The Incredible Life & Times of Terence McKenna

Introduction

Praised by hundreds of thousands of zealous soul-seekers worldwide, Terence McKenna’s accounts of his experiences with psychedelic substances have gifted us with astounding glimpses into the otherworldly. His lyrical intellect and learned interests included shamanism, renaissance alchemy, archeology, Jungian psychology, and technology. This made him a polymath like the psychedelic scene had never seen. May this brief portrayal of his existence be a homage to the knowledge he transmitted to our curious minds and the freedom to experiment he instilled in our wandering souls.

Early Life

Terence was born to a mother of Welsh heritage and father of Irish heritage on November 16, 1946 in Paonia, Colorado. (Interestingly, LSD was first synthesized on this exact day eight years earlier.) He was a curious child who nurtured many esoteric interests from a young age. When he was ten years old, he would blaze through literature such as Carl Jung’s Psychology and Alchemy in breaks from building his collection of butterflies and moths. Little did he know that, decades later, he would be using the same butterfly net during his historic adventures to the Amazon rainforest in search of psychedelic substances.

Terence’s unique verbiage was probably the deed of his grandfather, Joseph Kemp, who passed on when Terence was 13. As his brother Dennis notes, Kemp loved playing with language and would often invent alien-sounding vocabulary to describe anything from food to weather. It’s quite possible that his grandpa was one of Terence’s early idols and that he felt encouraged by Kemp to develop his intellect, curiosity, and ability of self-expression.

Dennis and Terence were inseparable as kids, with a caveat that Terence was something of a mean child. In his memoir, The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss, Dennis recollects how his brother used to mercilessly tickle him, to the point of torment, as well as how Terence would tease classmates. Dennis still idolized him and followed his “cooler” older brother in whatever he was up to.

Introduction to Psychedelics

Terence started experimenting with psychedelics as a teenager, introduced to the world of mind-altering substances by the works of Aldous Huxley and other legendary science fiction writers. As he himself once stated: “I regard science fiction as the entry drug into the psychedelic world.” When he was 17, he would grind up Heavenly Blue morning glory seeds and enjoy their mild trips while wandering among the Joshua trees in Southern California, where he lived at the time. He also took to smoking marijuana and claimed that it would henceforth be the connecting substance to his entire creative opus.

“If you don’t smoke cannabis, you may spend your evening balancing your checking account. If you do smoke cannabis, you may spend your evening contemplating the causes of the Greek Renaissance” – Terence McKenna

However, his true induction into transethereal hyperspace took place when he dropped acid for the first time at the age of 19. Under the effect of what he would later popularize as a “heroic dose” of the purest LSD he could find, young Terence went through a complete dissolution of the boundaries of reality. He would keep enjoying LSD for a long time to come; however, learning about the phantasmagoric visions of Huxley’s and Ellis’s worlds, he wanted a more potent visionary experience.

He got it with DMT. That same year, as anthropologist Graham St. John explains, Terence experienced the “holy grail” of mind-bending substances, and it transformed him entirely. Terence was utterly dumbfounded by the instantaneous replacement of reality with “titanic, alien, and off-planet motifs” and the discovery of strange entities existing in these alternate worlds. Describing beings he witnessed in these early trips, he famously commented:

These self-transforming machine elf creatures were speaking in a colored language which condensed into rotating machines that were like Fabergé eggs but crafted out of luminescent superconducting ceramics and liquid crystal gels.

Exploration of Shamanism

Inspired by these otherworldly experiences, Terence started getting curious about shamanism. Eventually, this line of research would bring him to the Amazon, but not before a short hiatus on the other side of the globe. Spurred by countercultural icon Timothy Leary (who would later call Terence “the Timothy Leary of the 90’s”) and his famous freedom call that went “Turn on, tune in, drop out”, young Terence apparently decided to take the “drop out” bit to heart. So he headed to Nepal to study the Tibetan language, culture, and shamanism and, of course, become an international hashish smuggler. A person’s gotta make a living somehow, right?

