I was born in Tashkent on March 10, 1979. My father is an engineer and has four patented inventions, one of which was once demonstrated at the Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy in Tashkent. My mother is a criminal defense lawyer. Both my grandfathers were military officers and died in the line of duty.
In 1995, after several years of post-Soviet turmoil, our family emigrated to the United States. Our first stop was Brooklyn.
I earned my first money in America with a shovel—shoveling snow in Brooklyn during the winter. It was my first experience of how things worked differently in a new country than they did back home. No one knew who your father was or who your grandparents were. There was just you, a shovel, and a snowdrift by the porch.
What should Pavel finish writing?
One or two personal memories of Tashkent—something specific: a smell, a street, a person, an event. This brings the text to life.
what I felt when I left - one or two vivid phrases, not an essay
What Brooklyn was like in 1995 for a fifteen-year-old boy from Tashkent: what caught my eye, what was difficult, what was surprising
About snow removal and my first part-time jobs: how much they paid, who I worked for, and what it felt like. What was my first "real" job after shoveling? One or two vivid details.
▸ Photos
An archival photo of a child or teenager in Tashkent
family photo (parents, military grandparents, if appropriate)
early years in the United States
At nineteen, I was hospitalized with an abdominal hernia—I was seriously involved in strength training at the time. The surgery itself was routine. But what happened to me under anesthesia was the moment my life took a different turn.
[NEXT is Pavel's story. Several paragraphs.]
▸ What should Pavel finish writing (CRITICAL)
what exactly happened under anesthesia—a description, not an interpretation. What I saw, what I felt, how I realized what it was.
what happened after - how did you get out of it, what changed in your perception, how did you start thinking differently?
The first reaction of the parents and doctors - was there an understanding that something unusual had happened, or did Pavel keep it to himself?
Crucially, this section must be honest and personal. Not stylized as "spiritual experience." No "light," "voices," or "revelations"—unless that's exactly what happened, in which case write exactly as it happened.
▸ Photos
No need. This block is text, on a white background, a lot of empty space.
After what happened in the hospital, I became interested in psychology, hypnosis, and altered states of consciousness. That was the background. In the foreground, I needed to organize my life in a foreign country, and I tried my hand at various things.
I helped people with immigration. I was involved in trucking—I had a period with trucks. I worked in real estate. Each of these ventures brought in money, but none of them made me feel like I belonged.
[NEXT — Pavel talks about specific years and projects, about what he was looking for and didn’t find, about disappointment in every endeavor]
At the same time, I experimented a lot. I tried most of the known psychoactive substances—LSD, ayahuasca, ketamine, MDMA, mushrooms—in different contexts and with different vehicles. This was the 2000s and early 2010s, when this movement was sweeping across Western culture. I was looking for answers where conventional psychology couldn't reach.
[NEXT — Pavel about this stage: what he was looking for, what he found, what was disappointing in random experiments without continuity and structure]
I think the main thing I've realized over the years is that most people aren't living their own lives. They move by inertia, choosing what others choose, and then wonder why nothing works. Everyone has a calling—a cause driven by something greater than reason. While you're headed in the wrong direction, no amount of effort will yield results. While you're headed in the right direction, circumstances begin to unfold on their own.
What should Pavel finish writing?
Specific years and chronology of businesses: immigration → trucks → real estate (in what order, in what years approximately)
one or two stories from each period - what was good, what was disappointing
About experiments with substances: what were the most powerful experiments before Ecuador, what did they reveal?
the moment when it became finally clear that I needed to take hypnotherapy seriously—what was the catalyst?
On calling—Pavel's personal thoughts in his own words. Not a sermon, but an observation from his own journey.
The tone of this section is the most humane on the entire page. Here, Pavel isn't a success story, but a seeker. This creates strong empathy in premium readers, because almost everyone has experienced working "out of place." There's no need to hide failures or embellish them—on the contrary.
▸ Photos
If there is archival footage from different periods (trucks, real estate office) - great, it adds a documentary feel
If not, leave the block as text, without a photo.
In 2004, I studied with Richard Bandler, the co-founder of neurolinguistic programming and the man who essentially created what we now call NLP. The following year, I went to study with Gerald Cain, a student of the classic American hypnosis teacher Dave Elman.
[NEXT – personal from Pavel: why hypnosis after everything he's tried. What Bandler was like in person. What studying with Kane was like.]
That same year, 2005, I opened a private practice in Miami and founded the American Academy of Hypnosis. At first, I worked with private clients in South Florida. Among my clients were a wide variety of people: from those trying to quit smoking to those with deep psychological trauma.
[NEXT—what Pavel learned about the profession in his first years. What experiences stuck in his memory. How his approach changed.]
What should Pavel finish writing?
Why hypnosis and not classical psychotherapy? What attracted me after all the experiments?
Bandler in person – one or two details from the training. What I took from him, what I didn't.
studying with Kane - what kind of person is he, what was the transfer of knowledge like
one or two memorable client cases (no names, general) - what they made you understand about the profession
How the practice developed in the early years. Stages: from one client per week to a constant flow
▸ Photos
photo with Bandler or Kane, if available
early years of practice in Miami - office, furnishings
Academy: office, first groups of students
By 2019, I had fourteen years of private practice and several thousand clients under my belt. I understood what Bandler and Cain had taught me, not as a student, but as a practitioner with my own method. And it became clear to me that this knowledge needed to be shared.
