March 3, 2025 • 43 mins
In this engaging conversation, Dr. Dan and Lance David explore their personal journeys with psychedelic medicine, focusing on their experiences with ketamine and psilocybin. They discuss the transformative power of these substances, the importance of connection and community in the healing process, and the insights gained from their experiences. The conversation highlights the potential of psychedelics in therapy and personal growth, emphasizing the significance of being present and open to change.
takeaways
takeaways
- Psychedelics can serve as valuable tools for personal growth.
- Expectations can be exceeded in transformative experiences with ketamine.
- The experience of seeing the universe as music and vibration is profound.
- Community and connection enhance the therapeutic effects of psychedelics.
- The journey through difficult times can lead to significant personal development.
- Psilocybin offers a grounded experience that fosters gratitude and reflection.
- Therapeutic experiences can shift perspectives on self-acceptance.
- The importance of being open to new connections and experiences.
- Psychedelic therapy can lead to lasting changes in mental health.
- The journey with psychedelics is unique for each individual.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Hello, and welcome to the Meeting Project podcast. I'm your host,
doctor daniel A Franz. As always, thank you for this
opportunity to bring some meaning, purpose and resilience and in
this episode, some psilocybin your way today. Good friend, fast friend, right.
(00:38):
Lance David and I met back in November at our
ketamine practicum in Boulder, Colorado, and certainly stayed in touch
because we knew we would be together for future practicums.
And we just found out after recording the show. We
were kind of comparing notes about families and stuff. Both
(00:58):
our first daughters were born on the same day in
the same year. How crazy is that? So yeah, Lance
and I just kind of connected after the Oregon retreat
last week. Welk just got home and kind of wanted
to share about the differences between ketamine and psilocybin and
our beliefs about using them in a clinical setting. So
(01:23):
I know, I enjoyed the conversation with Lance because he's
just a fun guy. Get it, mushroom psilocybin, fun guy.
I can't keep doing that, but yeah, here's my conversation
with Lance David.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Enjoy, ladies and gentlemen. We are honored here at the meeting.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Project podcast asked today to have the inimitable, the inestimable,
the inevitable, and the irresistible Captain giggle Pants himself the
Maritime Medicine Man, my good friend, mister Lance, David. Welcome Lance.
It's so good to see again, buddy. Thanks Dan. That's
quite an intro. You know. That's you, brother, That is
(02:21):
that is how I at least that's how I see you.
If we go back to when we first met too
long ago, man, those those are some interesting beginnings. Just
standing in a parking lot in Boulder, Colorado, both a
wee bit anxious about the journey we were about to take,
(02:41):
That is true. Yeah, staring at the mountain, h connecting,
trying to I mean that was that was uh, that
would have been day one, right. You know we were
some of the first You were one of the first
first people I talked to. And we're getting ready to
go into our journey, weren't we yep. So well, let's
(03:06):
talk a little bit about psychedelic medicine, Lance, because you,
I mean, before joining this program, you had a long
and storied history which is constant frequent psychedelic journeys, right,
you I'm me confused with something not a single one,
not a one? Yeah, what, I don't think we've ever
(03:28):
talked about this, like what, what what brought you into
wanting to study this never having experienced it?
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Michael poll lends how to change your mind. I'd like
to find I keep saying that was three and a
half or four years ago. I like to find the
exact date because that that that piece of trivia interests me.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
But I I'll just say.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Three and a half years ago. I read that book. Sure,
I heard him on a podcast talking about it. That's
usually where I that's where I get a lot of
book recommendations. And I just I devoured that thing. And
you know, I'm like a lot of therapists. I got
into this because I, you know, thought maybe helping other
(04:12):
people would help me learn, and help help other people
would help me.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
I said, I went, I went to Uh.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
I actually went to seminary to be the best lance
I could be. So that's always been important to me.
And UH, when I read that book, I was like,
I see the value of the of the tool that
psychedelics can be. I'm also about straight laced as they come,
(04:40):
so idea of like doing drugs, especially ones that I
couldn't find in a legal way, was pretty terrifying. So
I think I got an email for this. I p
I this organization. We're both doing this.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Educational cohort through and.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
I said, well, and at the time, silic, I mean
I really wanted to do psilocybin. That was I was
really drawn to that medicine.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
And is that because I mean, I think that's Poland
writes a lot about psilocybin and his journey in there. Okay, yeah,
And and I can remember.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Maybe not the quote, but the paraphrase what he said
when he said that like his journey with psychedelics made
him a better man. And you know it wasn't just
he himself. That was a testing to that. He said
his wife would attest to that too, and that that
really struck with me.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
I think that's something I've always wanted to be as
a better man. And say, there was something about that
book that was like it wasn't necessarily about the therapy,
but more about Okay, how can I be better? Oh?
Totally all right?