This excursion into the drug trafficking waters went sour when a shipment headed to America got intercepted by US Customs. Terence understood it was time to call it quits and spent his next life chapter traveling throughout Southeast Asia, stopping for a while in Indonesia to collect butterflies professionally, and in Japan to teach English. Ultimately, though, he would head back to Berkeley to continue studying biology. However, this period of stability turned out to be a brief one. His mother’s passing in 1971 would once again usher in a big transition.

At this point, Dennis and Terence decided that the DMT experience was to be the most significant discovery of their lives, and that there should be no more important cause to dedicate themselves to than understanding and describing this strange, potent molecule. They researched and discovered an indigenous settlement in Southern Colombia that was using oo-koo-he, a DMT-containing sap taken from virola trees and prepared for oral ingestion. Already aware of the various DMT-snuffing customs in the Amazon region, they correctly assumed that an oral preparation would allow them more time in the nth dimensions of hyperspace, and so, in 1971, alongside three friends, they set out for an expedition to South America.

Upon arriving in La Chorrera, the mission village that was home to the Witoto Indians, the oo-koo-he using settlement, the company was surprised to discover that the pastures there were brimming with a different psychedelic: psilocybin mushrooms. At first, the McKennas thought eating them would provide an interesting pastime until the moment seemed right to inquire about oo-koo-he and ayahuasca. However, this haphazard discovery would soon prove to be a pivotal, serendipitous side-purpose of their voyage.

True Hallucinations

“Like most Westerners, I believed that magic was a phenomenon of the naive and the primitive, that science could provide an explanation for the workings of the world. In that position of intellectual naiveté, I encountered psilocybin mushrooms for the first time, at San Augustine in the Alto Magdalena of southern Colombia. Later and not far away, in Florencia, I also encountered and used visionary brews made from Banisteriopsis vines, the yage or ayahuasca of 1960s underground legend.” – Terence McKenna, True Hallucinations

Published in 1989, True Hallucinations tells the story of Terence McKenna, his brother Dennis, and a small band of their friends, heading to the Amazon rainforest in search of the great mystery.
They ended up making these mushrooms a regular element of their sustenance. As Dennis describes it, “The food we brought was inadequate, and you can make quite a nice bowl of soup or an omelette with psilocybin mushrooms.” Out of this constant state of altered consciousness, they would get many “funny ideas”, a string of which grew into what would thenceforth be known as the “La Chorrera Experiment”.

This experiment came to Dennis as a telepathic download from the intelligent direction of “the Teacher, the mushroom, or whatever it was”. Under his instructions, the members of the group were supposed to attempt “creating, and then fixing, the mercury of [their] own consciousness, fused with the four-dimensionally transformed psilocybin-DNA complex of a living mushroom”. Basically, the goal was to achieve a superconductive state that would allow for creation of something like a symbiosis between their human DNA, the tryptamines in the ayahuasca vine, and the psilocybin in the mushrooms. You can read an in-depth account of the experiment and the events leading up to it in Terence McKenna’s book True Hallucinations and Dennis’s book The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss.

The conclusion of the experiment can be summarized neatly in the following words of Terence:

Our destiny was apparently to be the human atoms critical to the transformation of Homo sapiens into galaxy-roving bodhisattvas, the culmination and quintessence of the highest aspirations of star-coveting humanity.

Later Life and Works

After this experience, Terence was ready to fully unfold as the visionary, prophetic advocate of psychedelic substances and altered states of consciousness we remember and celebrate him as. After finishing his studies, he co-authored two books with Dennis and then three more after their paths separated. He was published in various magazines and papers and went on many tours as a modern-day bard of the ineffable, retelling his awe of the wild worlds he had witnessed and continued witnessing. He was welcomed far and wide, regaling masses who absorbed every colorful word of his vivid, trance-like discourse. You can listen to many of these talks here.

