definition works well, in that God is not a singular entity, but a primordial force that grew out of nothing and at some point became aware of itself. Existence was born from the void when the void declared I AM.
I broke into tears, repeating the words "I had no idea" over and over. (Ever see the end of the movie Contact? The writers knew.) They were the kind of tears that can only occur when you realise there's no such thing as death.

Becoming one with this presence may imply loss of personality and thus, loss of identity, but I was happy to discard the shackles of ego in light of the overwhelming love emanating from it.
The best way to describe this feeling of oneness is that it felt like going home, which is a recurring theme among NDE survivors, in that they felt like going home; many of whom did not wish to return, despite having loved ones to return to. Imagine a place so joyous that you do not wish to return to your loved ones. That is the message NDE'ers are telling us.
This feeling of oneness, and of going home, was like nothing I'd ever experienced, but paradoxically was the most familiar feeling in the world, because it's like remembering who we are between lifetimes. Taking shrooms reminded me of the things I knew before I was born. It is nothing but unconditional, eternal love. You might've just gunned down a school full of kids and then shot yourself, and you would get no less love than your victims.
A quick browse of Erowid.org shows hundreds of similar stories from using psychedelics. Do we write off such experiences as mere drug use as the "experts" tell us? Or as the ancients did, use entheogens to help us understand our mysterious cosmos? You'll be forgiven for thinking that this is all just nonsensical ramblings of someone on drugs. LSD users were seeing God back in the 60s, but consider the words of Harvard professor Dr Timothy Leary:

I learned more about my brain and its possibilities, and more about psychology in the five hours after taking these mushrooms than I had in the preceding fifteen years of studying and doing research in psychology.

Or Apple founder Steve Jobs:

Taking LSD was a profound experience, one of the most important things in my life.

If shrooms taught me death was an illusion, it taught me space was too, for if all the cosmos was One, then distance was meaningless. If you could examine one end of the universe and then examine the opposite end, you would find the same entity as the source of both points.
Alex Grey's artwork conveys this well. His constant use of wide open eyes intersecting and penetrating solid matter is how the world appears in the shamanic state. Everything is a living, conscious projection of the One. There is nothing that is not it.
If you recall the holodeck from Star Trek, that is a fairly accurate depiction of how the universe is composed. All of it, everything, from a planet to a grain of sand is a projection of consciousness, emanating from a relatively local space. Aley Grey's piece, Theologue, depicts this perfectly. We mistakenly believe that form creates consciousness when it is actually consciousness that creates form.
Imagine you were born on the holodeck and spent your entire life inside a program, then one day someone disables that program. At first it would feel strange and you'd wonder where you were, but eventually you'd realise that the new reality is what's real and what you thought was real was actually the illusion. That right there is the psychedelic experience.
I can think of only two scenarios in which I'll encounter that divine presence again: taking another potent hallucinogen...
Or dying.

[shaberon]

Posted by Johnnycomelately (here)
What he wonders is, does that stuff ever go bad, something to be avoided for fungus or whatever.

Does fungus ever grow fungus? Wow that is way outside the parameters...five years refrigerated...um, kind of unusual...

It's hard to be reassuring about something that might make you feel like puking anyway. I don't know that the mushroom itself might "spoil", and if it is dry and doesn't look like there isn't anything on it, then there probably isn't. But I don't know if the active ingredients might survive that long either.

[shaberon]

Posted by Losus4 (here)
Taking shrooms reminded me of the things I knew before I was born.

That's pretty good.

I have found something similar, but more literal. I am not one of those people who says they have memories of past lives. I *do*, however, have memories of Being in the Womb, as well as that moment of consciousness called Seeking Rebirth.

That is like remembering the "fall into matter". Something like stalking the astral plane of the surrounding area until going down a whirlpool into a fertilized ovum.


As for the rest of your experience, this perhaps can be characterized as "vision", as distinguished from something like "random hallucination".

So it is not hard to imagine that a similar experience, which, so to speak, slips "out of control", is mental illness.



You have a choice between something that is broadly agreeable with any positive expression of spirituality, or else, madness and death. Much like fifteen years of psychology lessons at once.

I might almost say there is One Dimension which only offers the choice of those two directions. Primordial Sound is one of the things we use to go "up".

Yes, handled properly, these mushrooms can give you such an experience rather vividly. And then you will go around wondering why people have legal alcohol. To me, at least, it is the most direct opposite.

[Inversion]

Here's another informative and entertaining presentation by AJ from The Why Files. In ancient times humans would follow herds around and also eat the mushrooms that grew from their dung. Mushrooms open up consciousness and the knowledge of their effects have been suppressed by TPTB. He talked about a drink called Kykeon consumed in Greece and Soma.

05/31/25 (26:17)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=LeF3n-1sPJY

Something extraordinary happened to the human brain 100,000 years ago. In just a few thousand generations, our brains nearly doubled in size - a change that should have taken millions of years.

Scientists couldn't explain it until Terence McKenna proposed a radical theory. He believed early humans transformed into conscious beings not through fire or tools, but through eating a forbidden fungus growing in animal dung across Africa.