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Well, that again, that's a lot of why I started
doing this in the first place.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Right. Yeah. One of my.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Mentors says that every every child is a psychologist in
terms of they're trying to figure out what's wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
With their family.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Yeah, and some of us just like stayed in that
in that field.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
So yeah, that I love that one. Every child the
psychologists trying to figure out what that's I mean. I
remember taking my first psychology course in high school and
then going home of being like, huh, well that explained something,
and then and then just starting my bachelor's right, so
you know, you get you get a dusting of psychology
(06:36):
in your first four years. And I remember coming to
home and I think it was my mom was like, so, uh,
the neighbor's kid, you know what do you I'm like, no, no, no,
I can't. I'm not I'm not qualified. I can tell
you why I think you're crazy, mom, but not the
neighbor's kids. So she didn't like that very much. Like
I've been studying you for years, right, you are the
perfect case study. So any idea? What was it about
(07:00):
Poland's book? Then you just heard it on a podcast
You're like, yeah, I gotta know more about this guy.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Well, I'd read other books of his, so he was
already you know, a reliable source in my opinion that
I enjoyed, you know, his stuff, and.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Exactly what it was, but it just you know, he
really drew me in.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah, I mean, it's a great book. And have you
watched the Netflix brief documentaries.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
I did with my wife right before we went out
to Oregon.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Oh oh okay, so just a few weeks ago. What
does she have to say about it? She was intrigued. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
so same here, except we probably watched it before Boulder. Okay,
you know, I think it was one of those nice
where we couldn't find anything. I'm like, hey, I tried
this book, maybe maybe we can take no kidding, Like
(07:58):
she was into it, She's like, well, can we watch
another one? Since she kind of said it now once
she gets you know, frustrated with me or annoyed, there
are other words that come out. But she is intrigued
by the science of it. So so then okay, straight
laced mm East coast steminarian from from equally from Farmville, Illinois. Right,
(08:24):
you got it? Yep, We've we've shared that before. But
now you're you're out there on the East coast straight laced,
and you're gonna go do ketamine.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Yeah, and and honestly so that I joined this program
before psilocybin was legal in Oregon. So when I when
I signed up, there was only the ketamine experience.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Well, that's right, because you were in I remember you
talking about that just today. Really you were Cohort three
to begin, right, So that was what two three years ago? Yeah,
I was supposed to be in.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Boulder on February second, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three,
all these post COVID pre COVID, right, twenty twenty two
or twenty three, it must have been twenty three.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Well, and quite honestly, I find it hard to map
our cohorts in our in our school too, because they
kind of overlap in different ways. We started in July.
Now there's another one starting already. I don't know. Yeah,
So I am lucky Cohorts seven, lucky to be with
you and some of the other gentlemen, gentlemen we met,
(09:36):
and ladies as well. But so you started and had
to delay yep, And now you're back. What what was
that like leading up to taketamine for you? Because I
remember talking in the parking lot and you were shall
we say not not too excited. I was not.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
I my expect expectation were really low for Kennedy. I
did not you know, I was glad to be there.
I love being in Colorado, you know, I thought this
would be interesting. But you know I was really holding
out for psilocybin. I have to say, can I mean
(10:19):
blew my expectations out of the water.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
I do recall what do you remember of your journey?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
I remember sort of had this very I was excited.
I remember doctor Rowhani right as she injected me in
the left arm. Then as she's putting the band aid
on me, she said, I'm going to give you yellow
(10:50):
so the universe can find you. The universe found me.
You know, I know that it's like a make us
very susceptible to you know whatever, and very influenceable. And
I was really glad to be influenced in that way,
if that's truly what happened, because because I saw I
(11:12):
felt like I saw the totality of the universe, and
I saw it as music, music.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
And color, and it was beautiful.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
And you know, it's so weird to talk about right
to put in to describe this, because there there was
no me but the me that wasn't was a vibration
of music and everyone was just it was all just vibration,
and uh, we're all seeking resonance with other vibrations, and
(11:43):
sometimes we're in resonance, sometimes we're in dissonance, sometimes we're
in harmony. It was just beautiful.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Yeah. I love I love hearing you. Look, I can
listen to you describe it over and over again, the
way you describe it relating to music and that idea
that we're all connected. So yeah, just some of the
details in the right first doctor Roheeney, Oh my goodness,
what a beautiful soul. Yeah. I remember doing my you know,
you have to be cleared medically for ketamine, and I remember,
(12:14):
you know, we had to do a zoom call and
just talking to her over zoom. I mean, first of all, nobody,
not even my wife, calls me love that many times
in a half hour, right, Yeah, And she was just
so peaceful, so pleasant, and calls you love every chance
she gets. But the meditations and the prayers and just
how she honors the medicine and and and us as
(12:38):
as journeyers was so beautiful. Right. Definitely set the stage
as well as you know, we had Emily and Corene
and Dan who actually I just got an email from
him heading out to Colorado in a couple of weeks.
I'm gonna have coffee or Dan. So I'm very excited
for that. Yeah. I so for me actually knowing we
(13:01):
were going into that Boulder experience and knowing I wanted
to work with this molecule with my clients, I didn't
want to go and blind, you know, much like you,
never had any kind of experiences like this. I remember,
as I joked many times, like right, I grew up
in the Nancy Reagan War on Drugs era. You know,
(13:22):
my brain was in that frying pan, and I was
always terrified that I was just going to fry that
egg up and crack it. Right. Those messages still even today,
I mean we saw them around the room in Oregon,
just my goodness, just last week. Yeah right, you know,
still a lot of fear in a lot of people.
