April 29, 2024 • 53 mins
In this episode, we delve into a fascinating discussion with our guest, Elias Moskona, who generously shares his personal journey of self-discovery and mental health improvement through the lens of psychedelics. Elias opens up about his experiences and the profound impact psychedelics had on his well-being.
We explore the nuanced topic of using psychedelics for therapeutic purposes, discussing the benefits and considerations involved. Our conversation highlights the crucial elements of set, setting, and integration in creating safe and meaningful psychedelic experiences.
Together, we address the stigma surrounding psychedelics, the legal landscape, and the promising potential they hold in revolutionizing mental health treatment. We stress the importance of responsible use and the necessity of professional guidance when embarking on such transformative journeys.
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Guest Info:
Elias Moskona
Growing up in a conflictive household in Venezuela, life always felt safer in my own head. When I left my home to study abroad, I did not realize that along with my belongings, I was bringing with me invisible wounds of trauma, and all the coping mechanisms I had learned as a kid. It took a miserable college experience, moving countries again, a marriage and a divorce, a wonderful therapist and my discovery of psychedelics as tools for mental health, for me to start piecing together the puzzle that held the answers to who I was. Today I can say that putting in the effort to find myself was the single most meaningful decision of my life, and I reap the benefits of it on a daily basis.
Website - http://www.curasanajourneys.com
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/curasanajourneys/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:01):
This is Linz.
SPEAKER_01 (00:03):
This is Russ.
SPEAKER_02 (00:04):
And we're married.
Are we?
Yep, since 2013.
SPEAKER_01 (00:07):
We're the hosts of the Unfiltered Union podcast.
SPEAKER_02 (00:09):
Where we discuss popular headlines and interview
interesting people.
SPEAKER_01 (00:13):
Our opinions may vary, but we will never censor
our guests or our viewpoints.
SPEAKER_02 (00:17):
Welcome to the Unfiltered Union.
Welcome to the Unfiltered Union.
a new guest
SPEAKER_03 (00:26):
yay
SPEAKER_02 (00:28):
we have Ilias Moscano with us and he grew up
in a conflictive household inVenezuela and life always felt
safer in his own head when heleft home to study abroad he did
not realize he was bringingalong invisible wounds of trauma
and all the coping mechanisms helearned as a kid it took a
miserable college experiencemoving countries again and a
(00:48):
marriage and a divorce awonderful therapist in the
discovery of psychedelics astools for mental health for him
start piecing together thepuzzle that held the answers to
who he was.
So today, he can say thatputting the effort to finding
himself as the single mostmeaningful decision of his life,
and he has reaped the benefitsof it on a daily basis.
(01:09):
He now dedicates his life tooffering others guidance as they
navigate their own process ofself-discovery and
self-connection, focusing on thesafe and responsible use of
psychedelics as powerful toolsfor the exploration of the
psychological, emotional, andspiritual landscape that hold
the secrets to who we If youdidn't get that from the
introduction, this is going tobe a mixture of both mental
(01:30):
health and talking about toolsfor how to overcome some of
those mental health issues.
Inks, if you will.
I mean, the idea of usingpsychedelics is something that,
Russ, we have talked aboutpreviously during your OCD
experience.
SPEAKER_01 (01:47):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (01:48):
And I think this is going to be a very interesting
conversation.
SPEAKER_01 (01:51):
For sure.
And before we do jump in, youhave a business that is
dedicated to coaching throughpsychedelics.
How do you actually pronouncethat name?
SPEAKER_00 (02:04):
Yeah, the name is pronounced Kurasana.
Okay.
It's C-U-R-A-S-A-N-E.
And the name, it's thecombination of two Spanish words
that mean to heal kind of indifferent ways.
And so I have a website, it'scurasana.com.
And that's where I provide myservices and coaching and
guidance around psychedelicexperiences.
All right.
SPEAKER_02 (02:24):
Wow.
I mean, let's start from thebeginning.
Let's try and start from thebeginning.
How was your home life growingup?
SPEAKER_00 (02:34):
Yeah.
So, you know, uh, My parentswere an incredibly conflicting
couple.
They were just not meant foreach other is the reality.
And so I think during that time,you know, growing up, there was
a lot of anxiety and a lot oftrying to kind of escape that
experience of them fighting andjust discussing.
(02:54):
And, you know, there was, it wasnot as, you know, it's not
horrible, but as some otherexperiences of childhood are,
and I find myself lucky in thatI always I always had everything
that I needed in order to kindof become the person who I am
today, very privileged incertain ways.
But it was certainly, I wouldsay, a traumatic experience in a
(03:17):
lot of ways to kind of grow upwith that constant conflict.
And so I ended up developingcertain mechanisms of just kind
of disconnecting a little bitfrom everyday life and living in
my head and not fully showing upin relationships in ways in
which later I realized you knowI didn't realize that when I was
(03:38):
growing up but later on in lifeit became obvious that I had
developed certain patterns thatwere just not going to serve me
in the long term
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
yeah it's crazy how much childhood trauma can really
impact us through our entirelives right things that maybe
some people would say oh that'snot really traumatic it's like
yeah but to me it was
SPEAKER_01 (04:00):
yeah that's the thing too is people tend to
discount other people's traumaand that's not good.
You know, just because you wentthrough a situation and it
didn't mess you up like itmessed me up, that doesn't
discount the way I'm feeling.
SPEAKER_02 (04:17):
For sure.
And I mean, you develop ways todeal with it.
I mean, what ways would you saythat you feel you built coping
mechanisms around all that todeal with it?
How do you feel you cope?
SPEAKER_00 (04:30):
Yeah, well, I'll speak a little about that.
But just on that point that yousaid about how people can
interpret your own trauma, I'mnot sure if you're familiar with
dr gabor mate he's got a fewbooks around trauma and also a
couple things like adhd andaddiction and the way that he
speaks about it is and i reallylike this is trauma is not what
happens to you but it's whathappens inside of you as a
(04:53):
result of what happened to youand he makes a really good point
about uh sensibility it's peoplehave different levels of
sensibility there's people aremore sensible than others and so
if you think about uh You know,a way of imagining this is if I
just kind of touch you right nowon your shoulder and just kind
of push a little bit, you'regoing to feel it, but it's not
(05:14):
really going to hurt.
But if tomorrow you go to thebeach and you get sunburned and
it's really bad, and then Iexert the same amount of
pressure, you're going to have avery different reaction.
You're going to be so much moresensible to that.
And so different people react todifferent experiences in that
way, which is what makes, youknow, each individual case so
interesting and so, you know, soreal for the person who
(05:36):
experiences it.
that definitely in my Myexperience was that I realized
at around 30 years old that Ihad no idea what I liked, who I
was, why I was doing the thingsthat I was doing.
It's like waking up and whenpeople call it waking up, that's
(05:58):
truly what it feels like.
I open my eyes and I'm like, youknow when you're driving and for
like 15 minutes, your mind issomewhere else and then all of a
sudden you're like, oh God, wasI driving?
Was I lost while I should havebeen paying attention?
That That's kind of what it feltlike.
And I was, you know, 30, 31years old already into this
experience in a marriage thatwas not serving either of us in
(06:23):
a, you know, with a career thatI had not really chosen, just
kind of had fallen into it witha group of friends that I didn't
connect with living in a placelike even geographically that I
didn't really like or enjoy.
And so like all of this bigpieces of my life, I was like,
how did I put this together likewho did it for me and eventually
(06:45):
had to accept that it had beenme because that experience of
disconnecting from reality ofnot truly being present because
of the things that i grew upwith that coping mechanism of
just kind of going inwards andnumbing out had just kind of
kept going for years and yearsunchecked so that so that so
(07:05):
that was the experience of thatthat finally kind of made it so
i was like oh something'shappening here i need to figure
it and it took it took a lot ofdifficulty and kind of realizing
that some things were truly notworking for me some addictions
like true troubles in themarriage for me to be like okay
(07:27):
this is this needs to beaddressed I won't lie and say
that it was quick oh
SPEAKER_01 (07:32):
yeah but I find it interesting everybody that we
talk to that has a mental healthstruggle it all seems It seems
to always compound to a point towhere it's a breaking point.
Every single situation that I'veseen mine, including mine, it
was a snap.
(07:55):
And then it's like, Oh, we gotto go and do something about
this.
Cause if we don't, we're goingto be, we're going to end up in
a bad spot.
SPEAKER_00 (08:04):
Yeah.
I, I like the phrase.
If people don't change when theysee the light, they change when
they feel the heat.
Yeah.
you sometimes have to kind ofhit that rock bottom.
And that also looks differentfor everyone, just like trauma
looks different for everyone.
But the thing that makes yousay, this cannot be the life
that I'm living.
(08:25):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (08:26):
I like that a lot.
Well, we mentioned that youstarted therapy on your mental
health journey.
What do you feel led you to thatmoment, led you to seek therapy?
SPEAKER_00 (08:39):
Yeah.
Well, let me open up a littlebit about that and That's, you
know, just kind of peel some ofthe layers.
But I was struggling withaddiction and it wasn't
substance addiction.
It was actually a behavioraladdiction.
It started with pornography andthen it evolved into full-blown
sexual addiction.
I think that's something that alot of people, definitely a lot
(08:59):
of men struggle.
I don't know one man who can behonest in my life personally who
says that they haven't struggledor currently struggle a lot with
pornography.
And that was a path that for mestarted very early on like it
does for a lot of people andthat started leading to uh just
kind of that bleeding into myday-to-day life so compound that
(09:22):
with uh being in a marriagewhere i wasn't happy and then
starting exploring it's likewell what happens if i push that
outside of the relationship andended up kind of becoming a
serial serial cheater verydisconnected from that started
living in a life like a life ofcomplete lies uh It's truly a
(09:42):
double life where as soon as Ihad some time for myself, I
would start scheming like trulythe behavior that you see on
somebody with substanceaddiction.
And since I've learned throughmy training and through coaching
and a lot of other tools, a lotof the training that I have,
that addiction is addiction isaddiction.
They express themselvesdifferently.
(10:04):
They have differentconsequences.
But the addictive mentality willdrive you to do those things
that separate you from your realself.
especially if you're alreadydisconnected from it.
And for me, it was that way inwhich it presented.
And when I realized that I waslosing control of how I wanted
to act, I never thought ofmyself as a cheater.
(10:25):
I never thought of myself assomebody who would lie,
definitely not at those levels.
And again, that wake up momentof like, I could see myself
driving an autopilot, just goingthrough the motions.
And there was a part of me thatwas trying to pump the brakes,
like, don't do this.
This is not something that youwant in the kitchen.
This is just don't do it, don'tdo it, don't do it.
And being completely unable tocontrol myself.
(10:48):
And so that was the moment whereit's like, this is hurting me.
It's hurting my partner.
It's unrecognizable as I don'tknow who I am anymore.
Like I truly don't know who I amnow.
And that was the moment that forme, I was like, I need to start
therapy immediately.