Psychedelics are illegal not because a loving government is concerned that you may jump out of a third story window. Psychedelics are illegal because they dissolve opinion structures and culturally laid down models of behavior and information processing. They open you up to the possibility that everything you know is wrong – Terence McKenna
Eventually, this legendary human got stricken with one of the most lethal and least operable cancers in existence. A walnut-sized lump grew right inside his frontal cortex, and the prognosis was swift departure. As terrifying as the prospect of imminent death can be for many of us, Terence took it as well as humanly possible. With all his experience exploring alternate worlds normally unavailable to the majority of 3D-dwelling humans, he was quite prepared to cross over forever—in his own words: “Taking shamanic drugs and spending your life studying esoteric philosophy is basically a meditation on death”. Spring of the year 2000 heralded his last days, which he spent in devotion to Buddhist practices and quiet reflection on what the future would bring to humanity, in the company of his last partner, Christy Silness, at their peaceful, reclusive hideaway in Hawaii.

Terence brought us an infinite wealth of information from his journeys in this, and other, existences. Not a single psychonaut after him would come close to the phantasmagorical way he would weave stories to bring us closer to the unfathomable dimensions of reality. He made them describable, and he never did it with a Messianic undertone—his messages were always clearly idiosyncratic and inviting to discussion and attestation. As he would humbly state, close to his demise: “My real function for people was permission. Essentially what I existed for was to say, ‘Go ahead, you’ll live through it, get loaded, you don’t have to be afraid.” He will be forever treasured for his contributions to the expansion of consciousness of the souls he touched with his account of the lore of the beyond.

You are a divine being. You matter, you count. You come from realms of unimaginable power and light, and you will return to those realms – Terence McKenna

Magic Mushrooms and Canadian Law: Everything You Need to Know

Answered on this page:

  • When did magic mushrooms first appear in Canada?
  • When were magic mushrooms made illegal in Canada?
  • Are magic mushrooms illegal in Canada today?
  • How are magic mushroom laws enforced in Canada?
  • What does the future hold for magic mushrooms in Canadian law?

New research has Canadians increasingly interested in the potential medicinal benefits of magic mushrooms and their active ingredient, the hallucinogenic compound psilocybin. Recent studies indicate that taking magic mushrooms under the right conditions can produce positive personality changes, help treat addictions, and reduce (or even eliminate) symptoms of depression.

We know millions of Canadians are struggling with depression and addictions, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, so what’s preventing more Canadians from taking advantage of the potential benefits of magic mushrooms? For many, it’s the relationship between magic mushrooms and Canadian law. 

The legal status of magic mushrooms in Canada is going through a period of intense change, but don’t worry if you’re having trouble keeping up – we’ve got you covered.

This article will explain everything you need to know about magic mushrooms and Canadian law. We’ll start with a primer on the history of magic mushroom laws in Canada, review the current legal status of magic mushrooms in Canadian law, then look into the future and try and predict how Canada will be regulating magic mushrooms in the years and decades to come.

Note: We have to put a disclaimer here and let you know that we’re not your lawyer and this article is not legal advice. If you need legal advice, get a lawyer.

A History of Magic Mushroom Laws in Canada

Very few Canadians had ever heard of magic mushrooms before 1957, when Life Magazine published an article called “Great Adventures III: Seeking the Magic Mushroom” by Robert Gordon Wasson, an amateur mycologist. 

In the article, Wasson described his experience travelling to Oaxaca, Mexico and taking magic mushrooms with Mexico’s indigenous people known as the Mazatec. He claimed to be “the first white man in recorded history to eat the divine mushrooms”.

The article served as a roadmap that would lead countless Canadians, Americans, and Europeans to Mexico in the 1960s, in pursuit of the same hallucinogenic and spiritual experiences that Wasson had described. 

After these tourists returned home, they began to recognize pasture mushrooms in the local environment that were similar to those they encountered in Mexico – as it turns out, mushrooms with hallucinogenic properties occur naturally on every continent of the world.

Magic mushrooms began to be used in Canada in the mid-1960s. The first criminal seizure of magic mushrooms took place in Vancouver in 1965, when RCMP officers confiscated psilocybin-containing liberty cap mushrooms from a group of students at the University of British Columbia.