And so I had an experience here. Excuse me. I
(13:44):
know a local provider and I've seen the results of
her work without the therapy, right, just ketamine injections, and
they are sometimes just miraculous, right, love seeing that. So
I went and I had my experience in different from
what we're being trained to do. She set me up
in a nice, dimly lit room and gave me some headphones,
(14:06):
to which I played my own soundtrack because she didn't
have any music, and she asked me if I wanted
Ice Sheds, I'm gonna keep my eyes open. And I
had a blast. I had a full time. But it
was I mean, it was a very therapeutic, you know.
I had visions of waves and warm motions and uh
as I've shared here on the podcast with many other people.
(14:27):
I made the mistake. I used the Johns Hopkins psilocybin
research playlist okay, which is very intentional, very like grifted
and prepared for the research they're doing, which means you
probably shouldn't hit random it's and I did, and it
(14:48):
wasn't a good idea. So it was all over the place,
but it was Yeah, but there was a song that
really really affected me negatively. Come on, I had a blast.
Let the neuroplasticity set in for a couple of days
and nothing else. By the time we got to Bowlder,
I'm like, all right, I've had one experience. I want
to do this one up a little bit more. But Rohini,
you know, she h she was gonna give us a
(15:10):
pretty big dose anyway, and then we had the option
for a booster. Did you take the booster and did
you just take it off?
Speaker 3 (15:16):
Well, they didn't allow us to take it all there, yeah, right,
But I I I don't remember this, but I was told,
you know, when my when my buddy asked me if
I wanted the booster, apparently, I said.
Speaker 4 (15:33):
Oh, yeah, yeah, And I still wish I would have,
but I was in such a good place when she
came around the second time.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
I was like, no, I'm good, And I don't know.
I don't know if it would have meant made much
of a difference other than keeping me in there longer.
I know, my partner Greg, he he took his and
you know, he was journeying for quite a while. He was,
you know, for a while. But I do remember the
way the room was set up. Doctor Roheeney and her
(16:07):
assistant started on that end and I was on the
other end. I'm like, dang it, I want to be
one of the last to get my dose. And at
first I was like I was being a little selfish.
I was like, oh, hurry up, I want to get here,
but I had. I mean, it was such an honor
and a blessing to watch everybody else go in, to
watch you go in, okay, and I got to wait
(16:28):
a while. And maybe I've never shared this story with you.
I've shared the story many times. I believe you went
in pretty quickly because it was still a while before
they got to me. And you were you were having
some great verbalizations. Man, you were digging it a lot
of oh wow and old man and you know, and
(16:51):
you could tell you were jamming to the music too,
not as much as your partner the next day, he
really he was moving here, movement. So yeah, so I
went in and had a good time and ketamine. Man,
I don't know about you. I love ketamine. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
I still have only had the one experience, but it
will not be the last one in my life.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
It was, it was I just thought it was really rich.
And I mean I walked out of there with a
deep into confidence. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
At times I can be a pretty confident person, but
it definitely wax as it WANs.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
I can be a pretty moody person.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
I think that that a lot of times my confidence
is dependent on my mood. Really, since the mid November.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
I have had more I would say, more sustained confidence
him over several months than I have at any point
in my life. Yeah, it's really nice, you know, it's
it's fascinating. I didn't know you before, kennymine, right, but
for a few hours remember you saying that as as
we're you know, in kind of our sharing circle, and
I was just like, really, I mean we had a
(18:11):
good conversation staring at the mountains and everything, and now
experiencing you in different ways at different times professionally, like,
it's just so cool, right because I'm like, I don't
I don't know who that person you're talking about is,
but I don't see him. It's yeah, it's really yeah
to seeing you. The impact you have on other people
in the different communities were a part of has been Yeah,
(18:35):
no lack of confidence. I just like, nah, not Lance,
not that guy.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
I mean I I can hide my insecurities. I became
a master at that, so you might not be the
only person who have said that to me. Is sure prized,
but yeah, I kind of overcompensated at times.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
I would say, okay, fair enough, did you have I
know a lot of us were in a group chat
for the psilocybin, and we'll get to that here in
a second. Did you experience the contraction right to kind
of we talk about how both of these substances are
mind expanding, right, you feel much more open, you get
(19:17):
that neural plastic city going, but then there's a natural contraction.
Did you feel any of that after Kennemine, Well, I
don't know if you remember, but like the so, I whatever,
day one.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Day one was the day I took it, Day two.
I sat with my partner the morning the day of
day three, which you know, our day, the day we left.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
You know, I was still on a high.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
And you know I was on East Coast time, so
I was I'm a pretty early riser anyway. So I'm up,
you know, three point thirty Colorado town coming right right. Yeah,
and so and I, like in the last year, have
gotten back into running. I got my back to a
place where I'm at, so I go for a run.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
I ran down to the University of Colorado. I'm just
you know, I don't.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Know if you ever there's a reminds me of where's
a Charlie Brown episode?