And so I started working withsomebody who was a sex therapist
(11:13):
and could help me kind of manageand understand truly what was
happening for me, like whataddiction was, why I was
experiencing what I wasexperiencing and even though I
carried an enormous amount ofshame because of my behavior,
she started helping meunderstand that that was, I'll
(11:37):
say, natural, as in when you'reso disconnected and in such
pain, your body willautomatically try to look for
something that helps you feelbetter, even if it's a
completely negative behavior inthe long term.
And so kind of removing a littlebit the shame around having
acted so horribly for such along time.
(12:00):
And that's kind of where thejourney really started.
I would say the return torecovery.
SPEAKER_01 (12:06):
You know, that's a really good point, too, is
pornography can be an addiction,too.
A lot of people don't considerthings like that an addiction
because it's like...
Well, I'm not doing anythingthat's hurting my body or what,
you know, I'm not doing alcohol.
Yeah.
I'm not doing drugs and I'm notstealing from my family to do
(12:28):
drugs or, but it's still anaddiction because you're still
using that as a vice.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Addictions, you know, anaddiction is, uh, it's a, it's a
short-term behavior that iffeels positive and that on the
long term when left uncheckedwill have negative consequences
but it starts out as sometimes alifeline like this thing that's
like I need this to breathe Ineed this to make my life a
(13:02):
little bit better because I'msuffering and so you try masking
that suffering but eventually ifyou don't get it under control
then yeah it becomes what itbecomes it can be substances it
can be sugar it can be you knowphones like screens like we can
get lost in anything otherpeople Anything.
SPEAKER_01 (13:19):
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
You know, that, that reminds mea lot of the OCD.
Don't seek reassurance becauseit's a, it's an immediate feel
SPEAKER_02 (13:29):
dopamine hit.
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
Yeah.
It's immediate, an immediatefeel of relief.
And then all it's doing isdamaging you.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Yep.
SPEAKER_01 (13:36):
It's so, it's crazy.
SPEAKER_02 (13:39):
It's what you feel you need, but it's only like
hurting more.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Right.
Right.
It's not doing anything, butcausing harm.
SPEAKER_00 (13:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I imagine that you'veexperienced a lot of that, Russ,
where like you wanted to likeit's this search for what's the
thing that's going to make makeit feel a little bit more
tolerable.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (13:58):
Oh, yeah.
And asking lens.
Hey, I'm not that kind ofperson.
Right.
And she would at first she wouldsay, no, of course not.
But once I started going totherapy and the OCD therapist
was like, hey, you don't do thatbecause that's bad.
Reassurance is
SPEAKER_02 (14:14):
not what you need.
SPEAKER_01 (14:15):
Reassurance is gas on the fire.
It's not going to make OCD anybetter.
It's actually going to make itworse because you're just
confirming to your brain thatyour fear is valid.
SPEAKER_02 (14:29):
Creating those neuron pathways that say, yes,
be afraid of this.
SPEAKER_01 (14:33):
Exactly.
Exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (14:36):
It's crazy.
Well, when in your experiencedid you start to, well, when did
you discover and or start toutilize psychedelics through
your mental health?
journey?
SPEAKER_00 (14:50):
I was very lucky that as I was starting therapy,
that I had my first psychedelicexperience after I had started
therapy.
Because what we're hearing aboutpsychedelics so much right now,
there's a whole renaissance, asit's called, truly this new wave
of using them for mental health.
(15:12):
And I think that it can be veryeasy to lose track of the fact
that what's making them veryuseful for mental health.
It's not just a psychedelic.
It's the way in which they'reused.
It's the method.
And it's the fact that there isintegration or processing after
a journey that is done with aprofessional.
It's a tool.
(15:33):
And you can use a hammer tobuild something beautiful or to
destroy a wall.
And in the same way, that's whattools are.
So when I discoveredpsychedelics, I did it because I
was listening to a podcast wherethey had a mycologist he's
called Paul Stamets and I'vesince heard of a few people who
listened to that particularepisode and he was talking about
(15:56):
psilocybin which is theingredient in magic mushrooms
and he is such a salesman in away like he truly he's
captivating when he speaks he'salso in the documentary
Fantastic Fungi if you guyshaven't watched it I highly
recommend it to anybodylistening and I just as soon as
(16:17):
podcast ended, I was like, Ineed to figure this out.
How can I get my hands on someof this?
And I didn't really have anycontacts or I didn't know.
It was not my world at all.
And actually, I was so scared totry to find somebody who would
sell them to me or anything likethat, that the easiest way for
me to do it was like, I'll justfind the spores and I'll grow
(16:38):
them.
I'll grow my own mushroomsfirst.
And that seemed easier thanfinding somebody on the street
who could help me out.
And I did.
And More legal.
Yeah, technically, because I'mnot buying it from anyone.
The spores are actually legal inmost states.
And so because the spores don'tcontain psilocybin, so you can
(16:59):
actually buy the spores.
And if you go through trouble oflearning how to do it, then you
can grow them.
Technically, don't consume them.
It's just for science.
It's just for my quality.
And so, yeah, it was greatbecause as I started consuming
them and having these reallystrong experiences, I was sure
trying to kind of model myexperiences after what I
(17:20):
understood was being done at theuniversities with all this
research that was coming out.
But the truth is that I wasn'texactly sure of what I was doing
at the very beginning.
But then I would have these bigexperiences, incredibly
powerful, very confusing.
And then I would go back to mytherapist and be like, this is
what happened.
(17:40):
And she would be able to dointegration for me and kind of
help me do integration.
doing it for me and helped mepiece together kind of all of
these pieces of material thatwere coming up during my
experiences.
So that was probably about fiveyears ago that I started
(18:03):
experimenting with psychedelicsfor my mental health.
SPEAKER_02 (18:08):
Wow.
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
So how was your, your first experience?
Like what, I don't, I don't wantpeople to think like you're just
doing it to trip balls, youknow, you're doing it because of
the way it, from what I'veheard, I've never done it, but
it opens it.
Yeah, I have, especially when Iwas down the really bad path of
(18:34):
OCD, but it opens your mind up.
Can you kind of explain how thatworks?
and what you feel like whenyou're in you know I don't want
to say a trip because that makesit sound terrible, but when
you're on a journey.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
On a journey.
And I appreciate kind of thecarefulness around the
vocabulary.
And I'll also say that at thispoint in my life today, I enjoy
psychedelics recreationally, youknow, quote unquote, as much as
I get benefit from themtherapeutically.
And I think that with aresponsible attitude, with the
right mindset, with knowledge,like knowing what you're doing,
(19:11):
knowing your substance, testingit, knowing about dose, about
set and setting, a recreationalexperience, like just having a
really good day on arecreational experience can be
almost as therapeutic in certaincases, truly, as having a
controlled journey.
But I wouldn't necessarilyrecommend for somebody who
(19:32):
doesn't know what they're doingyet to jump into that.
What makes those experiencesdifferent, as I mentioned, was
the methods, the setting, themeaning how you're prepared to
come into this experience, thetools that you have.
For somebody who doesn't knowanything about mental health and
(19:53):
they're kind of just startingtheir journey and understanding
themselves, it's going to be amuch different experience than
somebody who has been, say,going to therapy or who has a
really dedicated practice ofself-understanding and
self-knowledge, who journals alot or those kinds of things.
What that feels like, atherapeutic experience, or a
(20:15):
trip is by definition, thepsychedelic experience is
ineffable.
It's one of the characteristicsof the psychedelic experience.
It's very difficult to put itinto words.
And so what I can speak to maybeis some of the most common
effects when you're in thejourney, like what that might
feel like, but to speak ofvisuals, to speak of what is it
(20:38):
that people see and how theyfeel inside after having that
can be very tricky.
And it's also different forevery single person um What
psychedelics do, if I had tosummarize it, to say it briefly,
is that they help blur the linebetween the conscious and the
(21:01):
unconscious mind.
The word psychedelic means mindmanifesting.
So it's really allowing forthose parts of your mind that
usually are kind of behind theshadows that are kept in check
by your defense mechanismsbecause they're too difficult to
deal with or they're a littlescary or too scary to come up
(21:23):
during regular consciousnessbecause on my day-to-day, well,
I have to make dinner and I haveto work and I have to tend to my
plants and feed my cat.
I can't be thinking about all ofthese traumatic experiences and
just kind of having the presentwith me.
There's mechanisms that we havethat keep them in check.
So during a psychedelicexperience, that line is
blurred.
(21:43):
It's like the guards fell asleepand that starts seeping into the
bending on the dose just kind ofbeing pushed into your conscious
awareness people have theexperience of kind of receiving
insights or they can call itdownloads as if all of a sudden
something made sense that youhad never seen it before I know
(22:06):
another practitioner who call itlike the third leave like
sometimes you're looking at a ata situation in your life and you
think that you only have twochoices and that they're black
or white and psychedelics justkind of have like a as if this
was a plant, like I'm branchingout and all of a sudden there's
like a new leaf that comes outthrough the middle and it's this
(22:28):
option that is not here, notthere, that is more integrated
with the reality of what youhave in terms of choices.
It doesn't have to be as blackand white.
People get visuals,close-sighted visuals can be
very intense.
They are almost dreamlike.
(22:48):
Some of them can be incrediblybeautiful.
I've had clients who literallycry because what they're
experiencing is so beautiful.
Just the images that they'reseeing just move them to tears.
And Psychological experiencescan be incredibly positive, as
in this is the most joy thatI've experienced in my life.
(23:10):
All of a sudden, I can laughlike I did when I was five years
old, and I haven't experiencedthis since I was a kid.
And they can be very harrowingas well.
It's heaven and hell.
Your demons might come up, andthen that's what we call a
challenging experience, whichoutside of this context can be
known as a bad trip.
(23:30):
I would make the difference thatwhen you're in a bad trip,
usually the set and the settingare not enough to contain that
experience.
And so it can really spiral intosomething that comes out of
control, which is why people endup in the hospital.
Usually they're safe physically,but they are having such a
(23:50):
struggle mentally that they needthat outside help.
But within the context of atherapeutic setting, you have a
control set setting, somebodywho's supportive, you know
exactly what you took and thedosage you took and all of that
helps contain those experiences.
So then instead of a bad trip,you can have a challenging
experience, but that just meansthat you're looking at
(24:12):
everything that exists withinyou in a space that is allowed
specifically for that.
And you have somebody who canhelp you do so lovingly and
openly and to hold it all, toprocess it all in that moment.
And hopefully in sessions thatcome after, which become the
integration.
(24:32):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_02 (24:33):
That's a lot.
Hold on.
So you've mentioned a couple ofthings, right?
You said your method, your set,and your setting.
Can you dive in a little deeperas to what that looks like if
you're someone who's interestedin this experience?
How do you manufacture all ofthat?
SPEAKER_00 (24:55):
Yeah.
So that is, I think, what'simportant about working with a
facilitator or a guide.
There's maybe different levelsof kind of professionals that
you can work with.
