Mormons on Mushrooms
Mormons on Mushrooms is a storytelling podcast hosted by Mike and Doug, where we explore alternative methods for healing and living a fulfilling life—especially in the aftermath of losing faith, certainty, or identity. We cover a wide range of topics, from music, mythology, and pop culture to spirituality, psychology, psychedelics, and all of the magic and mystery that life has to offer.
Episodes
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 w...
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.
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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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Mike and Doug sit down with the legendary Brady and Meg Parks from The National Parks to talk about writing and recording a new album on their own—late nights in a backyard studio, kids asleep inside, and songs coming together in a chaotic mess until something clicks. They get into co-writing as a couple, dropping ego, and letting the music be less polished and more real—crickets, mistakes, and all.
The c...
Mike and Doug bounce from Neil Diamond, the Oscars and current events into a wider, more personal conversation about privilege—where it shows up, how it gets talked about, and how it can mess with your sense of self. Along the way, they circle questions of shame, responsibility, identity, and the pressure to either defend yourself or shrink. It’s not a linear conversation and it doesn’t try to land...
Mike and Doug talk about grief. After the sudden loss of a close friend, the conversation turns to the strange waves that follow death—the contractions of sadness, memory, anger, and love that move through the body if you let them. They reflect on childhood encounters with death, the different ways people grieve, and how tools like therapy, psychedelics, meditation, and music have changed their relationship to...
Mike and Doug explore what it actually means to be yourself in a world constantly offering scripts. What begins as a conversation about shrinking, privilege, and cultural pressure turns into something more personal: what makes you the most you? The episode wrestles with the tension between self-awareness and self-erasure, humility and hiding, growth and authenticity. Instead of performing strength or apologizing for...
Mike and Doug reflect on the Super Bowl halftime backlash, Bad Bunny, and the manufactured outrage of the 24-hour news cycle, using it as a doorway into something deeper. The conversation moves through Mormonism, colonialism, whiteness, sexuality, and repression, circling the tension between reverence and embodiment. From Hawaii baptisms and altar mishaps to crotch-grabbing moral panics and religious seriousness, th...
Mike and Doug recount a cathartic, slightly unhinged weekend in Utah full of music, laughter, rituals, and deep connection. From a racist Uber ride and wandering the Joseph Smith Memorial building to writing a new song about living again, the episode moves through politics, spirituality, grief, and creativity without losing its joy. At the center is something simple and necessary: being alive together, making art, a...
Mike and Doug are joined by Adam as they wrap up the year with a loose, live Best of 2025 episode. They trade Top 10 lists covering standout movies and TV (Knives Out, Severance, Sinners), music and concerts, sports highs, travel moments, and the creative thrill of recording original songs together.
The conversation drifts into art vs. commerce, why TV feels dumber, travel in Europe, pride in Amsterdam, the awe of th...
Mike and Doug sip eggnog and red wine, trade stories, and play a handful of original Christmas songs—some joyful, some aching, all deeply felt. Along the way they talk Santa, Jesus, solstice, grief, family, belief, and what it means to reclaim Christmas after faith falls apart. Cozy, chaotic, sincere, and full of heart.
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Mike and Doug revisit the Mormon mythos and the Book of Mormon, from headless Shiz gasping for breath to Utah’s mission-call pageantry and the culty performance of modern Mormonism. Doug reads from the book of Ether while Mike keeps interrupting with memories and myth, and somehow it all circles back to Jesus, ayahuasca, and The NeverEnding Story. A mix of laughter, rage, reverence, and the strange beauty of w...
*Fixed an audio issue in the previous version where the guitar playing was silenced / trimmed
A hilarious, stoned wander through smoke alarms, old drafts, and Mormon boyhood that somehow morphs into Mike and Doug opening up about how music saved their asses. From first songs to personal meltdowns to the magic moments when melodies just “arrive,” this one’s a messy, heartfelt love note to friendship ...
From hotel revelations to Book of Mormon fan fiction — Mike and Doug catch up after a month apart to talk faith, fantasy, and the messy beauty of the in-between. They wander through Mormon nostalgia, creative purpose, and what it means to enjoy life without an endgame.
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An exploration of art, money, and meaning — from Twain’s hustle to the Beatles’ breakup, Nashville bars to AI-generated songs. Mike and Doug wrestle with the paradox of creating for love versus chasing success, and what it means to keep the soul in the work
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Mike and Doug dive into Mark Twain and Beatles deep cuts, swap stories about their own songwriting, and laugh about Care Bear hats at a Darius Rucker show. The talk drifts into authenticity, slowing down creatively, and Doug’s raw reflections on health, ego, and the fear of being “phony.”
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Mike and Doug catch up after their Idaho trip and reflect on the stories we tell ourselves. Doug shares an experience in his yard where a snake encounter turned suddenly when his dog Ozzy bit it in half. The moment sparked reflection on presence, seriousness, and experiencing life as a waking dream.
They also talk about:
- Valley folk vs. mountain folk, and local identity.
- The confusion between names like Kurt and Ki...
Mike reunites with Glenn Ostlund of Infants on Thrones to kick off a new series on the Gene Keys. They dive into Glenn’s new book You’re Not Broken, Just Rewiring, explore Gene Key 51 (Agitation → Initiative → Awakening), and share raw stories of faith, separation, creativity, and transformation.
You're Not Broken... Just Rewiring
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