Speaker 1 (20:11):
And when I was a kid, and he's like Charlie
Brown's gonna win the race, and he just insteaded taking
the last turn, he just kept running straight. Of course
he lost. That was kind of me.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
I was just running and I was just so happy,
and I hit to her with my ankle, just bit
it like I held a water bottle in one hand
and my.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Phone and the other. They went, you know, flying, skinned
up my knee hands. You know, I.
Speaker 3 (20:42):
Threw my back out a little bit, you know, I was.
I knew I was getting on a plane later the day,
and you know there's contractions, not the word, I don't
know what the word is, but it's it was like crashy,
like I yeah, and I don't know, you know, I
don't have an experience that didn't have that didn't have that,
(21:04):
but you know, I came back that morning to our
group and you know, our processing. I was just I
was franky. I was you know, I was, I was mad.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
And then I got.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
The lovely experience of sharing that with people who cared.
They had made a difference too, and they demonstrated that,
oh man, that that really sucks.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
And it just.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
The the high of you know, having people love on
you returned and I ended up being grateful that I
crashed there rather than you know, maybe back home when
I'm trying to get back to work and you know,
trying to be a dad and a husband and all
the all the all the roles where I could just
(21:55):
kind of received from people and it really, you know,
hat that frappy experience was sort of transformed into something
kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I was talking about this right after coming back from
Oregon last week, Like, regardless of the molecule, regardless of
the medicine, it's not about the medicine. It's having all
those people around. I mean broken people, people with their
own struggles, but people that as soon as you start talking,
put their put themselves aside and like, all right, tell
me about you, tell me about you know, duffing it
(22:31):
on the curve and you know, rolling around your water
bottle and just to be that present is so much medicine,
so healing. And then you know for us still, I
mean our keademy and group just met this morning. I
didn't get to be a part of it, and our
psilocybic group is still chatting away on a different you
know chat app. So so much connection and I think
(22:56):
that's the magic behind it, right, Anybody can go out
and I'm sure, I mean, hopefully it's hard to find
Kedemy these days, but mushrooms, you know, people have been
finding those forever. It's not about just you know, throwing
a bunch of mushrooms in your face and going into
a concert, but the truth, therapeutic values, all that stuff
we did leading up to it and getting to know
each other and then I mean, that whole process. Man,
(23:20):
it's amazing. It is. You know, you're reminding me. I
went into.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
The Kenemy weekend not really expecting to connect with people,
and that's not.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Usually like me.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
I'm usually kind of you know, exciting. But I don't know,
I think maybe I just was letting some of the
disappointments of you know, connections that you make with people
and then they sort of drop off. You know, I'm
fifty three years old. There's as many people that I've lost,
way more people I've lost then I've stayed in contact with.
(24:02):
At this point, nobody sort of prepares you for all
those losses in life. And I think I went in
a little uh, I went in a little garden, and
you you noted that uh annoyed me?
Speaker 1 (24:16):
With that that me annoying you? Obviously talked to my
wife before.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
But it it did something. It the ketamine shifted something
in me, and I became a lot more open to
the folks around me, you included. And uh, I'm I'm
really glad for that.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Like uh, it's you.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
Know, the phrase love the one you're with comes to mind.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
And you know, I spent some time overseas when I
was younger, teaching English and.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Korea, and I got involved with this community that you know,
they they'd been there for a while or you know,
a group of ex pats and they did that really like,
you know, I was there for a year and I
you know, I'm still in contact with some of those
people because they just they made such annette impact of
my life.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
But they yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Mean where I live now, there's a lot of military
people who you know, you meet and you're like, oh,
this is my fast friend, and then then two years
are gone and all that loss is hard to deal with.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Well, I think, you know, in our profession, we go
to enough conferences and conventions and educational experiences that that
happens all the time. You know, oh yeah, you have
a great time and it's intense and it's intimate, it's
intimate and then it's like, all right, well see a
piece out and you know, you may text back and
forth for a while, but then it's like takes work.
(25:46):
That's yeah, which it is. I mean going back to
the kedemy and experience truly a tessment that you know.
I know you and I are both involved in that
little group every once in a while. Hey, good to
hear from y'all. Now let's hop into what happened last week. Okay, right,
because ketamine was amazing, I'm bringing into my office. I
have clients lined up already, very excited for how that
(26:10):
is going to help people. I cannot offer psilocybin anytime soon,
but you bet I'm going to find a way because
what we experienced last week was again nothing short of
damn near maraca. I don't want to say miraculous because
people have been using it for thousands of years, so
it's not like it's new, right, which it was new
to us. Well, yeah, so how was it for you?
(26:36):
I mean, I still remember, but you're sick of the audience.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
It was different than I expected, So I don't know
if you've told your audience, but what you know we
learned in that in boulder was h Psilocybin is a
punch in the face, ketamine is a view from space.
MBMA is a warm embrace.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
I see, I thought that that one the other way around.
Hold on, I thought it was I gotta mean is
a punch in the face, and psilocybin's of you from space.
That's not what I remember. All Right, Well, we're gonna
have to ask. I'm gonna email Emily and find out
because and I've always felt like each one is both
like Kennemy can punch it in the face, but oh okay, yeah,
(27:17):
I'll take psilocybin was a punch in the face for me,
But let's talk about you first. Well, it was not
a punch in the face for me, That's what was.
