I think you're ending up splitting hairs here, starting out by initially (apparently) saying drugs should be avoided, but then coming around to the position that LSD or mushrooms would be much better than MDMA, even though plenty of others would warn people off LSD and mushrooms in just the same way as you've done with MDMA.

It's tricky talking about drugs that are illegal and that can be harmful, but can also be highly beneficial and safe when taken under the right conditions. Let's try to avoid blanket condemnations and moralising; HN is meant to be a place for more nuanced discussions than that.

MDMA has for several decades been widely reported, anecdotally, to bring about profound, lasting, changes in people's emotional states, and to set them on long-term journeys of personal growth. And in recent years many governments around the world have green-lit medical trials into its benefits for various kinds of emotional/psychiatric conditions, though of course few people have access to these trials.

So, let's not be so dismissive of someone being open enough to share their personal experience.

I’ve taken both lsd and mushrooms (the latter were perfectly legal in the UK and were openly sold in London high street stores). Both were interesting but neither helped in the same way.

Nobody does; he's providing an anecdote.

Not a requirement but a catalyst. It makes it happen faster than it would have otherwise