Magic mushrooms continued to grow in popularity through the hippie movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Liberty cap mushrooms grew abundantly in the pastures, meadows, and fields of British Columbia, attracting thousands of pickers from across the country. 

Pickers would arrive in autumn when the mushrooms were in season, establishing tent cities around the most productive areas and often committing petty crimes like trespassing or property damage to access liberty caps growing on private land. Magic mushrooms were still technically legal in Canada, but the practices around accessing the mushrooms were often illegal or disruptive to the community.

While disruptive mushroom pickers may have created problems for local police, they may not have influenced the development of Canadian Law as much as a single document from the United Nations: the Convention on Psychotropic Substances, 1971. This was an International treaty where 71 states agreed to participate in a worldwide program to limit the availability of psychotropic substances to the general public and restrict the use of psychotropics to medicinal and scientific settings. 

The 1971 Convention listed psilocybin as a Schedule I drug, the most restrictive designation possible. Schedule I drugs were characterized as having a high potential for abuse and no known therapeutic value, a description that no longer seems to suit magic mushrooms. Ultimately, the convention on psychotropic substances influenced how Canada, as well as other countries, wrote laws to govern the use of psychotropics. In many cases, complying with the convention meant banning psychotropic substances like magic mushrooms entirely, often without complete knowledge of their effects – either positive or negative.

Predictably, magic mushrooms were prohibited in Canada in 1974, by their addition to the Food and Drug Act – sort of. In fact, the government of Canada added the compound Psilocybin to the Food and Drug Act – not the mushrooms themselves (this becomes important later). Between 1974 and 1979, approximately 350 individuals were convicted under the Food and Drug Act for possessing magic mushrooms.

Then, in 1979, the British Columbia Court of Appeals ruled that possession of magic mushrooms in their natural state (freshly picked and not dehydrated) did not constitute possession of psilocybin. For three years, between 1979 and 1982, magic mushrooms were completely legal in Canada and pickers rejoiced.

But their joy was short-lived, as a 1982 decision from the Canadian Supreme Court would overrule the B.C. Court of Appeals decision, stating that possession of magic mushrooms in their raw form did actually constitute possession of psilocybin. Magic mushrooms were illegal in Canada once again and would remain illegal for decades to follow.

Magic Mushrooms in Canada: What Does the Law Say Today?

Magic mushrooms are still under prohibition in Canada, although recent legislative changes indicate that this could change in the near future. Still, our review of magic mushrooms and Canadian law would be incomplete without a thorough analysis of how mushrooms and psilocybin are regulated in Canada today. 

Here’s everything you need to know.

Magic Mushrooms are Regulated Under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act

Magic mushrooms are not explicitly mentioned in the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act (CDSA). However, Psilocybin, the active ingredient in mushrooms, belongs to the list of Schedule III controlled substances which includes other recognized psychotropics, such as:

  • Methylphenidate (Ritalin/Concerta, used to treat ADHD)
  • Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)
  • Mescaline (Hallucinogenic, occurs naturally in Peyote cactus)
  • Dimethyltryptamine (DMT, a hallucinogenic compound produced by the human brain and associated with dreaming)

Possession of magic mushrooms in their natural state is still considered to constitute possession of psilocybin. The CDSA even states that any reference it makes to a controlled substance also includes a reference to any substance containing the controlled substance. 

Thus, all of the laws which apply to Schedule III controlled substances may be applied to psilocybin itself or to magic mushrooms in any form that contain psilocybin

Possession of Magic Mushrooms is Regulated in Canada

The CDSA prohibits anyone in Canada from possessing psilocybin or magic mushrooms except as authorized under Canadian law. Medical practitioners such as doctors, lawyers, or veterinarians, may be authorized under the regulations to prescribe psilocybin treatments to their patients. 

Patients seeking a prescription for magic mushrooms from a practitioner are required by law to disclose any other acquisitions of drugs in Schedule I, II, III, or IV, along with any prescriptions received for such substances in the past 30 days.