I would say kind of at thelowest of the levels, if it's a
(25:16):
sitter, that's somebody who'snot really a professional guide
or they might have someexperience is basically telling
somebody, hey, can you just kindof be present while I'm doing
this thing?
And they make sure that they'rearound and can help you with
whatever you might need And thenthere's a professional therapist
(25:36):
who has a certification to workon these things, which right now
there's not many in the UnitedStates or in the world, really.
They're just kind of workingwith universities trying to
understand all of this becauseit's still very misunderstood.
At the level that I work, Iconsider myself a facilitator,
like a guide.
I have training in coachingthat's specific to the
(25:57):
psychedelic experience forpsychedelic integration, for
preparation.
So what that looks like is isthe methods that I use encourage
an inwards facing experience,meaning that different from like
just kind of tripping, takingsome mushrooms and going into
the woods or hanging out,watching TV, right?
(26:17):
Which is what a lot of peopleuse them like.
This is actually a eyes closedexperience.
You're wearing a sleep mask andyou're wearing headphones that
are playing a very specificplaylist that was designed for
this experience.
It's very evocative.
you emotionally and it also hassome spaces where it leaves you
(26:37):
you know with some breaks in themusic or like very just kind of
calm music for you to be able toto have a minute to or a couple
minutes to take a breather andto process what just happened
experiences usually last betweenfive to six hours where people
are in the psychedelicexperience for usually about
(26:57):
four and a half to five hoursthere's also some time to gear
up to go into the experience onthe day of and sometimes to
land.
So the person will be with mefor basically an entire day when
they're doing their experience.
I provide what I callnon-directive support.
So it's not like you're takingthe self-saving and I'm just
(27:21):
kind of asking you questions ortelling you how about we think
about this or move you in thisdirection.
Actually, I'm not trying toinfluence your experience.
I trust that you know yourselfmore than I know you.
Even if you've been working withme for a really long time.
You know yourself better than Iknow you.
And I trust that the experienceis going to bring up the things
that need to be brought up.
(27:43):
So what I'm doing there is whensomething comes up that feels
like it needs to be discussed,that feels like it needs to be
unpacked, then I come in as acoach and I help nudge or kind
of open up the path for theclient to just continue their
own experience.
In terms of the setting, it hasto be very welcoming.
It has to be very very safe, hasto be private.
(28:06):
There must be other peoplearound other than the client and
the facilitator or facilitators.
Fairly neutral becausepsychedelics can be very what to
what that I'm looking for here.
When you're on a psychedelicexperience, you're very
influenceable.
And so imagery of things thatyou have any kind of opinion on
(28:30):
will become enhanced, like thevolume for Everything has just
been raised.
So a space that's neutral, thatis safe.
Safety is key.
Having a good relationship withyour guide and just really
making the person feel thateverything that comes up during
(28:51):
that day is welcome and it'sokay.
SPEAKER_03 (28:55):
Wow.
UNKNOWN (28:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:56):
That's a lot.
SPEAKER_02 (28:57):
I mean, the whole idea of this controlled
experience, I mean, I didn'trealize, I guess, that that is
something that, I mean, it seemsobvious when you talk about it,
right?
Like you want the idea of thesitter, right?
That makes total sense.
But to exponential, to expend onthat, to have it even bigger
(29:20):
than that is to have someoneactually help you through it.
And I think you've said it a fewtimes, right?
The idea of integration I mean,is that post or during or both
or how does integration work?
SPEAKER_00 (29:36):
Yeah, that's a great question.
So I think of integration askind of taking everything, all
the threads that you kind of gotto pull during that experience
and weaving them into somethingnew, something that's going to
affect your life.
So it can be new behaviors, itcan be new perspectives because
another of the characteristics,I said the experiences is
(29:56):
ineffable, it's also very easyto forget, which is surprising,
I think, to some people, becauseit's such an intense experience.
And when you come out of it,you're like, oh my God, this is,
you know, it's changed my life.
And then a week later, you'regoing to remember some of the
details, but the feltexperience, you know, that true,
(30:16):
like, oh God, this was sointense that I want to make
these changes, that will fadeaway.
That's why, you know, it'simportant to recognize that this
is still work.
It It's a tool, but the tool isgoing to give you the pieces.
You have to put that puzzletogether and make sure that if a
piece is just kind of fallingoff at some point because a
couple of weeks have passed oryou went back to a certain
(30:38):
pattern of behavior that it'snot serving you, that's going to
push out the work that you did.
So it's realizing through theexperience that you have all of
these choices that you can makeall of this, turn all of these
new behaviors into somethingconcrete for yourself and
beneficial for yourself, butdoing that work.
(30:59):
And so integration usually comesafter, and that can be, it's
usually for me in the form ofcalls with my clients, the week
of the experience, you know,within two or three days.
And then depending on, you know,how much integration they are
doing with me and how much wefeel that is necessary every
(31:23):
week after that is, or, youknow, The timing can change.
There can be some integrationthat happens on the day of, but
normally integration takes alittle bit of time.
It really is just processing.
And for big, big experiences, itwill take some time to process.
SPEAKER_01 (31:44):
You know, of all the stuff that you're saying, I
really like that you are not...
coloring any of it you're sayingyou could have a harrowing
experience but but it's always atool that we use to break down
that harrowing experience and welearn from it you're not like
(32:06):
trying to sell it as thisthing's gonna fix you the cure
yeah it's gonna it's gonna fixyou 100% you know or or it's the
easy button for mental healthissues it's still work but I I
like what you're doing and whatyou're saying because I feel as
if you're legitimatizingpsychedelics.
(32:30):
Most people right now arelooking at psychedelics as
something that hippies do.
They get high off of them andthey trip.
But that's not the case anymore.
SPEAKER_02 (32:40):
There's nothing wrong with hippies.
SPEAKER_01 (32:43):
No, no.
I'm just saying it's just...
I like it because any that canhelp people with mental illness
should be seriously considered.
SPEAKER_02 (32:56):
100%.
SPEAKER_01 (32:58):
Because there's such little advancement in mental
health that anything, especiallysomething like this that can
open your mind up and almostmake you, why am I depressed?
Let me look at the, you know,let me open my mind up and kind
of really dig into myself.
SPEAKER_02 (33:15):
Well, when you think back on your mental health
journey, and we've talked aboutit a million times, and I'm
going to bring you in on thishere a little bit.
During your mental healthjourney, we changed medicine.
How many times?
I
SPEAKER_03 (33:26):
know.
SPEAKER_02 (33:27):
And the, what do we want to call it?
The withdrawal, the fallback,the uptake, the titration,
whatever the verbiage you wantto use in order to get to a good
point on the new medicine alwaystook a while.
So it was a painful experiencefor a little while.
So the idea of, you know,psychedelics being hurrying, I
(33:49):
mean, it's...
SPEAKER_03 (33:51):
Everything
SPEAKER_02 (33:51):
is when you come to mental health.
So I don't see this as any badpoints right now.
It's like it is.
It is part of a mental healthjourney if you want it to be.
SPEAKER_01 (34:03):
Well, I could see someone being a little resistant
to wanting to go through a...
you know, a harrowing experienceand being fearful of it.
But I mean, you
SPEAKER_02 (34:13):
would get that on medicine too.
SPEAKER_01 (34:15):
Yeah.
Agreed.
But I feel like this is justanother option.
For sure.
We need to legitimatize thingslike this instead of big pharma
pushing this stuff away becausethey want to sell more Zoloft.
SPEAKER_02 (34:31):
Right.
UNKNOWN (34:32):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (34:33):
don't get me started
SPEAKER_00 (34:39):
yeah i mean there's there's so much truth in in in
what you said i mean i've uhhave people i i have never had
to go through the pharmaceuticalroute to kind of manage uh
mental health symptoms but ihave multiple loved people very
close to me who have and whohave gotten stuck in that cycle
(35:00):
where you know now the pill is aforever thing for them Or if
it's not, it has been anincredibly difficult journey to
leave it aside.
So talk about, you know, we havethis fear of psychedelics
because for 40, 50 years, itwas, you know, there was this
propaganda that said that theseare the worst things that are
addictive, that are incrediblyhurtful for you.
(35:22):
And here we are being sold, youknow, overprescribed with
medications that truly, youknow, when you look at the
history, I understand that therewas some hope in the
antidepressants, but the waythat they're used today, we've
really just kind of falling outof line with it.
(35:42):
So this is another option.
And I'm glad that as I'mspeaking, it feels like there's
an effort to legitimize itbecause that's exactly what it
is.
And I agree with you that for alot of people, I think there's
different camps right now.
Psychedelics are just very sexy.
So there's a lot of people justkind of trying to push them.
(36:02):
I Without speaking of the heroinexperiences, without speaking of
the set and the setting, becauseit's just easy to sell products
to misinformed people,especially when there's such a
wave, when people are hearingabout this as a magic cure, they
want to try it.
And so there has to be an effortfor the people who believe in it
(36:24):
to legitimize it, but also inthe most responsible way.
And something just out ofperspective, because you
mentioned that people, when theythink of psychedelics, they
think of the hippie culture, andthat's true.
And I think something that'sreally interesting about them,
(36:46):
which I've come to understandthe more that I move in the
circles, is that psychedelicswere in the underground because
legislation had pushed themthere.
We knew back in the 70s, 60s,even in the 50s that these were
incredible tools for mentalhealth.
There was research in the 50sand 60s with LSD for alcoholism,
(37:10):
for all kinds of mental healthconditions.
And so at some point, there wasan explosion.
It was really more because ofpolitical reasons.
They were pushed into theunderground.
And there they were mixing alongwith all of the pseudoscience
that exists in undergroundmovements.
And so we associated with thepeople who believe in all kinds
(37:31):
of things that have absolutelyno scientific backing.
And so now they're kind of beingpulled out of the underground
and into the scientific realm aswell.
And we're also seeing as that iskind of coming up, a lot of the
other beliefs that were aroundpsychedelics kind of being
heightened, you know, kind ofbeing almost brought into the
(37:54):
light because of that.
So it's been an interestingexperience.
I definitely came topsychedelics through a more
scientific background, you know,I was very materialistic, not as
in I like material stuff, but Idon't believe in anything that I
can't touch type thing.
SPEAKER_03 (38:11):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (38:13):
And I've certainly kind of hung out and learned
from people that I would havenever thought I was going to be
sitting around the same tablewith.
For
SPEAKER_01 (38:22):
sure.
For sure.
And one of the things is I don'tthink big pharma can sell
something that comes fromsomething that grows in the
ground.
you know, they can't make bukuprofits off of it.
So they, you can't tell me thatthe politicians aren't in that
pocket or they're not in thepolitician's pocket and
(38:43):
squashing things like that, eventhough it's a game changer.
Absolutely.
Scary.
SPEAKER_02 (38:53):
Before we go down the rabbit holes of conspiracy
theories and understanding howthe government could be
impacting big pharma.
And we all know what it's true,but move, Moving on.
I mean, how would you say thatyou feel that psychedelics have
affected your mental health?