It was really gentle. Now.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
I also fell asleep after I ingested the mushrooms right after, yes,
before they kicked in.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Damn you, Lance, That's why I told you. I told
you a couple of times. Your peaceful, giggling journey is
what totally set me up for feeling like, oh man,
Lance had it easy. My partner, who I'll talk about
in the future podcast, I mean, mister Yoga literally did
five hours of yoga all on mushrooms, and so I'm like, oh,
(28:02):
this is going to be amazing. I'm going to take
a nice nap and have some pleasant dreams. Nope, not
so much, but you did. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
I mean, I'm a I'm actually a napper pretty much
every day. And it was like kind of right around
my nap time, and I was I was tired anyway,
and I laid down p Dya shades on and I mean,
I don't remember fall honestly.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
But my partner said I was snoring, so I likely was.
I remember hearing a little bit of that because I
was just next to you over there. But now remind
me you what did you take? I took thirty four
milligrams I took, and the mass attech the same mathoe, okay,
excuse me. Thirty four milligrams being the largest legal dose
(28:48):
in the state of Oregon. So of course all this
was legal and supervised and in accordance with the Oregon
State Health what do they call it? Yeah, I don't know,
but we signed a lot of forms. I know that
forms may have a lot of papers.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Yeah, so it's hard to know when I woke up,
but you know, and I my the the back part
of the little backstory there too is my my wife
came with me and and we flew from East Coast
to flew into Phoenix, spent two days in Sedona, two
(29:26):
days at the Grand Canyon, you know, went through I've
never been in the desert before, so it's just really
fascinating and beautiful. You know, every day we felt like
four days because we just really filled it with a
lot of really just amazing hikes and drives. And so
(29:49):
in my psilocybin journey, I was flying around the Grand
Canyon like it I you know, I can picture them.
I can still see it in my mind.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
And the interesting thing.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
And as I reflect on it was in my journey,
I never see the sky. It's like I was in
the canyon.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
It was it was all earth.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
That feels that feels significant to me. Maybe I've talked
about that in our group that we talked a lot
about grounding, being grounded, and because you know, you can
I need that sometimes on a challenging journey. And it
was like all I saw was ground like and and
(30:37):
it was also like I kind of knew that this
was my own interior, like this was the space inside
of me felt grounded and beautiful and just like a
nice place to be.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Yeah. Yeah, and again from from just you know, down
the wall, from you next to you, pretty much like
that's what it looked like. Man, you look like you
you know, they're smiling and a little bit of giggling.
Not as much giggling as there was ketamine weekend, but yeah, man,
you really seem to be just enjoying or so.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Yeah, it wasn't as intensely pleasurable as ketamine, but it
was it was peacefully pleasurable. And sometimes think, I don't
even know if this is an actual if I'm using
these terms right, but I think about that the difference
between dopamine and serotonin, and dopaminees like the up chemical
(31:36):
like pleasure like what you get on cocaine sighting, and
serotonin is more the chill to sit and watch the sunset. Yeah,
and yep, I am definitely a dopamine chaser.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
You know, I like adventure and.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
You know, go go go, and I my wife likes
serotonin and you know, sit by the fire and I
get bored a lot. As I've gotten older, I appreciate
the serotonin and I see how much I need that,
Like it's so good for me to stop chasing the
(32:14):
dopamine and send in some serotonin. And that's what like
ketamine felt like a dopamine journey, and silicide really felt
like a serotonin journey.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
It was just there was a lot of it was chilled,
It was beautiful. I had tears, you know, like.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Kind of for the beauty, but also sort of had
this picture that well, yah, I rewinded what I said earlier,
you know, the when I after read Michael Poland's book,
I was like, I wanted to do psilocybin again because
I want I want to be changed, I want to
(32:55):
throw I want to And the message I got was that, hey, man,
you have done a lot of growth.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
In fact, the last year has been pretty good. That
the two years before that were some of the worst
of my life. And you know, a real desert experience
for me, and I sort of just knew in that
journey that that desert was not wasted.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
It helped form me, It helped help me, let help
me shed some things that I just didn't need. And
also the gratitude of being out of it was also
really really strong as well.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Yeah, I love what you said there, right, that desert
wasn't wasted. In logo therapy, we talk about you know, hey,
we're all going to suffer. Take your suffering and find
something in it, find achievement in it. And if I
synthesize what you were saying, like, yeah, that desert. Nobody
wants to go through it, but we all go through it.
And somewhere in that philocybin journey you realize and I
(34:04):
remember you talking about that, if I can out you like,
I want to find what all that was for. I
want to make sure that I've integrated and grown from it.
And the journey told you like you're good man.
Speaker 3 (34:16):
Yeah, yeah, it wasn't this sense like I don't need
any more growth.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
I don't wasn't that at all.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
But it was like, you don't have to strive so hard.
