Jada, Jaden, and Will Smith have all used psychedelics. Here’s why Hollywood’s favorite family says personal wellness makes them better people.
In the recent episode of Jada Pinkett Smith’s Red Table Talk Facebook show, son Jaden, 23, opened up about his use of psilocybin “magic mushrooms.”
“I had an experience and during that experience, I understood what ego was for the first time,” the rapper said. “It was always in my had talking, telling me what I was and what I wasn’t, and for the first time I had ego dissolution, where I was like, “that was the moment that really changed me,'” Smith said.
“You get to a place in your life where you’re blocked by something, whether it’s trauma, whether it’s your emotions, your ego,” he said. “You’re not being able to express yourself and then I feel like psychedelics are a way to tear down that wall and see what’s beyond it.”
Smith says he turned to psychedelics to help figure things out in his life—it’s not about just “getting high” or recreational use, he said. He stressed the importance of taking psychedelics in a safe setting, even with trip guides. He says psychedelics should be used medicinally, to bring about “profound change” in someone’s life.
“Profound change” is easy to pinpoint in the multi-hyphenate entrepreneur and rapper’s ventures. He has long been altruistic; he’s been feeding the unhoused community in Los Angeles for several years through his vegan “I Love You” food truck. The Just Water company he started alongside his father donated water to the families in Flint, Michigan, impacted by the city’s water contamination crisis. He’s also brought sustainability into his MSFTS brand and other fashion collaborations.
All in the family
Psychedelic use runs in the family. Pinkett Smith told her son during the Red Table episode that she had struggled with depression for a long time. “I mean, crippling depression,” she said.
She says that plant medicine not only helps you feel better, but she says, “it helps you solve the problems of how you got there in the first place.”
A growing body of research points to psychedelics as a viable treatment option for depression, specifically for treatment-resistant depression. That’s defined as an inadequate response to at least one adequate trial period of an antidepressant. Antidepressants fail for an estimated 50-60 percent of patients diagnosed with depression.
Clinical trials have shown long-lasting results in reducing depression symptoms from just one psilocybin experience. Last year, Oregon became the first state to legalize psilocybin for clinical use such as in the treatment of depression.
Will Smith also recently opened up about his experiences with ayahuasca, the DMT-based plant medicine favored by celebrities including Machine Gun Kelly and Megan Fox. He ventured to Peru, where the plant brew is commonly used by Indigenous cultures, during a separation period from Pinkett Smith. He took the potent medicine 14 times, he revealed in his new memoir, Will.
“I was floating deep in outer space,” he wrote in his memoir about the experience, “I was trillions of light-years away from earth.”
He said the experience led him to a deep sense of self-love that made him question his career and his relationship. “If I’m this beautiful, I don’t need #1 movies to feel good about myself. If I’m this beautiful, I don’t need hit records to feel worthy of love. If I’m this beautiful, I don’t need Jada or anyone else to validate me,” he wrote. The couple eventually reconciled, but have adopted an open relationship approach to their marriage, although they keep the parameters loosely defined.
Will’s latest venture is the Disney+ series Welcome to Earth that sees him take a David Attenborough-esque explorers approach to the planet, raising awareness about its sacredness.
“We think we know our planet, but there’s still a secret world to be discovered,” Smith says in the trailer. “If you go to the right place, with the right guide, you might just find a portal into it.”