And then do you have any storiesyou can share with us of
possible clients?
SPEAKER_00 (39:14):
Yeah, absolutely.
I would love to.
I mean, for me, it's day andnight.
I won't say that my firstpsychedelic experience did it.
But over the course of, youknow, the first six months that
I was doing my sessions and, youknow, As I started doing them, I
learned how to do them better,and I was going to therapy, and
(39:36):
then I would do these othersessions.
I think they accelerated mytherapeutic process incredibly.
The progress that I saw withinthe first year was amazing.
If I had to...
if I had to pick one thing maybeis reconnection to self.
(40:00):
You know, when I spoke of kindof growing up and being in my
head and feeling disconnectedfrom who I was and making
decisions from a space that Ididn't even know who was making
them, that started shifting.
It's like all of a sudden Icould see and feel who I was and
started kind of creating thatconnection to the self.
(40:23):
I believe in this and There'stherapeutic theories, things
like internal family systems andothers that speak of the self.
The self is like thisindestructible diamond.
When you come into the world andyou see a kid, they're 100%
themselves.
(40:43):
They are as pure as they can be.
They are not bound by any kindof education or indoctrination
or shame.
They're just themselves.
As As we grow up, there's theselayers of different things that
get in the way that startburying that diamond.
I said education, trauma is oneof them, indoctrination,
(41:07):
conditioning, all of thesedifferent things where we learn
that we shouldn't be acting thisparticular way and that we
should shy away, that we shouldmake a decision because the
other person expects us toversus because we want to.
All of those things startburying that self.
What I found that psychedelicsdid for me is that they started
(41:28):
creating a channel, like justkind of digging a tunnel where
all of a sudden that diamondcould start shining back again.
I call it at some point, like Isaid, I found my Elias-ness,
like what makes me me.
And not only did I find it, likeI feel it radiating out of me.
And from there, when I feel likethat, and you can get to this
(41:48):
place, you know, in other ways,you don't need psychedelics for
that.
But for me, that's what it did.
It certainly can be like anaccelerated path because they
have this biochemical actionmechanism.
So they're truly just kind ofshifting the way in which your
brain works, at least for enoughtime that then you can hang on
(42:10):
to that and grab momentum.
And so when you're feelingyourself at 100% and you make
better decisions, then you cansay, you know what, this
relationship that's not servingme, I'm going to move away from
it.
You know what, there's behaviorsthat keep me stuck in a cycle, I
don't want them anymore.
And this, you know, you cantruly be more connected.
(42:31):
There's less space between Ifeel and then I act.
Where are you?
Interestingly enough, I moved toWashington, D.C.
just a couple of weeks ago.
(42:52):
I just got here and the reason,part of the reason at least,
it's because D.C.
is a decriminalized state.
After they passed Initiative 81,psychedelics have gone to the
lowest level of of priority forlaw enforcement.
So you still cannot sell them.
(43:12):
You still cannot purchase themin stores and things like that.
But it's basically been said,we're not going to waste our
time trying to criminalize andact on substances that are
definitely not as bad as we weremade to believe and certainly
starting to show a lot ofpotential to help people.
(43:34):
So it's an interesting city andthere's only a couple of places
in the country where that's thecase, Colorado being one of
them, Oregon being one of them,but D.C.
is another one.
SPEAKER_01 (43:43):
That's awesome.
We're from Northern Virginia, sowe were a rock star.
We were in that area.
Around the corner, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (43:53):
That's funny.
That is.
Small world.
SPEAKER_02 (43:57):
Well, I think from everything that we've heard from
you, I mean, I think it's abenefit to anyone with mental
health struggles that they'regoing through to explore the
idea of psychedelic coaching.
But I mean, who do you think isthe target, if you will?
Who's someone that would be mostbenefiting from this experience?
SPEAKER_00 (44:20):
Yeah, what a great question.
I think there's a lot ofcuriosity.
So a lot of people want to tryit out.
I would say there's not onething that this experience can
gift you.
It can be used for dealing withdifficult mental health
conditions.
It can also be used for justself-development, for somebody
(44:42):
who's looking forself-actualization.
Even if they right now, ifthey're not dealing with a
mental health condition, you canjust use it to self-actualize.
Sometimes you just want to useit for a moment of reconnection
for some people that never,never happens.
We live very busy lives.
So to take an entire day, eight,nine hours for yourself to go to
(45:08):
see somebody who's going to holdspace for you and prepare a
beautiful ceremony because youdeserve it, that's also a great
reason to do them.
I think one of the mostimportant criteria is openness.
You have to be open to newexperiences and open to the fact
that this is going to work somekind of work it always is but if
(45:35):
you come in prepared for thatwith an open heart and with an
open mind you're going to getvalue out of this experience
SPEAKER_01 (45:46):
So essentially everyone.
SPEAKER_00 (45:50):
I believe mostly everyone.
Yeah.
And I will say, because I thinkit's really important, that
there are certain mental healthconditions that are...
what's the word?
It's not recommended.
There's a better word for itthat I'm totally losing right
(46:11):
now.
But yeah, there are certainmental health conditions like
schizophrenia where they trulyrecommend to not engage with
psychedelics because they can bevery destabilizing.
Bipolar disorder is kind ofstill in a gray area, but
professionals right now normallydon't work with it.
(46:31):
Research is, there's not that ofmuch research geared towards
bipolar.
And so I would say it's mostlyfor everyone, but it's important
that you consider your ownsituation before jumping into
something like that.
And a good guide is going to askquestions around that.
So for anybody who's engagingwith somebody who wants to offer
(46:54):
those services, it's reallyimportant that they kind of
understand what makes a goodfacilitator.
And there's a lot of really goodarticles that you can find
online that will help you definekind of if the person that
you're working with feels legitwhat it should feel like and you
know what questions to ask asI'm saying that I'm thinking
that I probably should havesomething like that in my a
(47:14):
little FAQ on my on my websitethat helps people kind of even
if they're not working with meto direct them to someone
because it it's probably formany people it is one of the
most important experiences ormost significant experiences
that they have in their life andAnd it's also one of the most
(47:34):
vulnerable spaces that you canbe in.
It's a very vulnerableexperience by nature.
So you want to have somebody ifyou're doing it with somebody
that knows how to hold thatspace and that you can truly,
truly trust.
SPEAKER_01 (47:50):
Right.
See, I see very small amounts ofnegatives, if any, in trying it.
There's definitely a lot lessside effects from what it sounds
like than Zoloft.
I mean, let's be clear.
That's what you're taking.
We
SPEAKER_02 (48:09):
keep saying Zoloft.
We're not picking on it.
It's
SPEAKER_01 (48:12):
what he's taking.
That's right.
Yeah, I understand.
What do you think about flippinggears onto the fun question?
SPEAKER_02 (48:21):
Let's do it.
SPEAKER_01 (48:21):
If you won$10 million tonight, what would be
the first thing you do tomorrow?
SPEAKER_00 (48:31):
That's a, yeah, I think that's an easy one.
I'm trying to think to see iflike, is there anything else?
But the truth is, you know, yousaid in my introduction, I
dedicate my life to this today.
And the truth is that currentlyI, there is an attachment that I
have to a nine to five jobbecause, you You know, paying
(48:52):
bills is important.
And if there's one thing that Ido not want is for this to just
become a financial, you know,that all my money is coming from
my facilitation and coachingpractice because that in a way
just kind of puts pressure onit.
And it's a pressure that it'snot welcome.
It's a pressure that affects howyou work on it.
(49:12):
So if I had$10 million and Ididn't have to think about
things, I would just open up apractice, buy a piece of land
that would, you know, wouldbecome a retreat where you would
have not just important piecesfor this work.
It's not just the psychedelicsand the integration, but your
community.
So having a community where likewellness is put at top priority
(49:33):
and where people who need toheal can come, can feel safe,
can stay.
And when they have done the workthat they need to do, then they
can go.
SPEAKER_02 (49:45):
That sounds beautiful.
SPEAKER_00 (49:47):
Yeah, I'll go.
SPEAKER_02 (49:48):
That's a
SPEAKER_01 (49:49):
good answer.
I like it.
SPEAKER_03 (49:53):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (49:57):
Well, if we win the lottery and it's a substantial
amount, we'll give you that$10million.
How about that?
You can hold us to it.
For sure.
SPEAKER_00 (50:03):
Then you guys get lifetime passes for all of the
SPEAKER_03 (50:08):
services.
Gold member subscriptions.
SPEAKER_01 (50:14):
So, We talked about your business before a little
bit.
Where can we find you online?
Where can people sign up for anappointment, learn about your
services, things of that nature?
Where are you out there on theold interwebs?
SPEAKER_00 (50:30):
Yeah, so my website really would be the best place.
It's www.curasanajourneys.com.
And Curasana, as I mentioned, isC-U-R-A-S-A-N-A, journeys.com.
The website is the best placebecause although I have tried
doing a little bit of socialmedia marketing and it's just,
(50:52):
it almost goes up against theprinciples of the wellness that
I'm trying to kind of build andto share.
Like I don't want to bepromoting wellness on, you know,
highly addictive websites thatare as addicting to me as to the
people that are using them.
And so I've tried my hand onInstagram.
You can still find my profilethere at Kurasana journeys, but
don't expect it to be very up todate or very, uh, Yeah, I'm not
(51:18):
going to be promoting stuffthere a lot.
At least that's for now.
I want to stay disconnected fromthat.
So the website would be the bestplace.
Awesome.
SPEAKER_02 (51:28):
And we've been to your website.
It's very pretty.
Yeah.
You did a good job.
SPEAKER_00 (51:31):
Oh, thank you.
I appreciate it.
It took a lot of work and, uh,yeah, just kind of multiple, uh,
tries, but, uh, it's, yeah,it's, I I'm happy with where
it's at.
SPEAKER_02 (51:42):
For sure.
Well, we can't thank you enoughfor joining us and this has been
both educational.
SPEAKER_01 (51:48):
Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (51:48):
And honestly fun.
SPEAKER_01 (51:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I liked talking
SPEAKER_02 (51:52):
about something that I, you know, you don't know,
wouldn't expect, I guess, to bein the the realm of mental
health, but
SPEAKER_01 (51:59):
we've been taught that psychedelics are the devil.
SPEAKER_02 (52:02):
Yeah.
But hearing about it, I mean, I,I don't know.
Maybe we talk about this.
Like we have family still in theDC area.
Do you want to go?
We
SPEAKER_01 (52:13):
could
SPEAKER_02 (52:13):
go visit and we'll go check out.
SPEAKER_01 (52:17):
Yeah.
And then we'll have you at allon as like a post, a post, what
part of them or whatever.
Well,
SPEAKER_00 (52:27):
if you get, birth to yourself as some people do
SPEAKER_01 (52:31):
see he fixed my issue already
SPEAKER_03 (52:36):
there
SPEAKER_02 (52:37):
you go we need you here thanks so much
SPEAKER_00 (52:42):
yeah well thank you guys this has been a pleasure
it's been really fun and thankyou for giving me the
opportunity to share this withyou and your listeners Thanks
for listening to the UnfilteredUnion.
