The Afterglow Experience

There are many parallels between mountains and life. Some of my most formative experiences in the outdoors were mountaineering with my dad. Climbing mountains was my deepest passion growing up. In high school, I would sit in class with ten different browser tabs open on my computer, and nine of them would be about the mountains I dreamed of summiting. Every weekend I was checking off another peak, some local day-hikes, some extended foreign expeditions. My dad and I got all the technical gear, all the safety training, and I absolutely loved it. He would occasionally get philosophical while we climbed, making connections between what we were doing and life as a whole. Years later, even though I haven't maintained the same consistency I once had with true mountaineering, I still catch myself finding meaning in the mountains. First of all, I recognize the privilege that my previous paragraph describes. Not everyone gets opportunities like that, and I feel extremely lucky. Not everyone...

Painting by Ron Fleishman Why do we work? I've been thinking about my career quite a bit lately and have some contradicting feelings that I want to put out there and try to sort out.  On one hand, I need money to survive and live the type of life that I love. Work provides me with health insurance, opportunities for personal relationships and problem solving, technical growth in an exciting field that is improving business and challenges me, and the promise of promotions and a secure financial future. On the other hand, I don't need that much money to enjoy life. I could work a lot less or in a very different industry doing something outdoors that pays enough to get me through each day. I could even just do an adequate job in my current position, have good benefits, and get paid fine, but still have plenty of free time. So why do I have this constant nagging desire to do more or to try to start my own thing or move up the ranks? ​The way I see it, in America w e work to earn mo...

Warlords of Atlantis - by Luminokaya I recently introduced a couple close relatives to the world of psychedelics. They had asked me if I knew anything about psilocybin and I ran upstairs, grabbed a jar of mushrooms, and we chatted about the effects, preparation techniques, past experiences, etc. well into the night. It turns out that they had done some previous research and heard about the potential benefits of psilocybin for treating depression, something that they were mildly dealing with and were interested in exploring alterative methods of treatment. Two days later, they were back over for their first trip. One of the points that I tried to emphasize to them before starting our journey was that it would be a much more positive experience if they could relax and accept whatever happened, knowing that they were in no physical danger and that we had created a very safe space. It is easy to be afraid when your entire mind forgets what is real and it feels like the trip may never end. ...