It's the growth has come, it will come.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
You know.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
I'm probably shared this in the group too, Like I
I've worked with a lot of men who, maybe especially
with the couples, who are just there because their wife
told them to be right and they resist. You know,
I'm fine, I don't need any help. And I think
i've you know, rejected that and Matt wanted to be
(34:56):
that guy, and so I feel like I feel like
that's what I sound like I when I when I
talk about I, Oh, I looked around the room, you know,
and people shared had a lot of really powerful growing
The challenging experience was kind of what I thought I wanted,
but what I got was just you're you're okay, and
(35:19):
it's just, uh, it's really I even find myself now, like,
do I really believe that I experienced it? It's cool
because it didn't have to be a belief, like I
had an experience of that.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah, nobody can take from me. I I can't deny it.
I was there. That's a real cool idea, right. It's
like in therapy, so awful we try to convince people
to think a different way, like, hey, let's change your thoughts,
let's reshape them, refocus, reframe them into these healthier ways.
(35:54):
But yeah, well psilocybin, man, you don't need eight twelve
weeks to somebody being like, here's how you change your thoughts.
They change, you experience, your thoughts change, and there they are.
You know, like you said, you get the sense of yeah,
I'm okay. Yeah. I think that was one of the
(36:16):
cool things about being in that group too. I mean
a bunch of therapists. Not to generalize, but all of
us pretty growth oriented individuals, right, Like, this is a
group of good therapists that invest heavily in their in
their training and education because this is not an inexpensive program.
And everybody had a little bit of that, like this
(36:36):
idea that like, wow, it's okay, okay to quit pushing
so hard. Yeah, it's okay to be me yep. And
I think to your point, that's a lot to do
with that. If I remember, right in one of our lectures,
psilocybin just hits. You know, if antidepressants get a few
(36:58):
serotonin receptors, you're in there and help them out like psilocybins, like,
oh yeah, I'm gonna bombard every serotonin receptor you have
in your brain, if there's all kinds of different ones,
and uh yeah, that sense of just you know, there's
there's that kind of a stereotype of the mushroom using
hippie just always being like yeah, me and everything's okay. Yeah,
(37:24):
but it man, I don't know about you. It's a
week and a day out and I still feel that
a lot. Just veryful.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
Yeah, even when things get a little crazy, I can
find that easier than I could more.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Than a week ago. Yeah. Yeah, So, I mean, I
guess the big question, would you do it again? I
will do it again? You will. There's not a would,
there's a will. Excellent, Okay, next question, will you do
it with me again? Hell? Yeah, yeah, you know, that's
just we need to find a way to make that happen.
(38:04):
That would be that that group I mean, dang talk
about First of all, obviously, mister East Coast, you were
the from the furthest Away. I'm from the second furthest
Away because most of the people in our group very
West Coast. Yeah, a lot of California people, a lot
of Oregon people, some Arizona and stuff like that. So
it was really cool just to see the different way
(38:25):
people relate to the world, unaltered in their culture. Yeah,
but man, I would. I would hang out with all
those people, right, And we still do through our through
our little whatever app we're using to connect so well,
I have the few times I've been on the West
(38:45):
Coast and in the mountains, I have felt like occupied
the wrong side of the country. Yes, yeah, well, as
I shared with you, we we leave Friday. We're packing
up the dog and whatever we can fit in the
small vehicle. Nice driving out. I'm gonna have coffee with
Dan from Ketymine and do some business with some other
(39:07):
therapists and stuff out there in Colorado. So I will
keep you posted and let you know how that goes. Yeah,
I'd love to hear. Yeah, well, my friend, it is
late on a Friday night. I should send you home
to your family. I know. I get to my wife's schedule,
the meeting with our priests this evening. So all right, Yeah,
I guess I get to learn how not to be
(39:29):
such a muck in my marriage tonight. So how to
be Yeah, that what's coming. I hope so, man, because
I could use it. That was one of you know,
going back to I know you took your wife on
this trip. I took my wife on the Kennemine trip.
But I think you know it's it's nice to have
them with us. It was equally nice for like, man,
(39:49):
I don't know how you did it, because those those
days in Oregon were long. Man.
Speaker 3 (39:55):
They were we're we're still on East Coast time.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
We were going to bed Burtty so an yo, dude,
me too. Like literally, I felt like an old man,
like if it was eight o'clock, what a Pacific time.
I was like, I'm I'm dying. I gotta go to bed.
But like you said, up at five, Randy to go.
And we didn't even have to be a class till eight,
So it was it was kind of nice being on
it in a different time zone.
Speaker 3 (40:20):
I'd rather go that direction than well, there's no no
place to go east for me unless I go across
the bone.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
But well, hey, our friend Nick, you know, he have
a thirty hour flight back to Athens. So yeah, no,
thank you. Well, last man, it's a pleasure. I love
chat with you, love hanging out with you. Thank you
so much for taking the time to share your experience
with whomever out there is listening. My pleasure. Thanks for
having me Dan, And uh yeah, we'll have to get
(40:48):
together and have some psilocybins sometimes. So that sounds good.
What a just fun, mild, mannered, enjoyable gentleman. Lance is
great therapist, right, so you know usually I tell you
to find out more about blah blah blah. No, no,
(41:10):
Lance is a therapist. Period The man sees clients five
days a week in Annapolis, Maryland, while supervising his little
team of therapists. I believe he said he supervises four
or five therapists and that's what he does, and that's
what he enjoys doing, straight up, all day, every day therapy. Bam. So,
(41:30):
unless you're in the Annapolis area, if you want to
find out more about Lance, get a hold of me,
and you know you can find more out about what
I'm doing at Danielafranz dot com. That's d A n
I E l A f r a n z dot com.