SPEAKER_01 (52:55):
Did you like the episode?
Support the show.
Visit us on Patreon atpatreon.com slash
unfilteredunion.
SPEAKER_02 (53:03):
Or you can rock some merch.
Check out our store atstore.unfilteredunion.com.
SPEAKER_01 (53:08):
For all other things unfiltered, check out our site
at unfilteredunion.com.
SPEAKER_02 (53:14):
It's what you do
SPEAKER_03 (53:14):
with the things you love.
This is Linz.
SPEAKER_01 (00:03):
This is Russ.
SPEAKER_02 (00:04):
And we're married.
Are we?
Yep, since 2013.
SPEAKER_01 (00:07):
We're the hosts of the Unfiltered Union podcast.
SPEAKER_02 (00:09):
Where we discuss popular headlines and interview
interesting people.
SPEAKER_01 (00:13):
Our opinions may vary, but we will never censor
our guests or our viewpoints.
SPEAKER_02 (00:17):
Welcome to the Unfiltered Union.
Welcome to the Unfiltered Union.
a new guest
SPEAKER_03 (00:26):
yay
SPEAKER_02 (00:28):
we have Ilias Moscano with us and he grew up
in a conflictive household inVenezuela and life always felt
safer in his own head when heleft home to study abroad he did
not realize he was bringingalong invisible wounds of trauma
and all the coping mechanisms helearned as a kid it took a
miserable college experiencemoving countries again and a
(00:48):
marriage and a divorce awonderful therapist in the
discovery of psychedelics astools for mental health for him
start piecing together thepuzzle that held the answers to
who he was.
So today, he can say thatputting the effort to finding
himself as the single mostmeaningful decision of his life,
and he has reaped the benefitsof it on a daily basis.
(01:09):
He now dedicates his life tooffering others guidance as they
navigate their own process ofself-discovery and
self-connection, focusing on thesafe and responsible use of
psychedelics as powerful toolsfor the exploration of the
psychological, emotional, andspiritual landscape that hold
the secrets to who we If youdidn't get that from the
introduction, this is going tobe a mixture of both mental
(01:30):
health and talking about toolsfor how to overcome some of
those mental health issues.
Inks, if you will.
I mean, the idea of usingpsychedelics is something that,
Russ, we have talked aboutpreviously during your OCD
experience.
SPEAKER_01 (01:47):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (01:48):
And I think this is going to be a very interesting
conversation.
SPEAKER_01 (01:51):
For sure.
And before we do jump in, youhave a business that is
dedicated to coaching throughpsychedelics.
How do you actually pronouncethat name?
SPEAKER_00 (02:04):
Yeah, the name is pronounced Kurasana.
Okay.
It's C-U-R-A-S-A-N-E.
And the name, it's thecombination of two Spanish words
that mean to heal kind of indifferent ways.
And so I have a website, it'scurasana.com.
And that's where I provide myservices and coaching and
guidance around psychedelicexperiences.
All right.
SPEAKER_02 (02:24):
Wow.
I mean, let's start from thebeginning.
Let's try and start from thebeginning.
How was your home life growingup?
SPEAKER_00 (02:34):
Yeah.
So, you know, uh, My parentswere an incredibly conflicting
couple.
They were just not meant foreach other is the reality.
And so I think during that time,you know, growing up, there was
a lot of anxiety and a lot oftrying to kind of escape that
experience of them fighting andjust discussing.
(02:54):
And, you know, there was, it wasnot as, you know, it's not
horrible, but as some otherexperiences of childhood are,
and I find myself lucky in thatI always I always had everything
that I needed in order to kindof become the person who I am
today, very privileged incertain ways.
But it was certainly, I wouldsay, a traumatic experience in a
(03:17):
lot of ways to kind of grow upwith that constant conflict.
And so I ended up developingcertain mechanisms of just kind
of disconnecting a little bitfrom everyday life and living in
my head and not fully showing upin relationships in ways in
which later I realized you knowI didn't realize that when I was
(03:38):
growing up but later on in lifeit became obvious that I had
developed certain patterns thatwere just not going to serve me
in the long term
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
yeah it's crazy how much childhood trauma can really
impact us through our entirelives right things that maybe
some people would say oh that'snot really traumatic it's like
yeah but to me it was
SPEAKER_01 (04:00):
yeah that's the thing too is people tend to
discount other people's traumaand that's not good.
You know, just because you wentthrough a situation and it
didn't mess you up like itmessed me up, that doesn't
discount the way I'm feeling.
SPEAKER_02 (04:17):
For sure.
And I mean, you develop ways todeal with it.
I mean, what ways would you saythat you feel you built coping
mechanisms around all that todeal with it?
How do you feel you cope?
SPEAKER_00 (04:30):
Yeah, well, I'll speak a little about that.
But just on that point that yousaid about how people can
interpret your own trauma, I'mnot sure if you're familiar with
dr gabor mate he's got a fewbooks around trauma and also a
couple things like adhd andaddiction and the way that he
speaks about it is and i reallylike this is trauma is not what
happens to you but it's whathappens inside of you as a
(04:53):
result of what happened to youand he makes a really good point
about uh sensibility it's peoplehave different levels of
sensibility there's people aremore sensible than others and so
if you think about uh You know,a way of imagining this is if I
just kind of touch you right nowon your shoulder and just kind
of push a little bit, you'regoing to feel it, but it's not
(05:14):
really going to hurt.
But if tomorrow you go to thebeach and you get sunburned and
it's really bad, and then Iexert the same amount of
pressure, you're going to have avery different reaction.
You're going to be so much moresensible to that.
And so different people react todifferent experiences in that
way, which is what makes, youknow, each individual case so
interesting and so, you know, soreal for the person who
(05:36):
experiences it.
that definitely in my Myexperience was that I realized
at around 30 years old that Ihad no idea what I liked, who I
was, why I was doing the thingsthat I was doing.
It's like waking up and whenpeople call it waking up, that's
(05:58):
truly what it feels like.
I open my eyes and I'm like, youknow when you're driving and for
like 15 minutes, your mind issomewhere else and then all of a
sudden you're like, oh God, wasI driving?
Was I lost while I should havebeen paying attention?
That That's kind of what it feltlike.
And I was, you know, 30, 31years old already into this
experience in a marriage thatwas not serving either of us in
(06:23):
a, you know, with a career thatI had not really chosen, just
kind of had fallen into it witha group of friends that I didn't
connect with living in a placelike even geographically that I
didn't really like or enjoy.
And so like all of this bigpieces of my life, I was like,
how did I put this together likewho did it for me and eventually
(06:45):
had to accept that it had beenme because that experience of
disconnecting from reality ofnot truly being present because
of the things that i grew upwith that coping mechanism of
just kind of going inwards andnumbing out had just kind of
kept going for years and yearsunchecked so that so that so
(07:05):
that was the experience of thatthat finally kind of made it so
i was like oh something'shappening here i need to figure
it and it took it took a lot ofdifficulty and kind of realizing
that some things were truly notworking for me some addictions
like true troubles in themarriage for me to be like okay
(07:27):
this is this needs to beaddressed I won't lie and say
that it was quick oh
SPEAKER_01 (07:32):
yeah but I find it interesting everybody that we
talk to that has a mental healthstruggle it all seems It seems
to always compound to a point towhere it's a breaking point.
Every single situation that I'veseen mine, including mine, it
was a snap.
(07:55):
And then it's like, Oh, we gotto go and do something about
this.
Cause if we don't, we're goingto be, we're going to end up in
a bad spot.
SPEAKER_00 (08:04):
Yeah.
I, I like the phrase.
If people don't change when theysee the light, they change when
they feel the heat.
Yeah.
you sometimes have to kind ofhit that rock bottom.
And that also looks differentfor everyone, just like trauma
looks different for everyone.
But the thing that makes yousay, this cannot be the life
that I'm living.
(08:25):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (08:26):
I like that a lot.
Well, we mentioned that youstarted therapy on your mental
health journey.
What do you feel led you to thatmoment, led you to seek therapy?
SPEAKER_00 (08:39):
Yeah.
Well, let me open up a littlebit about that and That's, you
know, just kind of peel some ofthe layers.
But I was struggling withaddiction and it wasn't
substance addiction.
It was actually a behavioraladdiction.
It started with pornography andthen it evolved into full-blown
sexual addiction.
I think that's something that alot of people, definitely a lot
(08:59):
of men struggle.
I don't know one man who can behonest in my life personally who
says that they haven't struggledor currently struggle a lot with
pornography.
And that was a path that for mestarted very early on like it
does for a lot of people andthat started leading to uh just
kind of that bleeding into myday-to-day life so compound that
(09:22):
with uh being in a marriagewhere i wasn't happy and then
starting exploring it's likewell what happens if i push that
outside of the relationship andended up kind of becoming a
serial serial cheater verydisconnected from that started
living in a life like a life ofcomplete lies uh It's truly a
(09:42):
double life where as soon as Ihad some time for myself, I
would start scheming like trulythe behavior that you see on
somebody with substanceaddiction.
And since I've learned throughmy training and through coaching
and a lot of other tools, a lotof the training that I have,
that addiction is addiction isaddiction.
They express themselvesdifferently.
(10:04):
They have differentconsequences.
But the addictive mentality willdrive you to do those things
that separate you from your realself.
especially if you're alreadydisconnected from it.
And for me, it was that way inwhich it presented.
And when I realized that I waslosing control of how I wanted
to act, I never thought ofmyself as a cheater.
(10:25):
I never thought of myself assomebody who would lie,
definitely not at those levels.
And again, that wake up momentof like, I could see myself
driving an autopilot, just goingthrough the motions.
And there was a part of me thatwas trying to pump the brakes,
like, don't do this.
This is not something that youwant in the kitchen.
This is just don't do it, don'tdo it, don't do it.
And being completely unable tocontrol myself.
(10:48):
And so that was the moment whereit's like, this is hurting me.
It's hurting my partner.
It's unrecognizable as I don'tknow who I am anymore.
Like I truly don't know who I amnow.
And that was the moment that forme, I was like, I need to start
therapy immediately.
And so I started working withsomebody who was a sex therapist
(11:13):
and could help me kind of manageand understand truly what was
happening for me, like whataddiction was, why I was
experiencing what I wasexperiencing and even though I
carried an enormous amount ofshame because of my behavior,
she started helping meunderstand that that was, I'll
(11:37):
say, natural, as in when you'reso disconnected and in such
pain, your body willautomatically try to look for
something that helps you feelbetter, even if it's a
completely negative behavior inthe long term.
And so kind of removing a littlebit the shame around having
acted so horribly for such along time.
(12:00):
And that's kind of where thejourney really started.
I would say the return torecovery.
SPEAKER_01 (12:06):
You know, that's a really good point, too, is
pornography can be an addiction,too.
