Mormons on Mushrooms

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Mike opens up about unemployment, the fear of an uncertain future, and the old Mormon voice that still wonders whether life falling apart means he has wandered from the path.

Then comes a three-night bender involving dissertation-celebration shots, an EDM concert, burlesque, and more—and a passionate defense of Mike’s place among the world’s greatest 46 year-old Olivia Rodrigo fans. 

After the crash comes a return to simplicity through Kundalini yoga, sunrise chanting, sound baths, and an honest conversation about the blurry line between medicine and drugs. We also reveal the artwork and release plans for our first two Christmas singles before sending Doug into the wilds of Nashville for some sacred “Doug time.”

Content note: This episode contains candid discussion of substances, alcohol, psychedelics, and strong language.

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If you can’t trust the skunk man, who can you trust?

Doug’s latest wildlife crisis leads us into Idaho politics: official rifles, declaring English the state language, restricting ballot initiatives, reproductive rights, and the strange version of “freedom” that protects your right to carry a gun while limiting everyone else’s choices.

From there, we talk about returning to the practices that keep us human—movement, ritual, music, and feeling emotions without getting trapped in their stories. Mike explores how his environment shapes his identity through the lens of Human Design, while Doug reflects on authenticity, spiritual evolution, and allowing the people we love to find their own way without forcing an outcome.

Also: eating creatures, foraging with Australian hippies, forgotten Audible credits, and the possibility that Doug himself has been the skunk man all along.

Content note: This episode includes discussion of reproductive rights, religious harm, and strong language.

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Mike is back from two weeks in Europe—and possibly the most soul-filling trip of his life. Attending his first gay wedding in a Scottish castle brings his anger toward the Mormon Church rushing back: an institution that stands against love and joy like this isn’t merely misguided—its stance is wicked, even diabolical. We talk about why compassion for believers can’t mean softening the harm, along with missions, invasive bishop interviews, and the challenge of choosing your own moral compass over inherited doctrine.

Along the way: getting drunk and lost in Copenhagen, befriending strangers, and seeing 82-year-old Beverly Glenn-Copeland perform beneath an open sky. That experience leads into Doug’s weekend tracking vocals for Bombadilio—and the fear, insecurity, and exhilaration of hearing your own voice from inside the recording booth.

Finally, Mike reflects on the loneliness beneath the adventure and the grief that found him alone in a Copenhagen cemetery at night. Because apparently a trip can’t change your life without asking you to feel all of it.

Content note: This episode contains discussion of religious homophobia, invasive sexual questioning of minors, grief, alcohol, and strong language.

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Five years after first releasing our conversation with Existential Kink author Carolyn Elliott, we return to Episode 40 in memory of a guest whose warmth, wit, and ideas have stayed with us.

We begin with a new introduction reflecting on the early days of Mormons on Mushrooms, the generosity Carolyn brought to this conversation, and how our relationship with shadow work has evolved. Mike questions the temptation to use the unconscious for egoic gains and wonders whether we can approach our patterns with more curiosity and less relentless digging. Doug explores his own attraction to secrecy.

Then we revisit our original conversation with Carolyn about existential kink: the unconscious pleasure hidden inside rejection, scarcity, humiliation, frustration, and other experiences we consciously claim not to want. We explore the “good boy” conditioning of Mormonism, Doug’s missionary rejection kink, Mike’s encounter with the angry and instinctual parts beneath his Mormon niceness, and the difference between acknowledging a desire and acting it out.

The conversation expands into psychedelics, religious repression, collective shadow, racism, good and evil, compassion, and what it might mean to love the parts of ourselves we would rather pretend do not exist.

Carolyn was delightful, provocative, generous, and completely herself. We’re grateful we had the chance to speak with her—and deeply sad that we never got to take her up on that invitation to trip together.

Topics include:

• Remembering Carolyn Elliott
• Existential kink and Jungian shadow work
• The unconscious pleasure inside recurring patterns
• Mormon repression and “good boy” conditioning
• Rejection, secrecy, confession, and shame
• When shadow work becomes another form of self-punishment
• Curiosity versus endlessly digging for wounds
• Psychedelics and plant medicine
• Collective shadow, racism, and inherited patterns
• Holding compassion for the parts of ourselves that frighten us

Note: The original interview is presented as it was recorded. References to Carolyn’s programs, contact information, and upcoming events reflect the time of the original publication.

Content note: This episode contains a brief disclosure of childhood sexual abuse, along with discussion of psychedelics, addiction, sexual themes, and strong language

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Six years, six seasons, and one slightly delayed anniversary later—we’re back, baby.

After a summer filled with concerts, funerals, psychedelics, work transitions, travel plans, and an unreasonable number of DoorDash bananas, we catch up on everything that’s happened during the break.

Mike reflects on losing his job after sixteen years, finishing his dissertation proposal, and the strange polarity between newfound freedom and panic about what comes next. We also revisit the tribute concert for Kevin, remember Carolyn Elliott and the lasting impact of Existential Kink, and unpack a psychedelic journey that briefly descended into madness—and may have opened something in Mike’s voice before nearly destroying it.

Doug opens up about the unexpected death of his soulmate dog, Ozzie Bear, and the grief that followed. His dad offers one of the most beautiful lessons of the episode: “We share our grief with our loved ones so that they can help us carry it.”

Finally, we return to our roots with a conversation about Mormonism: friends leaving the Church fourteen years after we did, institutional changes that feel more operational than prophetic, leadership roulette, the contradictions of personal revelation, and the absence of a clear moral voice in a moment that desperately needs one.

Season seven begins exactly where it should: somewhere between grief and laughter, Mormonism and mushrooms, madness and meaning.

Topics include:

• Remembering Carolyn Elliott
• Kevin’s tribute concert and the healing power of music
• Psychedelic madness, ritual containers, and integration
• Layoffs, freedom, fear, and life outside the cage
• World Cup withdrawals and Wrexham time-zone confusion
• Grieving Ozzie Bear and refusing to gatekeep grief
• Why more longtime Mormons may be leaving
• Operational revelation, prophetic silence, and the Church as a business

Content note: This episode includes discussion of death, pet loss, psychedelics, and strong language.

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A week after The Reckoning — the biggest show of their lives — Mike and Doug are still riding the high. They recap it all: the nerves and lost voices beforehand, playing with a real band for the first time, the moment 30 people got up to dance, and watching their old Mormons on Mushrooms community show up transformed. 

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Mike's first music festival. Three days in Napa, LSD at noon, a boathouse on the river, and strangers keep asking if they're playing here. They're not — but something about being mistaken for rock stars at Bottle Rock makes June 13th feel inevitable. Also: what Dionysian masculinity looks like when women are standing on shoulders, and why worrying about the future is a lot harder to do when you're dancing in wine country with your best friend.

June Concert - RSVP Link

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A week together in Idaho has a way of surfacing things. Doug hears himself on a recording and has to sit with what he finds. Mike discovers he's more mystic than mechanic — and that statues find you when you're ready. Also: golf, piercings, six beers, and a Michael Jackson movie nobody planned on seeing.

June Concert - RSVP Link

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The church is changing the names of it's young women age groups and is suing Mormon Stories, and somehow all of it connects — tithing scams, Prop 8 money, the MAGA cult, and what happens when you've been off the hamster wheel long enough to actually see it spinning. Also: Mormonism, Scientology, and the possibility they use the same marketing firm.

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This week: a surprise visit from a ghost of missions past — and Doug's suspects a group effort to bring him back to the church. Also, the question of what you'd actually do if money wasn't the thing, Mike turns 46 and has some feelings about it, and two guys getting way too excited about a backyard concert.

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