There’s increasing evidence that psychedelics such as LSD and psilocybin mushrooms can assist in managing chronic pain, as they disrupt some of the functional connections in the brain involved in pain through activation of the 5-HT2A receptor. Psychedelics can provide analgesic benefits, and there’s growing anecdotal evidence to suggest that many people who are experiencing chronic pain can greatly benefit from consuming psychedelics. I have personally found this to be one of the most immediate benefits – when I would often find exercise difficult, psychedelics such as psilocybin mushrooms have provided me with the energy and enthusiasm to explore more of the outside world, and to keep going where I ordinarily might need to turn back.
The euphoric feelings that I’ve experienced while walking outside in nature under the influence of psychedelics have changed my relationship to pain and movement, where I feel good in moving my body and excited by the possibility of exploring more of the outside world in a more enchanted way. There is more possibility to use my body in a calm way in this world, where I’m able to take more in and not be distracted so much by the demands of the body. Where psychedelics are able to decrease discomfort allows me to experience the joy of movement as an emergent aspect of the experience, rather than it being something called exercise, which feels like it gets imposed through discipline.
I’ve been able to find more confidence in how I engage with the physical world and an increase in my awareness of how to move more in flow with my natural surroundings. Moving through modern urban surroundings can often feel challenging for my body, but my experiences with psychedelics in more natural environments have taught me a softer awareness that I can bring to every kind of environment I find myself in.
The joy of movement also seems to be in juxtaposition to more commonly spoken about fitness goals, where there seems to be so much of an obsession with optimising performance that we might not actually enjoy the exercise we’re doing. Tracking our performance is useful for understanding what we need to do, but this pressure might actually become toxic when we start to compare ourselves to others or become anxious because we’ve failed to meet certain goals. This kind of self-surveillance doesn’t seem healthy at all, and it feels like psychedelics might hold the key to forming a positive relationship with exercise that doesn’t necessarily contain as much pressure as a regimented fitness routine.
Instead, we can engage with the natural world in a way which can have positive, long-lasting effects that provide benefits to our whole body and mind, where we might be more aware of our senses and take in more from this natural world. Moving through the world in these states can be transformed into curiosity, exploration, or play, where we’re able to appreciate the joy in the new discoveries. This way of engaging with the world has personally felt like it ties in with the ability of psychedelics, such as magic mushrooms, to forge new pathways in the brain, which can potentially get to the root of some of the issues associated with weight gain, as well as address the relationship we have to exercise and food.
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