A lot of people don't considerthings like that an addiction
because it's like...
Well, I'm not doing anythingthat's hurting my body or what,
you know, I'm not doing alcohol.
Yeah.
I'm not doing drugs and I'm notstealing from my family to do
(12:28):
drugs or, but it's still anaddiction because you're still
using that as a vice.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Addictions, you know, anaddiction is, uh, it's a, it's a
short-term behavior that iffeels positive and that on the
long term when left uncheckedwill have negative consequences
but it starts out as sometimes alifeline like this thing that's
like I need this to breathe Ineed this to make my life a
(13:02):
little bit better because I'msuffering and so you try masking
that suffering but eventually ifyou don't get it under control
then yeah it becomes what itbecomes it can be substances it
can be sugar it can be you knowphones like screens like we can
get lost in anything otherpeople Anything.
SPEAKER_01 (13:19):
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
You know, that, that reminds mea lot of the OCD.
Don't seek reassurance becauseit's a, it's an immediate feel
SPEAKER_02 (13:29):
dopamine hit.
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
Yeah.
It's immediate, an immediatefeel of relief.
And then all it's doing isdamaging you.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Yep.
SPEAKER_01 (13:36):
It's so, it's crazy.
SPEAKER_02 (13:39):
It's what you feel you need, but it's only like
hurting more.
SPEAKER_01 (13:43):
Right.
Right.
It's not doing anything, butcausing harm.
SPEAKER_00 (13:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I imagine that you'veexperienced a lot of that, Russ,
where like you wanted to likeit's this search for what's the
thing that's going to make makeit feel a little bit more
tolerable.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (13:58):
Oh, yeah.
And asking lens.
Hey, I'm not that kind ofperson.
Right.
And she would at first she wouldsay, no, of course not.
But once I started going totherapy and the OCD therapist
was like, hey, you don't do thatbecause that's bad.
Reassurance is
SPEAKER_02 (14:14):
not what you need.
SPEAKER_01 (14:15):
Reassurance is gas on the fire.
It's not going to make OCD anybetter.
It's actually going to make itworse because you're just
confirming to your brain thatyour fear is valid.
SPEAKER_02 (14:29):
Creating those neuron pathways that say, yes,
be afraid of this.
SPEAKER_01 (14:33):
Exactly.
Exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (14:36):
It's crazy.
Well, when in your experiencedid you start to, well, when did
you discover and or start toutilize psychedelics through
your mental health?
journey?
SPEAKER_00 (14:50):
I was very lucky that as I was starting therapy,
that I had my first psychedelicexperience after I had started
therapy.
Because what we're hearing aboutpsychedelics so much right now,
there's a whole renaissance, asit's called, truly this new wave
of using them for mental health.
(15:12):
And I think that it can be veryeasy to lose track of the fact
that what's making them veryuseful for mental health.
It's not just a psychedelic.
It's the way in which they'reused.
It's the method.
And it's the fact that there isintegration or processing after
a journey that is done with aprofessional.
It's a tool.
(15:33):
And you can use a hammer tobuild something beautiful or to
destroy a wall.
And in the same way, that's whattools are.
So when I discoveredpsychedelics, I did it because I
was listening to a podcast wherethey had a mycologist he's
called Paul Stamets and I'vesince heard of a few people who
listened to that particularepisode and he was talking about
(15:56):
psilocybin which is theingredient in magic mushrooms
and he is such a salesman in away like he truly he's
captivating when he speaks he'salso in the documentary
Fantastic Fungi if you guyshaven't watched it I highly
recommend it to anybodylistening and I just as soon as
(16:17):
podcast ended, I was like, Ineed to figure this out.
How can I get my hands on someof this?
And I didn't really have anycontacts or I didn't know.
It was not my world at all.
And actually, I was so scared totry to find somebody who would
sell them to me or anything likethat, that the easiest way for
me to do it was like, I'll justfind the spores and I'll grow
(16:38):
them.
I'll grow my own mushroomsfirst.
And that seemed easier thanfinding somebody on the street
who could help me out.
And I did.
And More legal.
Yeah, technically, because I'mnot buying it from anyone.
The spores are actually legal inmost states.
And so because the spores don'tcontain psilocybin, so you can
(16:59):
actually buy the spores.
And if you go through trouble oflearning how to do it, then you
can grow them.
Technically, don't consume them.
It's just for science.
It's just for my quality.
And so, yeah, it was greatbecause as I started consuming
them and having these reallystrong experiences, I was sure
trying to kind of model myexperiences after what I
(17:20):
understood was being done at theuniversities with all this
research that was coming out.
But the truth is that I wasn'texactly sure of what I was doing
at the very beginning.
But then I would have these bigexperiences, incredibly
powerful, very confusing.
And then I would go back to mytherapist and be like, this is
what happened.
(17:40):
And she would be able to dointegration for me and kind of
help me do integration.
doing it for me and helped mepiece together kind of all of
these pieces of material thatwere coming up during my
experiences.
So that was probably about fiveyears ago that I started
(18:03):
experimenting with psychedelicsfor my mental health.
SPEAKER_02 (18:08):
Wow.
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
So how was your, your first experience?
Like what, I don't, I don't wantpeople to think like you're just
doing it to trip balls, youknow, you're doing it because of
the way it, from what I'veheard, I've never done it, but
it opens it.
Yeah, I have, especially when Iwas down the really bad path of
(18:34):
OCD, but it opens your mind up.
Can you kind of explain how thatworks?
and what you feel like whenyou're in you know I don't want
to say a trip because that makesit sound terrible, but when
you're on a journey.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
On a journey.
And I appreciate kind of thecarefulness around the
vocabulary.
And I'll also say that at thispoint in my life today, I enjoy
psychedelics recreationally, youknow, quote unquote, as much as
I get benefit from themtherapeutically.
And I think that with aresponsible attitude, with the
right mindset, with knowledge,like knowing what you're doing,
(19:11):
knowing your substance, testingit, knowing about dose, about
set and setting, a recreationalexperience, like just having a
really good day on arecreational experience can be
almost as therapeutic in certaincases, truly, as having a
controlled journey.
But I wouldn't necessarilyrecommend for somebody who
(19:32):
doesn't know what they're doingyet to jump into that.
What makes those experiencesdifferent, as I mentioned, was
the methods, the setting, themeaning how you're prepared to
come into this experience, thetools that you have.
For somebody who doesn't knowanything about mental health and
(19:53):
they're kind of just startingtheir journey and understanding
themselves, it's going to be amuch different experience than
somebody who has been, say,going to therapy or who has a
really dedicated practice ofself-understanding and
self-knowledge, who journals alot or those kinds of things.
What that feels like, atherapeutic experience, or a
(20:15):
trip is by definition, thepsychedelic experience is
ineffable.
It's one of the characteristicsof the psychedelic experience.
It's very difficult to put itinto words.
And so what I can speak to maybeis some of the most common
effects when you're in thejourney, like what that might
feel like, but to speak ofvisuals, to speak of what is it
(20:38):
that people see and how theyfeel inside after having that
can be very tricky.
And it's also different forevery single person um What
psychedelics do, if I had tosummarize it, to say it briefly,
is that they help blur the linebetween the conscious and the
(21:01):
unconscious mind.
The word psychedelic means mindmanifesting.
So it's really allowing forthose parts of your mind that
usually are kind of behind theshadows that are kept in check
by your defense mechanismsbecause they're too difficult to
deal with or they're a littlescary or too scary to come up
(21:23):
during regular consciousnessbecause on my day-to-day, well,
I have to make dinner and I haveto work and I have to tend to my
plants and feed my cat.
I can't be thinking about all ofthese traumatic experiences and
just kind of having the presentwith me.
There's mechanisms that we havethat keep them in check.
So during a psychedelicexperience, that line is
blurred.
(21:43):
It's like the guards fell asleepand that starts seeping into the
bending on the dose just kind ofbeing pushed into your conscious
awareness people have theexperience of kind of receiving
insights or they can call itdownloads as if all of a sudden
something made sense that youhad never seen it before I know
(22:06):
another practitioner who call itlike the third leave like
sometimes you're looking at a ata situation in your life and you
think that you only have twochoices and that they're black
or white and psychedelics justkind of have like a as if this
was a plant, like I'm branchingout and all of a sudden there's
like a new leaf that comes outthrough the middle and it's this
(22:28):
option that is not here, notthere, that is more integrated
with the reality of what youhave in terms of choices.
It doesn't have to be as blackand white.
People get visuals,close-sighted visuals can be
very intense.
They are almost dreamlike.
(22:48):
Some of them can be incrediblybeautiful.
I've had clients who literallycry because what they're
experiencing is so beautiful.
Just the images that they'reseeing just move them to tears.
And Psychological experiencescan be incredibly positive, as
in this is the most joy thatI've experienced in my life.
(23:10):
All of a sudden, I can laughlike I did when I was five years
old, and I haven't experiencedthis since I was a kid.
And they can be very harrowingas well.
It's heaven and hell.
Your demons might come up, andthen that's what we call a
challenging experience, whichoutside of this context can be
known as a bad trip.
(23:30):
I would make the difference thatwhen you're in a bad trip,
usually the set and the settingare not enough to contain that
experience.
And so it can really spiral intosomething that comes out of
control, which is why people endup in the hospital.
Usually they're safe physically,but they are having such a
(23:50):
struggle mentally that they needthat outside help.
But within the context of atherapeutic setting, you have a
control set setting, somebodywho's supportive, you know
exactly what you took and thedosage you took and all of that
helps contain those experiences.
So then instead of a bad trip,you can have a challenging
experience, but that just meansthat you're looking at
(24:12):
everything that exists withinyou in a space that is allowed
specifically for that.
And you have somebody who canhelp you do so lovingly and
openly and to hold it all, toprocess it all in that moment.
And hopefully in sessions thatcome after, which become the
integration.
(24:32):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_02 (24:33):
That's a lot.
Hold on.
So you've mentioned a couple ofthings, right?
You said your method, your set,and your setting.
Can you dive in a little deeperas to what that looks like if
you're someone who's interestedin this experience?
How do you manufacture all ofthat?
SPEAKER_00 (24:55):
Yeah.
So that is, I think, what'simportant about working with a
facilitator or a guide.
There's maybe different levelsof kind of professionals that
you can work with.
I would say kind of at thelowest of the levels, if it's a
(25:16):
sitter, that's somebody who'snot really a professional guide
or they might have someexperience is basically telling
somebody, hey, can you just kindof be present while I'm doing
this thing?
And they make sure that they'rearound and can help you with
whatever you might need And thenthere's a professional therapist
(25:36):
who has a certification to workon these things, which right now
there's not many in the UnitedStates or in the world, really.
They're just kind of workingwith universities trying to
understand all of this becauseit's still very misunderstood.
At the level that I work, Iconsider myself a facilitator,
like a guide.
I have training in coachingthat's specific to the
(25:57):
psychedelic experience forpsychedelic integration, for
preparation.
