I was drawn to the mushroom at a very young age--about 13 years old, one day while purusing through various books in my middle school library I came upon the image of a woman incensing mushrooms over a copalero. In retrospect, I now realize the image was of Maria Sabina as photographed by Alan Richardson. The image had a very peculiar and powerful effect on my psyche, I immediately knew 'this is what I'm about.' Later that same day, I was walking into the boys locker-room and a friend of mine stopped me and handed me a bag of what must have been cubensis mushrooms. It was one of the earlier and more absurd synchornicities that has accompanied my interest in these mushrooms; I went home that evening and ate the entire bag--we estimate ~7grams, and my life has never quite been the same since. 

About four years ago now, I spent a year studying the mushroom tradition in Huautla de Jimenez. In the interim between age 13 and age 33 when I finally visited Huautla, I spent time studying Buddhism, Sufism, lived for a time as a Theravadan monastic in Thailand, studied the NAC peyote tradition on the Lakota rez in South Dakota, studied yoga, drank ayahuasca with shamans in Peru for 6 months etc. But I ultimately consider the mushroom to be my primary spiritual teacher and ally, and consider my very first experience before the Mazatec altar as the consummation and completion of my spiritual quest/journey. That is not to say I am not growing or developing--which would be absurd, but that what the mushroom has shown me--particularly working within the Mazatec vehicle--far and away dwarfs and transcends any insight I have gleaned from other paths. From the time I first saw the image of Maria Sabina, to the very first time I sat before the Mazatec altar it was clear to me that this imagos of the sacred had been nothing short of a guiding angel in my life. During that night, as I stood before the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, I saw an energy--almost like honey-light, descend from the image of the Virgin and enter my heart. When it entered, I fell to the ground in a state of erotic-bliss, but Eros in the divine sense--in the Greek sense--the winged god of ecstasy. In that experience it was very clear to me that I had directly received the transmission of Sabina's tradition, precisely as you describe in your blog article here. So, I know precisely what you mean here ... as absurd as that sounds.

Feel free to contact me at mycologica7@gmail.com - or I recently established a twitter account @mycologica to talk a little bit about the sacred mushroom tradition-which I have directly experienced as being perhaps the single most powerful gnostic-vehicle there is ...