Selling of Magic Mushrooms is Regulated in Canada

The CDSA prohibits anyone from possessing magic mushrooms for the purpose of trafficking them to others.

Importing/Exporting Magic Mushrooms is Regulated in Canada

The CDSA prohibits anyone from importing or exporting magic mushrooms except as authorized under Canadian regulations.

Growing Magic Mushrooms is Regulated in Canada

The CDSA prohibits anyone from producing magic mushrooms in Canada.

How Are Magic Mushroom Laws Enforced in Canada?

The general trend in Canada is that enforcement of drug crimes is declining. The number of yearly arrests for drug-related offences has dramatically dropped by 30% in the last 5 years, as documented by Statistics Canada.

  • In 2015, police arrested 99,827 Canadians for drug-related offences.
  • In 2016, police made a total of 95,417 arrests in Canada for drug-related offences, 46% of which were for cannabis possession.
  • In 2017, the total number of arrests fell to 90,625 and just 42% were for cannabis possession.
  • In 2018, the total number of arrests fell again, this time to 84.927, driven in part by the legalization of cannabis in October same year. Still, cannabis-related offences accounted for 43% of all arrests.
  • In 2019, Canadian police made just 70,140 drug-related arrests and just 24% were related to cannabis.

And where were magic mushrooms in all this? Well, the Vancouver City Council recently voted to strike down a motion to crack down on magic mushroom vendors. We can also look to the emergence of new Psychedelics companies such as Numinus – the first Canadian company legally harvesting magic mushrooms.

There are many other promising developments in these areas, and arrests for possession rarely result in any major penalties for those with clean criminal records.

As a result of these considerations, the courts tend to show leniency to first-time offenders with a clear record, especially in cases of simple possession where the penalty for a first-offence is sometimes just a fine of $250-500.

Magic Mushrooms and Canadian Law: Indications of a Bright Future

Historically, the courts haven’t always agreed on whether magic mushrooms should be illegal in Canada. 

What’s also clear is that the Canadian lawmakers who pushed for prohibition were unaware of the medicinal benefits of psilocybin that have been uncovered by modern research into psychedelic substances. 

But now that those benefits are coming to the surface, we’re seeing our government and our courts change their stance on magic mushrooms. Just like when cannabis was legalized, we’re starting to see “soft changes” in how magic mushrooms are regulated that could ultimately lead to decriminalization and more widespread usage in the future. 

Below, we highlight some of the critical milestones that have been reached in the past five years for the legal status of magic mushrooms in Canada.

Magic Mushrooms are Openly Sold Online

Despite their questionable legal status, magic mushrooms are openly sold online in Canada. Digital dispensaries sell a variety of shroom products to Canadians over 19 years of age, with or without a medical prescription. The authorities know about these dispensaries but have chosen to focus their limited resources on criminal activities involving more harmful drugs.

Vancouver City Council Killed Motion to Crack Down on Psilocybin Sales

The lack of political will to prosecute Canadians for magic mushrooms has never been more clearly evident than it was on September 11th, 2019, in a meeting of the Vancouver city council.

This was when Councillor Melissa De Genova filed a motion with the title: “Deterring and Preventing the Distribution and Sale of Psilocybin Mushrooms and/or Other Illicit or Controlled Drugs Unlawfully Sold in the City of Vancouver”.

Breaking the fourth wall here for a moment, I can honestly say that I have never witnessed any occurrence of a government body who introduced a motion on whether or not it should enforce the de facto laws of the land. Why should politicians need to file a motion that mandates police to do their job? Aren’t the police already mandated to do their job?

The truth is that the police are too busy dealing with the impacts of hard drugs like opioids to bother chasing people around for magic mushrooms, especially now that they’ve been associated with positive health benefits for so many people. 

In any case, other councillors characterized the motion as “anti-drug hysteria” and it was defeated in a 6-2 vote.

Magic Mushroom Growing Kits and Spores are Legal

While the practice of cultivating magic mushrooms is technically illegal, magic mushroom spores and growing kits may be purchased in Canada, both in stores and online. It is not explicitly legal to purchase these kits, but nowhere is it prohibited and the kits themselves do not contain any psilocybin. 