So what that looks like is isthe methods that I use encourage
an inwards facing experience,meaning that different from like
just kind of tripping, takingsome mushrooms and going into
the woods or hanging out,watching TV, right?
(26:17):
Which is what a lot of peopleuse them like.
This is actually a eyes closedexperience.
You're wearing a sleep mask andyou're wearing headphones that
are playing a very specificplaylist that was designed for
this experience.
It's very evocative.
you emotionally and it also hassome spaces where it leaves you
(26:37):
you know with some breaks in themusic or like very just kind of
calm music for you to be able toto have a minute to or a couple
minutes to take a breather andto process what just happened
experiences usually last betweenfive to six hours where people
are in the psychedelicexperience for usually about
(26:57):
four and a half to five hoursthere's also some time to gear
up to go into the experience onthe day of and sometimes to
land.
So the person will be with mefor basically an entire day when
they're doing their experience.
I provide what I callnon-directive support.
So it's not like you're takingthe self-saving and I'm just
(27:21):
kind of asking you questions ortelling you how about we think
about this or move you in thisdirection.
Actually, I'm not trying toinfluence your experience.
I trust that you know yourselfmore than I know you.
Even if you've been working withme for a really long time.
You know yourself better than Iknow you.
And I trust that the experienceis going to bring up the things
that need to be brought up.
(27:43):
So what I'm doing there is whensomething comes up that feels
like it needs to be discussed,that feels like it needs to be
unpacked, then I come in as acoach and I help nudge or kind
of open up the path for theclient to just continue their
own experience.
In terms of the setting, it hasto be very welcoming.
It has to be very very safe, hasto be private.
(28:06):
There must be other peoplearound other than the client and
the facilitator or facilitators.
Fairly neutral becausepsychedelics can be very what to
what that I'm looking for here.
When you're on a psychedelicexperience, you're very
influenceable.
And so imagery of things thatyou have any kind of opinion on
(28:30):
will become enhanced, like thevolume for Everything has just
been raised.
So a space that's neutral, thatis safe.
Safety is key.
Having a good relationship withyour guide and just really
making the person feel thateverything that comes up during
(28:51):
that day is welcome and it'sokay.
SPEAKER_03 (28:55):
Wow.
UNKNOWN (28:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:56):
That's a lot.
SPEAKER_02 (28:57):
I mean, the whole idea of this controlled
experience, I mean, I didn'trealize, I guess, that that is
something that, I mean, it seemsobvious when you talk about it,
right?
Like you want the idea of thesitter, right?
That makes total sense.
But to exponential, to expend onthat, to have it even bigger
(29:20):
than that is to have someoneactually help you through it.
And I think you've said it a fewtimes, right?
The idea of integration I mean,is that post or during or both
or how does integration work?
SPEAKER_00 (29:36):
Yeah, that's a great question.
So I think of integration askind of taking everything, all
the threads that you kind of gotto pull during that experience
and weaving them into somethingnew, something that's going to
affect your life.
So it can be new behaviors, itcan be new perspectives because
another of the characteristics,I said the experiences is
(29:56):
ineffable, it's also very easyto forget, which is surprising,
I think, to some people, becauseit's such an intense experience.
And when you come out of it,you're like, oh my God, this is,
you know, it's changed my life.
And then a week later, you'regoing to remember some of the
details, but the feltexperience, you know, that true,
(30:16):
like, oh God, this was sointense that I want to make
these changes, that will fadeaway.
That's why, you know, it'simportant to recognize that this
is still work.
It It's a tool, but the tool isgoing to give you the pieces.
You have to put that puzzletogether and make sure that if a
piece is just kind of fallingoff at some point because a
couple of weeks have passed oryou went back to a certain
(30:38):
pattern of behavior that it'snot serving you, that's going to
push out the work that you did.
So it's realizing through theexperience that you have all of
these choices that you can makeall of this, turn all of these
new behaviors into somethingconcrete for yourself and
beneficial for yourself, butdoing that work.
(30:59):
And so integration usually comesafter, and that can be, it's
usually for me in the form ofcalls with my clients, the week
of the experience, you know,within two or three days.
And then depending on, you know,how much integration they are
doing with me and how much wefeel that is necessary every
(31:23):
week after that is, or, youknow, The timing can change.
There can be some integrationthat happens on the day of, but
normally integration takes alittle bit of time.
It really is just processing.
And for big, big experiences, itwill take some time to process.
SPEAKER_01 (31:44):
You know, of all the stuff that you're saying, I
really like that you are not...
coloring any of it you're sayingyou could have a harrowing
experience but but it's always atool that we use to break down
that harrowing experience and welearn from it you're not like
(32:06):
trying to sell it as thisthing's gonna fix you the cure
yeah it's gonna it's gonna fixyou 100% you know or or it's the
easy button for mental healthissues it's still work but I I
like what you're doing and whatyou're saying because I feel as
if you're legitimatizingpsychedelics.
(32:30):
Most people right now arelooking at psychedelics as
something that hippies do.
They get high off of them andthey trip.
But that's not the case anymore.
SPEAKER_02 (32:40):
There's nothing wrong with hippies.
SPEAKER_01 (32:43):
No, no.
I'm just saying it's just...
I like it because any that canhelp people with mental illness
should be seriously considered.
SPEAKER_02 (32:56):
100%.
SPEAKER_01 (32:58):
Because there's such little advancement in mental
health that anything, especiallysomething like this that can
open your mind up and almostmake you, why am I depressed?
Let me look at the, you know,let me open my mind up and kind
of really dig into myself.
SPEAKER_02 (33:15):
Well, when you think back on your mental health
journey, and we've talked aboutit a million times, and I'm
going to bring you in on thishere a little bit.
During your mental healthjourney, we changed medicine.
How many times?
I
SPEAKER_03 (33:26):
know.
SPEAKER_02 (33:27):
And the, what do we want to call it?
The withdrawal, the fallback,the uptake, the titration,
whatever the verbiage you wantto use in order to get to a good
point on the new medicine alwaystook a while.
So it was a painful experiencefor a little while.
So the idea of, you know,psychedelics being hurrying, I
(33:49):
mean, it's...
SPEAKER_03 (33:51):
Everything
SPEAKER_02 (33:51):
is when you come to mental health.
So I don't see this as any badpoints right now.
It's like it is.
It is part of a mental healthjourney if you want it to be.
SPEAKER_01 (34:03):
Well, I could see someone being a little resistant
to wanting to go through a...
you know, a harrowing experienceand being fearful of it.
But I mean, you
SPEAKER_02 (34:13):
would get that on medicine too.
SPEAKER_01 (34:15):
Yeah.
Agreed.
But I feel like this is justanother option.
For sure.
We need to legitimatize thingslike this instead of big pharma
pushing this stuff away becausethey want to sell more Zoloft.
SPEAKER_02 (34:31):
Right.
UNKNOWN (34:32):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (34:33):
don't get me started
SPEAKER_00 (34:39):
yeah i mean there's there's so much truth in in in
what you said i mean i've uhhave people i i have never had
to go through the pharmaceuticalroute to kind of manage uh
mental health symptoms but ihave multiple loved people very
close to me who have and whohave gotten stuck in that cycle
(35:00):
where you know now the pill is aforever thing for them Or if
it's not, it has been anincredibly difficult journey to
leave it aside.
So talk about, you know, we havethis fear of psychedelics
because for 40, 50 years, itwas, you know, there was this
propaganda that said that theseare the worst things that are
addictive, that are incrediblyhurtful for you.
(35:22):
And here we are being sold, youknow, overprescribed with
medications that truly, youknow, when you look at the
history, I understand that therewas some hope in the
antidepressants, but the waythat they're used today, we've
really just kind of falling outof line with it.
(35:42):
So this is another option.
And I'm glad that as I'mspeaking, it feels like there's
an effort to legitimize itbecause that's exactly what it
is.
And I agree with you that for alot of people, I think there's
different camps right now.
Psychedelics are just very sexy.
So there's a lot of people justkind of trying to push them.
(36:02):
I Without speaking of the heroinexperiences, without speaking of
the set and the setting, becauseit's just easy to sell products
to misinformed people,especially when there's such a
wave, when people are hearingabout this as a magic cure, they
want to try it.
And so there has to be an effortfor the people who believe in it
(36:24):
to legitimize it, but also inthe most responsible way.
And something just out ofperspective, because you
mentioned that people, when theythink of psychedelics, they
think of the hippie culture, andthat's true.
And I think something that'sreally interesting about them,
(36:46):
which I've come to understandthe more that I move in the
circles, is that psychedelicswere in the underground because
legislation had pushed themthere.
We knew back in the 70s, 60s,even in the 50s that these were
incredible tools for mentalhealth.
There was research in the 50sand 60s with LSD for alcoholism,
(37:10):
for all kinds of mental healthconditions.
And so at some point, there wasan explosion.
It was really more because ofpolitical reasons.
They were pushed into theunderground.
And there they were mixing alongwith all of the pseudoscience
that exists in undergroundmovements.
And so we associated with thepeople who believe in all kinds
(37:31):
of things that have absolutelyno scientific backing.
And so now they're kind of beingpulled out of the underground
and into the scientific realm aswell.
And we're also seeing as that iskind of coming up, a lot of the
other beliefs that were aroundpsychedelics kind of being
heightened, you know, kind ofbeing almost brought into the
(37:54):
light because of that.
So it's been an interestingexperience.
I definitely came topsychedelics through a more
scientific background, you know,I was very materialistic, not as
in I like material stuff, but Idon't believe in anything that I
can't touch type thing.
SPEAKER_03 (38:11):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (38:13):
And I've certainly kind of hung out and learned
from people that I would havenever thought I was going to be
sitting around the same tablewith.
For
SPEAKER_01 (38:22):
sure.
For sure.
And one of the things is I don'tthink big pharma can sell
something that comes fromsomething that grows in the
ground.
you know, they can't make bukuprofits off of it.
So they, you can't tell me thatthe politicians aren't in that
pocket or they're not in thepolitician's pocket and
(38:43):
squashing things like that, eventhough it's a game changer.
Absolutely.
Scary.
SPEAKER_02 (38:53):
Before we go down the rabbit holes of conspiracy
theories and understanding howthe government could be
impacting big pharma.
And we all know what it's true,but move, Moving on.
I mean, how would you say thatyou feel that psychedelics have
affected your mental health?
And then do you have any storiesyou can share with us of
possible clients?
SPEAKER_00 (39:14):
Yeah, absolutely.
I would love to.
I mean, for me, it's day andnight.
I won't say that my firstpsychedelic experience did it.
But over the course of, youknow, the first six months that
I was doing my sessions and, youknow, As I started doing them, I
learned how to do them better,and I was going to therapy, and
(39:36):
then I would do these othersessions.
I think they accelerated mytherapeutic process incredibly.
The progress that I saw withinthe first year was amazing.
If I had to...
if I had to pick one thing maybeis reconnection to self.
