Amanita Muscaria: Religion, Folklore and Medicinal Microdosing
The weather outside is frightful, and so is your family dynamic. Trip on mushrooms with your family and set things straight! That’s what New Year resolutions are all about, right? In histories of yore specifically in shamanic cultures of the north, Nordic families would take this time year to distribute dried Amanita Muscaria caps amongst the individuals in the household as gifts during the holiday season. Gifts of reconciliation, intuition and ancestral healing? Seems so - when Amanita Muscaria is involved. To this day homage to the fairytale Amanita Muscaria lays embedded on the wall, on a pillow, in a book. The Amanita Muscaria was harvested during rainy fall weather and dried to be presented during the cold, dark winter. Amanita muscaria’s ties to the Santa Mythology are clear: Red and white colors, the Christmas pine tree, the red and white wrapped gifts… originally Amanita Muscaria caps - underneath the tree. Flying reindeer are said to have consumed the psychoactive mushroom pre-flight and shamans would even drink their urine - which contained concentrated amounts of its magical indoles. Although we do not recommend consumption of reindeer pee, we definitely do recommend micro-dosing sacred mushrooms with your family to heal the dynamic. More on this to come!
Fly Agaric, Amanita Muscaria or as I like to call her, Queen of the Forest - our beloved mushroom has many names. Here in Alaska we harvest our own Amanita Muscaria from super-clean, forested areas. In the north there is a powerful link between the birch trees and medicinal mushrooms. Many diverse polypores such as chaga, birch polypore, turkey tail and iqmik depend on the birch - as well as the Amanita Muscaria. Amanita intertwines her mycelial network within the root systems of the birch trees. Amanita absorbs elements from the soil - so it is very important to harvest in clean areas where no known toxic substances are found.
When I harvest my Amanita Muscaria - in the fast and furious fruiting that must last me until the following years harvest - I sing songs to the mushroom and the forest. The forest during fall time in Alaska is an active place for large wild animals - and I like to make my presence known. We carry protection, but I also like to give the moose and bears a loud heads-up so we can maneuver around each other with plenty of space.
I sing to the mushrooms in gratitude for what they do for me. The fungal kingdom has an essence, much like we humans do. They are some of my biggest helpers, guides, teachers and allies. When I harvest Amanita Muscaria, my partner Dennis is often there helping me - he likes to harvest King Boletes at the same time - which we later craft into delicious, wild spice blends.AmanitaMuscaria caps contain varying quantities of five or more psychoactive indoles - including muscarine, muscazone, ibotenic acid and 5-MEO DMT. The most highly concentrated part of this magical fungal ally is contained in the layer between the red outer cap and the meat of the cap/gills. When smoking the Amanita Muscaria, this thin, red cap, along with any white specs from the universal veil - is dried, scraped clean of its gills and utilized. I like to blend my Amanita Muscaria caps with Kinnik Kinnik for smoking. I do not smoke Amanitaoften - but smoking Amanita, like all Amanita use (unless macro-dosed) has been a very subtle yet powerful experience for me. My usual methods of microdose consumption for Amanita Muscaria is in dried and in capsule form - either alone or blended with synergistic ingredients, mixed with honey, in a tincture, or topically as an oil infusion with healing and euphoric essential oils. These are all products that I create and offer to members of our private mushroom ministry. If you want to join the non-denominational, non-dogmatic mushroom ministry you can send me an email at minister@churchofthesacredfruit.org
If you want to check out our public online apothecary you can go to chaimedicinals.org
Amanita Muscaria can be utilized in a variety of ways as a sacred mushroom / organic technology. If you would like to learn more about microdosing AmanitaMuscaria, as well as the sacred blue psilocybin mushrooms, you can check out this zoom event that my dear sister cohort Lucibel Nunez and I presented recently here on youtube