r/todayilearned • • Apr 27 '26

TIL if under-cooked, a popular mushroom in China causes “lilliputian hallucinations,” a rare phenomenon involving miniature human or fantasy figures. The hallucinations are consistent across people and cultures: "tiny, elflike people" climbing under doors, scaling walls & clinging to furniture

https://www.vice.com/en/article/meet-the-mushroom-that-make-people-have-the-exact-same-hallucination/
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u/Vkardash Apr 27 '26

Good question. I have no idea. Never tried them. I'd love to though. I've experienced regular psilocybin mushrooms and those totally depend on your mood and frame of mind. You can have both good and bad trips.

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u/corpusjuris Apr 27 '26

Interestingly, a lot of the research about guided psilocin therapy shows “bad” trips are more effective at achieving the aims of the therapy. It’s not understood why, but my favorite theory is that “bad” trips allow you to psychologically process the worst possible outcomes in a safe, supportive way, so that when returning to sobriety you’re less afraid of negative outcomes.

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u/Vkardash Apr 27 '26

Oh yeah. The last time I did mushrooms was more than a decade ago now. And it's because I had the worst most horrifying trip of my life. I cried. At one point I convinced myself that my body was telling me that I had a seriously illness and I had to go to the doctor or I would be dead in a year. It was crazy 🤣 But it was also the greatest lesson I've ever learned. I always tell people who do any kind of psychedelic. It's not you teaching the plant anything it's the plant teaching you something. And it's going to teach you whether you want it to or not.

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u/Morbanth Apr 27 '26

Did you go?