(40:00):
You know, when I spoke of kindof growing up and being in my
head and feeling disconnectedfrom who I was and making
decisions from a space that Ididn't even know who was making
them, that started shifting.
It's like all of a sudden Icould see and feel who I was and
started kind of creating thatconnection to the self.
(40:23):
I believe in this and There'stherapeutic theories, things
like internal family systems andothers that speak of the self.
The self is like thisindestructible diamond.
When you come into the world andyou see a kid, they're 100%
themselves.
(40:43):
They are as pure as they can be.
They are not bound by any kindof education or indoctrination
or shame.
They're just themselves.
As As we grow up, there's theselayers of different things that
get in the way that startburying that diamond.
I said education, trauma is oneof them, indoctrination,
(41:07):
conditioning, all of thesedifferent things where we learn
that we shouldn't be acting thisparticular way and that we
should shy away, that we shouldmake a decision because the
other person expects us toversus because we want to.
All of those things startburying that self.
What I found that psychedelicsdid for me is that they started
(41:28):
creating a channel, like justkind of digging a tunnel where
all of a sudden that diamondcould start shining back again.
I call it at some point, like Isaid, I found my Elias-ness,
like what makes me me.
And not only did I find it, likeI feel it radiating out of me.
And from there, when I feel likethat, and you can get to this
(41:48):
place, you know, in other ways,you don't need psychedelics for
that.
But for me, that's what it did.
It certainly can be like anaccelerated path because they
have this biochemical actionmechanism.
So they're truly just kind ofshifting the way in which your
brain works, at least for enoughtime that then you can hang on
(42:10):
to that and grab momentum.
And so when you're feelingyourself at 100% and you make
better decisions, then you cansay, you know what, this
relationship that's not servingme, I'm going to move away from
it.
You know what, there's behaviorsthat keep me stuck in a cycle, I
don't want them anymore.
And this, you know, you cantruly be more connected.
(42:31):
There's less space between Ifeel and then I act.
Where are you?
Interestingly enough, I moved toWashington, D.C.
just a couple of weeks ago.
(42:52):
I just got here and the reason,part of the reason at least,
it's because D.C.
is a decriminalized state.
After they passed Initiative 81,psychedelics have gone to the
lowest level of of priority forlaw enforcement.
So you still cannot sell them.
(43:12):
You still cannot purchase themin stores and things like that.
But it's basically been said,we're not going to waste our
time trying to criminalize andact on substances that are
definitely not as bad as we weremade to believe and certainly
starting to show a lot ofpotential to help people.
(43:34):
So it's an interesting city andthere's only a couple of places
in the country where that's thecase, Colorado being one of
them, Oregon being one of them,but D.C.
is another one.
SPEAKER_01 (43:43):
That's awesome.
We're from Northern Virginia, sowe were a rock star.
We were in that area.
Around the corner, yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (43:53):
That's funny.
That is.
Small world.
SPEAKER_02 (43:57):
Well, I think from everything that we've heard from
you, I mean, I think it's abenefit to anyone with mental
health struggles that they'regoing through to explore the
idea of psychedelic coaching.
But I mean, who do you think isthe target, if you will?
Who's someone that would be mostbenefiting from this experience?
SPEAKER_00 (44:20):
Yeah, what a great question.
I think there's a lot ofcuriosity.
So a lot of people want to tryit out.
I would say there's not onething that this experience can
gift you.
It can be used for dealing withdifficult mental health
conditions.
It can also be used for justself-development, for somebody
(44:42):
who's looking forself-actualization.
Even if they right now, ifthey're not dealing with a
mental health condition, you canjust use it to self-actualize.
Sometimes you just want to useit for a moment of reconnection
for some people that never,never happens.
We live very busy lives.
So to take an entire day, eight,nine hours for yourself to go to
(45:08):
see somebody who's going to holdspace for you and prepare a
beautiful ceremony because youdeserve it, that's also a great
reason to do them.
I think one of the mostimportant criteria is openness.
You have to be open to newexperiences and open to the fact
that this is going to work somekind of work it always is but if
(45:35):
you come in prepared for thatwith an open heart and with an
open mind you're going to getvalue out of this experience
SPEAKER_01 (45:46):
So essentially everyone.
SPEAKER_00 (45:50):
I believe mostly everyone.
Yeah.
And I will say, because I thinkit's really important, that
there are certain mental healthconditions that are...
what's the word?
It's not recommended.
There's a better word for itthat I'm totally losing right
(46:11):
now.
But yeah, there are certainmental health conditions like
schizophrenia where they trulyrecommend to not engage with
psychedelics because they can bevery destabilizing.
Bipolar disorder is kind ofstill in a gray area, but
professionals right now normallydon't work with it.
(46:31):
Research is, there's not that ofmuch research geared towards
bipolar.
And so I would say it's mostlyfor everyone, but it's important
that you consider your ownsituation before jumping into
something like that.
And a good guide is going to askquestions around that.
So for anybody who's engagingwith somebody who wants to offer
(46:54):
those services, it's reallyimportant that they kind of
understand what makes a goodfacilitator.
And there's a lot of really goodarticles that you can find
online that will help you definekind of if the person that
you're working with feels legitwhat it should feel like and you
know what questions to ask asI'm saying that I'm thinking
that I probably should havesomething like that in my a
(47:14):
little FAQ on my on my websitethat helps people kind of even
if they're not working with meto direct them to someone
because it it's probably formany people it is one of the
most important experiences ormost significant experiences
that they have in their life andAnd it's also one of the most
(47:34):
vulnerable spaces that you canbe in.
It's a very vulnerableexperience by nature.
So you want to have somebody ifyou're doing it with somebody
that knows how to hold thatspace and that you can truly,
truly trust.
SPEAKER_01 (47:50):
Right.
See, I see very small amounts ofnegatives, if any, in trying it.
There's definitely a lot lessside effects from what it sounds
like than Zoloft.
I mean, let's be clear.
That's what you're taking.
We
SPEAKER_02 (48:09):
keep saying Zoloft.
We're not picking on it.
It's
SPEAKER_01 (48:12):
what he's taking.
That's right.
Yeah, I understand.
What do you think about flippinggears onto the fun question?
SPEAKER_02 (48:21):
Let's do it.
SPEAKER_01 (48:21):
If you won$10 million tonight, what would be
the first thing you do tomorrow?
SPEAKER_00 (48:31):
That's a, yeah, I think that's an easy one.
I'm trying to think to see iflike, is there anything else?
But the truth is, you know, yousaid in my introduction, I
dedicate my life to this today.
And the truth is that currentlyI, there is an attachment that I
have to a nine to five jobbecause, you You know, paying
(48:52):
bills is important.
And if there's one thing that Ido not want is for this to just
become a financial, you know,that all my money is coming from
my facilitation and coachingpractice because that in a way
just kind of puts pressure onit.
And it's a pressure that it'snot welcome.
It's a pressure that affects howyou work on it.
(49:12):
So if I had$10 million and Ididn't have to think about
things, I would just open up apractice, buy a piece of land
that would, you know, wouldbecome a retreat where you would
have not just important piecesfor this work.
It's not just the psychedelicsand the integration, but your
community.
So having a community where likewellness is put at top priority
(49:33):
and where people who need toheal can come, can feel safe,
can stay.
And when they have done the workthat they need to do, then they
can go.
SPEAKER_02 (49:45):
That sounds beautiful.
SPEAKER_00 (49:47):
Yeah, I'll go.
SPEAKER_02 (49:48):
That's a
SPEAKER_01 (49:49):
good answer.
I like it.
SPEAKER_03 (49:53):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (49:57):
Well, if we win the lottery and it's a substantial
amount, we'll give you that$10million.
How about that?
You can hold us to it.
For sure.
SPEAKER_00 (50:03):
Then you guys get lifetime passes for all of the
SPEAKER_03 (50:08):
services.
Gold member subscriptions.
SPEAKER_01 (50:14):
So, We talked about your business before a little
bit.
Where can we find you online?
Where can people sign up for anappointment, learn about your
services, things of that nature?
Where are you out there on theold interwebs?
SPEAKER_00 (50:30):
Yeah, so my website really would be the best place.
It's www.curasanajourneys.com.
And Curasana, as I mentioned, isC-U-R-A-S-A-N-A, journeys.com.
The website is the best placebecause although I have tried
doing a little bit of socialmedia marketing and it's just,
(50:52):
it almost goes up against theprinciples of the wellness that
I'm trying to kind of build andto share.
Like I don't want to bepromoting wellness on, you know,
highly addictive websites thatare as addicting to me as to the
people that are using them.
And so I've tried my hand onInstagram.
You can still find my profilethere at Kurasana journeys, but
don't expect it to be very up todate or very, uh, Yeah, I'm not
(51:18):
going to be promoting stuffthere a lot.
At least that's for now.
I want to stay disconnected fromthat.
So the website would be the bestplace.
Awesome.
SPEAKER_02 (51:28):
And we've been to your website.
It's very pretty.
Yeah.
You did a good job.
SPEAKER_00 (51:31):
Oh, thank you.
I appreciate it.
It took a lot of work and, uh,yeah, just kind of multiple, uh,
tries, but, uh, it's, yeah,it's, I I'm happy with where
it's at.
SPEAKER_02 (51:42):
For sure.
Well, we can't thank you enoughfor joining us and this has been
both educational.
SPEAKER_01 (51:48):
Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (51:48):
And honestly fun.
SPEAKER_01 (51:50):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I liked talking
SPEAKER_02 (51:52):
about something that I, you know, you don't know,
wouldn't expect, I guess, to bein the the realm of mental
health, but
SPEAKER_01 (51:59):
we've been taught that psychedelics are the devil.
SPEAKER_02 (52:02):
Yeah.
But hearing about it, I mean, I,I don't know.
Maybe we talk about this.
Like we have family still in theDC area.
Do you want to go?
We
SPEAKER_01 (52:13):
could
SPEAKER_02 (52:13):
go visit and we'll go check out.
SPEAKER_01 (52:17):
Yeah.
And then we'll have you at allon as like a post, a post, what
part of them or whatever.
Well,
SPEAKER_00 (52:27):
if you get, birth to yourself as some people do
SPEAKER_01 (52:31):
see he fixed my issue already
SPEAKER_03 (52:36):
there
SPEAKER_02 (52:37):
you go we need you here thanks so much
SPEAKER_00 (52:42):
yeah well thank you guys this has been a pleasure
it's been really fun and thankyou for giving me the
opportunity to share this withyou and your listeners Thanks
for listening to the UnfilteredUnion.
SPEAKER_01 (52:55):
Did you like the episode?
Support the show.
Visit us on Patreon atpatreon.com slash
unfilteredunion.
SPEAKER_02 (53:03):
Or you can rock some merch.
Check out our store atstore.unfilteredunion.com.
SPEAKER_01 (53:08):
For all other things unfiltered, check out our site
at unfilteredunion.com.
SPEAKER_02 (53:14):
It's what you do
SPEAKER_03 (53:14):
with the things you love.
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