And uh, as you've heard me say and see me say,
(41:52):
if these these molecules, these plants, these substances interest you
in any way, do me a favor and seek profe
guidance on that. Seek my professional guidance, anybody's professional guidance.
You know. I think it's it's not the wild wild
West of the sixties and seventies like it used to be.
But there's a resurgence here. But there should be should
(42:13):
be a resurgence in a clinical and therapeutic way. As
you heard Lance and I talk about, there is such
power behind a therapeutic modality, a group therapeutic modality. So
if these are things you're interested in, give me a holler.
As always, it's my pleasure to bring a little bit
of meaning, purpose, and resilience to your day. Take care
Hello, and welcome to the Meeting Project podcast. I'm your host,
doctor daniel A Franz. As always, thank you for this
opportunity to bring some meaning, purpose and resilience and in
this episode, some psilocybin your way today. Good friend, fast friend, right.
(00:38):
Lance David and I met back in November at our
ketamine practicum in Boulder, Colorado, and certainly stayed in touch
because we knew we would be together for future practicums.
And we just found out after recording the show. We
were kind of comparing notes about families and stuff. Both
(00:58):
our first daughters were born on the same day in
the same year. How crazy is that? So yeah, Lance
and I just kind of connected after the Oregon retreat
last week. Welk just got home and kind of wanted
to share about the differences between ketamine and psilocybin and
our beliefs about using them in a clinical setting. So
(01:23):
I know, I enjoyed the conversation with Lance because he's
just a fun guy. Get it, mushroom psilocybin, fun guy.
I can't keep doing that, but yeah, here's my conversation
with Lance David.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Enjoy, ladies and gentlemen. We are honored here at the meeting.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Project podcast asked today to have the inimitable, the inestimable,
the inevitable, and the irresistible Captain giggle Pants himself the
Maritime Medicine Man, my good friend, mister Lance, David. Welcome Lance.
It's so good to see again, buddy. Thanks Dan. That's
quite an intro. You know. That's you, brother, That is
(02:21):
that is how I at least that's how I see you.
If we go back to when we first met too
long ago, man, those those are some interesting beginnings. Just
standing in a parking lot in Boulder, Colorado, both a
wee bit anxious about the journey we were about to take,
(02:41):
That is true. Yeah, staring at the mountain, h connecting,
trying to I mean that was that was uh, that
would have been day one, right. You know we were
some of the first You were one of the first
first people I talked to. And we're getting ready to
go into our journey, weren't we yep. So well, let's
(03:06):
talk a little bit about psychedelic medicine, Lance, because you,
I mean, before joining this program, you had a long
and storied history which is constant frequent psychedelic journeys, right,
you I'm me confused with something not a single one,
not a one? Yeah, what, I don't think we've ever
(03:28):
talked about this, like what, what what brought you into
wanting to study this never having experienced it?
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Michael poll lends how to change your mind. I'd like
to find I keep saying that was three and a
half or four years ago. I like to find the
exact date because that that that piece of trivia interests me.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
But I I'll just say.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Three and a half years ago. I read that book. Sure,
I heard him on a podcast talking about it. That's
usually where I that's where I get a lot of
book recommendations. And I just I devoured that thing. And
you know, I'm like a lot of therapists. I got
into this because I, you know, thought maybe helping other
(04:12):
people would help me learn, and help help other people
would help me.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
I said, I went, I went to Uh.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
I actually went to seminary to be the best lance
I could be. So that's always been important to me.
And UH, when I read that book, I was like,
I see the value of the of the tool that
psychedelics can be. I'm also about straight laced as they come,
(04:40):
so idea of like doing drugs, especially ones that I
couldn't find in a legal way, was pretty terrifying. So
I think I got an email for this. I p
I this organization. We're both doing this.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
Educational cohort through and.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
I said, well, and at the time, silic, I mean
I really wanted to do psilocybin. That was I was
really drawn to that medicine.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
And is that because I mean, I think that's Poland
writes a lot about psilocybin and his journey in there. Okay, yeah,
And and I can remember.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
Maybe not the quote, but the paraphrase what he said
when he said that like his journey with psychedelics made
him a better man. And you know it wasn't just
he himself. That was a testing to that. He said
his wife would attest to that too, and that that
really struck with me.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
I think that's something I've always wanted to be as
a better man. And say, there was something about that
book that was like it wasn't necessarily about the therapy,
but more about Okay, how can I be better? Oh?
Totally all right?
