Hello fellow Nexians.
This coming weekend I am planning on using mushrooms with a fellow friend. He does not have any prior experience with any psychedelics, though he has had a first MDMA experience a while back. I usually trip solo as I don't have many friends to trip with, but I really want to make sure my friend has a great experience his first time. I want to prepare myself as much as possible to guide him as well as I possibly can.

As for dosage, I am planning to give my friend 7-8 grams of fresh sclerotia (magic truffles), probably Atlantis, possibly Mexicana. I myself will probably be taking around 10 grams. A sober sitter will be present as well. The one thing I have set my mind on is taking the mushrooms in the early evening in a secluded area outdoors. I always find the experience much more beautiful surrounded by nature, and I think it would make the come-up a bit easier for him rather than when surrounded by apartment walls.

I will be informing him to fast for a few hours before taking them, try to explain the general flow of a trip to him beforehand, and advise him to gently go with the experience. In the event that he should get some bad vibes I will tell him to breathe in and out in a relaxing manner (this is what helps me when things get rough) and help talk him through it. I'll also provide plenty of drinks, blankets and pillows, and relaxing music. He is one of the most mature friends I have, and there is a lot of mutual trust. Still, it's hard to prepare someone for such an experience, and it's even harder to do so without scaring them off. I don't want to provide him with a ton of what-if scenarios that will only make him more anxious for the come-up.

Any other tips on what I could do to help my friend have the best possible experience his first time?

Sounds like you've done a great job at preparing. I can't think of much more to add except when I got into some strife on a strong LSD trip, my sitter successfully calmed me down by distracting me with new activities - "hey let's go over here and get this" "look at that it's amazing". That worked really well for me. In my experience as long as the set and setting are good, there is hardly anything to worry about.

When I did mushrooms for the first time I was doing it together with two friends and to properly prepare myself I spent quite some time surfing the net looking for information on dealing with psychedelics and guiding others. I have found various guides on it but the one thing that saved my ass(literally as one of my friends freaked out badly and I had to guide him through the experience) was this movie from MAPS:
What to do during a psychedelic crisis

The tips from the clip helped me during later trips deal with negative and bad emotions as well. Further I advice your friend to read this blog post on how to prevent a psychedelic crisis and why it works.

Question: Why dose your friend lower than yourself? My first time I had 10g of sclerotia per person and we each agreed that anything less would've given us a much lesser experience.

Good luck and happy tripping!

Sound advice, thanks for reminding me. I absolutely know this feeling, even just getting out of the couch and getting a glass of water or a quick visit to the bathroom can get me out of some bad vibes. That's why I also opted to spend the come-up outdoors. It is considerably more intimidating in an enclosed space, especially for a first timer.





You might have a point there as well. I have used dosages inbetween threshold and medium experience that were fairly uncomfortable, since it gave me all of the mindtrickery without any visuals or any truly valuable experience. I agree 10g each would probably be a better dose, and a good introduction to the mushroom experience without pushing it too far.

Also thanks for the links, I've read a couple of these "psychological crisis" articles in the past myself, but yours had a few points that are not often mentioned. I'm sure we'll have a good time, thanks again for the replies guys