[NEXT – about the ceremonial experience in which clarity regarding HypnoCoaching came. The wording has been repackaged: not "the spirit gave the assignment," but "in one of my early ceremonial workings, I had a powerful experience of clarity regarding what to do next." Pavel provides the specific details himself.]
I trusted this vision. A few months later, I launched "HypnoCoaching"—a twelve-module program that has served over 300,000 graduates in over thirty countries since 2019. The program covers hypnotherapy techniques, regression work, a holistic approach to clients, and building one's own practice.
[NEXT: What Pavel learned as a teacher. What differentiates him from being a therapist. What memorable stories his students told him.]
What should Pavel finish writing?
the exact or approximate date of that ceremonial experience (important - this was before 2019, before the launch of the program)
How to describe the experience itself: calmly, without esoteric cliches. What I saw, what I understood. What happened after—how I trusted.
What unexpectedly turned out to be in the role of a teacher - what is different from the role of a therapist
one or two stories of disciples who discovered something in Pavel himself
Crucially, the tone: premium readers don't dismiss mystical experiences—Pollan and Davis describe theirs in detail. What they do dismiss are formulations like "the spirit gave me the task of making a million" and "those who obey get results." The same story, repackaged as a personal experience of clarity and trust in intuition, is far more powerful.
▸ Photos
filming of training, groups
course recording studio
alumni meetings
In 2020, I traveled to Ecuador for the first time. By then, I had fifteen years of private practice and experience with various substances in a wide variety of contexts. I wasn't going to study. I was going to see how things work in a place where tradition remains intact.
[NEXT – personal: how Pavel ended up among the Kichwa, who introduced him, what his first impressions were. What didn't live up to expectations.]
Over the next three years, I returned again and again. I lived in Kichwa and Tzachila communities in Ecuador and worked with the Mazatecs in Huautla de Jiménez, a village in Oaxaca, Mexico, the birthplace of the very ceremonial tradition that the Western world learned about in 1957 through R. Gordon Wasson's essay on the healer María Sabina.
I arrived as a practicing hypnotherapist. I left each time with a different understanding of what I do.
[CONTINUE – Pavel talks about the parallels between his work with the subconscious and what he observed in traditional ceremony. This is the page's strongest point – that's why premium readers read Davis and Pollan.]
What should Pavel finish writing?
How I first came to Ecuador. Who introduced me, who I went to first.
The names of one or two traditional teachers you studied with (with permission). This is a huge asset for credibility—but only if you have the teachers' consent.
one specific moment of fieldwork that I remember - in human terms, without esotericism
The parallel between hypnotherapy and ceremonial work, as Pavel sees it. This is the very intellectual position that distinguishes him from the average coach.
what has changed in him over the past three years
▸ Photos (the most photogenic block)
Kichwa and Tsachila communities
landscapes of Ecuador, Amazon
Huautla de Jimenez, Oaxaca
If available, please include a photo with traditional teachers (with their permission)
community life, houses, ceremonial buildings
Fundamentally: NO close-up photos of mushrooms, ritual objects, or staged "shamanic" shots. Only live work and real people in their natural environment. This is the line between Wade Davis and an Instagram psychonaut.
By 2023, I had a clear understanding of what I needed to do next. It wasn't just about continuing my private practice, it wasn't just about continuing to teach hypnotherapists. It was about creating something that combined Western work with the subconscious and what I'd seen in Ecuador and Mexico.
In November 2023, I registered Mushroom Church, Inc., a religious organization in Florida whose ceremonial practices are protected by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). The legal basis is the 2006 U.S. Supreme Court case Gonzales v. O Centro Espírita Beneficente União do Vegetal.
Mycomysticism is a modern link in a very old chain. Siberian shamanism with mushrooms, Mazatec velada, the Native American Church with peyote, Santo Daime and União do Vegetal with ayahuasca—they are all about the same thing: a ceremonial encounter between the human and the sacred through a plant or mushroom. Mycomysticism is that same tradition, translated into the language of a modern global community.
[NEXT – Pavel on why mushrooms, not ayahuasca. What distinguishes Mycomysticism from other movements. What is his own role in this tradition.]
What should Pavel finish writing?
Why mushroom instead of joining the existing UDV/Santo Daime/Native American Church
How Pavel himself defines his role in Mycomysticism—founder, guide, something else entirely. Without "His Majesty" and "Holiness."
what is most important to him in teaching (one or two things, not a long list)
On the principle of "preparation → ceremony → integration" - why they work together and why they don't work separately
▸ Photos
If available, please provide photos of churches that have been built or are planned.
community meetings, Mycomysticism festivals
Pavel in the role of the founder - but not in a staged mystical pose
There's no ready-made material from Wikitia. This block is entirely from Pavel.
What should Pavel finish writing?
Where does he live now, briefly about his life
What is he currently working on: a book, a program, an expedition
what he's reading, what he's listening to, who he's studying with now
where are you looking for the next 5-10 years - without any big promises, specifically
If there is a family and Pavel is ready to mention it, one warm line is very humane
▸ Photos
one warm modern photo, not a studio one