It may be illegal under 7.1(1) of the CDSA to sell mushroom growing kits, as they will be used to produce a controlled substance, however, the sale of mushroom kits is a common and generally tolerated practice.

Magic Mushrooms Approved for Palliative Patients

In April of 2020, four Canadians in palliative care with terminal illnesses petitioned the Canadian Health Ministry for a legal exemption that would allow them to use magic mushrooms to relieve the depression and anxiety associated with dying. 

On August 4th, it was revealed that their request had been granted and they would be the first four people to legally use magic mushrooms in Canada since the Supreme Court decision of 1982, a period of 28 years. Since then, at least 7 other legal exemptions have been awarded for psilocybin use, including at least 1 exemption for a non-palliative case.

Ministry of Health Supports Research into Psychotropics

At the beginning of this article, we talked about some of the research that has uncovered new benefits of magic mushrooms that were previously not known. 

The promising results obtained in these studies have led Health Canada to hand out more legal exemptions to health professionals who wish to conduct research and develop therapies involving psilocybin. 

In December 2020, Health Canada granted 16 exemptions to a selection of social workers and medical professionals. This gave them permission to possess and use psilocybin themselves, without the risk of legal consequences, for the purpose of developing new treatment protocols for patients.

Growing Magic Mushrooms Could Soon Be Legal for Medicinal Purposes

In the year 2000, the Ontario Court of Appeals determined that Canada’s anti-cannabis laws were unconstitutional because they did not provide an exemption for medical use. 

This, the court said, violated the individual’s right to “life, liberty, and security of the person” as outlined in Section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The legal precedent established here is essentially that the government shouldn’t prohibit a private citizen from being prescribed a medicine that can improve their quality of life. This designation might not have applied to magic mushrooms six or seven years ago, but with the new research and developments we’re seeing, it sure seems to apply today. 

If precedent holds, it could mean that Canadians have a constitutional right to access medicinal psilocybin or even to grow it for personal use.

Magic Mushrooms and Canadian Law: What’s Next?

It appears that magical mushrooms are on the same path to legality that cannabis started on in 2001.

While magic mushrooms are still technically illegal, individuals are rarely prosecuted for simple possession and penalties for first-time offenders usually consist of a fine that costs less than a traffic ticket.

The general trend of drug enforcement is on the decline and government bodies like the Vancouver City Council have voted not to ramp up enforcement activities against psilocybin dispensaries, both online and in the city.

It’s also important to look at what’s happening across the border. Magic mushrooms are still illegal the federal level in the United States, but simple possession has already been decriminalized in places like:

  • Ann Arbor, Michigan,
  • Denver, Colorado,
  • Oakland, California,
  • Santa Cruz, California,
  • Washington, D.C
  • Oregon

Magic mushrooms will be legal for use in supervised clinical settings in Oregon as of February, 2021.

In the future, we expect to see more legal exemptions for magic mushroom usage, both for medical professionals who wish to conduct studies and develop treatments and for private individuals who wish to enjoy the health benefits of psilocybin. 

More research is now being conducted into the health benefits of magic mushrooms than at any other time in our history. We believe this research will only yield additional evidence of the health benefits of magic mushrooms. As this body of evidence continues to grow, Canadians who claim the constitutional right to access medical psilocybin will start having their voices heard.

If all of the above holds true, the question isn’t “if” magic mushrooms will be legal in Canada one day – but “when?” and “how?”.

One path to legality involves the Federal government choosing to remove psilocybin from the list of Schedule III substances. This could depend very much on how Canadians vote: while Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has stated that he won’t consider decriminalizing drugs besides cannabis while he is in office, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has publicly stated his intention to decriminalize all illegal drugs if elected. 

The other path is a successful constitutional challenge, alleging that Canadians have the right to grow and possess magic mushrooms for medical purposes. If we collectively assert our rights to life, liberty, and security of the person, our government should recognize that access to beneficial medicine, including psilocybin, is protected under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

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