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Well, that again, that's a lot of why I started
doing this in the first place.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Right. Yeah. One of my.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Mentors says that every every child is a psychologist in
terms of they're trying to figure out what's wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
With their family.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Yeah, and some of us just like stayed in that
in that field.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
So yeah, that I love that one. Every child the
psychologists trying to figure out what that's I mean. I
remember taking my first psychology course in high school and
then going home of being like, huh, well that explained something,
and then and then just starting my bachelor's right, so
you know, you get you get a dusting of psychology
(06:36):
in your first four years. And I remember coming to
home and I think it was my mom was like, so, uh,
the neighbor's kid, you know what do you I'm like, no, no, no,
I can't. I'm not I'm not qualified. I can tell
you why I think you're crazy, mom, but not the
neighbor's kids. So she didn't like that very much. Like
I've been studying you for years, right, you are the
perfect case study. So any idea? What was it about
(07:00):
Poland's book? Then you just heard it on a podcast
You're like, yeah, I gotta know more about this guy.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Well, I'd read other books of his, so he was
already you know, a reliable source in my opinion that
I enjoyed, you know, his stuff, and.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Exactly what it was, but it just you know, he
really drew me in.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah, I mean, it's a great book. And have you
watched the Netflix brief documentaries.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
I did with my wife right before we went out
to Oregon.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Oh oh okay, so just a few weeks ago. What
does she have to say about it? She was intrigued. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
so same here, except we probably watched it before Boulder. Okay,
you know, I think it was one of those nice
where we couldn't find anything. I'm like, hey, I tried
this book, maybe maybe we can take no kidding, Like
(07:58):
she was into it, She's like, well, can we watch
another one? Since she kind of said it now once
she gets you know, frustrated with me or annoyed, there
are other words that come out. But she is intrigued
by the science of it. So so then okay, straight
laced mm East coast steminarian from from equally from Farmville, Illinois. Right,
(08:24):
you got it? Yep, We've we've shared that before. But
now you're you're out there on the East coast straight laced,
and you're gonna go do ketamine.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Yeah, and and honestly so that I joined this program
before psilocybin was legal in Oregon. So when I when
I signed up, there was only the ketamine experience.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Well, that's right, because you were in I remember you
talking about that just today. Really you were Cohort three
to begin, right, So that was what two three years ago? Yeah,
I was supposed to be in.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Boulder on February second, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three,
all these post COVID pre COVID, right, twenty twenty two
or twenty three, it must have been twenty three.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Well, and quite honestly, I find it hard to map
our cohorts in our in our school too, because they
kind of overlap in different ways. We started in July.
Now there's another one starting already. I don't know. Yeah,
So I am lucky Cohorts seven, lucky to be with
you and some of the other gentlemen, gentlemen we met,
(09:36):
and ladies as well. But so you started and had
to delay yep, And now you're back. What what was
that like leading up to taketamine for you? Because I
remember talking in the parking lot and you were shall
we say not not too excited. I was not.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
I my expect expectation were really low for Kennedy. I
did not you know, I was glad to be there.
I love being in Colorado, you know, I thought this
would be interesting. But you know I was really holding
out for psilocybin. I have to say, can I mean
(10:19):
blew my expectations out of the water.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
I do recall what do you remember of your journey?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
I remember sort of had this very I was excited.
I remember doctor Rowhani right as she injected me in
the left arm. Then as she's putting the band aid
on me, she said, I'm going to give you yellow
(10:50):
so the universe can find you. The universe found me.
You know, I know that it's like a make us
very susceptible to you know whatever, and very influenceable. And
I was really glad to be influenced in that way,
if that's truly what happened, because because I saw I
(11:12):
felt like I saw the totality of the universe, and
I saw it as music, music.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
And color, and it was beautiful.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
And you know, it's so weird to talk about right
to put in to describe this, because there there was
no me but the me that wasn't was a vibration
of music and everyone was just it was all just vibration,
and uh, we're all seeking resonance with other vibrations, and
(11:43):
sometimes we're in resonance, sometimes we're in dissonance, sometimes we're
in harmony. It was just beautiful.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Yeah. I love I love hearing you. Look, I can
listen to you describe it over and over again, the
way you describe it relating to music and that idea
that we're all connected. So yeah, just some of the
details in the right first doctor Roheeney, Oh my goodness,
what a beautiful soul. Yeah. I remember doing my you know,
you have to be cleared medically for ketamine, and I remember,
(12:14):
you know, we had to do a zoom call and
just talking to her over zoom. I mean, first of all, nobody,
not even my wife, calls me love that many times
in a half hour, right, Yeah, And she was just
so peaceful, so pleasant, and calls you love every chance
she gets. But the meditations and the prayers and just
how she honors the medicine and and and us as
(12:38):
as journeyers was so beautiful. Right. Definitely set the stage
as well as you know, we had Emily and Corene
and Dan who actually I just got an email from
him heading out to Colorado in a couple of weeks.
I'm gonna have coffee or Dan. So I'm very excited
for that. Yeah. I so for me actually knowing we
(13:01):
were going into that Boulder experience and knowing I wanted
to work with this molecule with my clients, I didn't
want to go and blind, you know, much like you,
never had any kind of experiences like this. I remember,
as I joked many times, like right, I grew up
in the Nancy Reagan War on Drugs era. You know,
(13:22):
my brain was in that frying pan, and I was
always terrified that I was just going to fry that
egg up and crack it. Right. Those messages still even today,
I mean we saw them around the room in Oregon,
just my goodness, just last week. Yeah right, you know,
still a lot of fear in a lot of people.
And so I had an experience here. Excuse me. I
(13:44):
know a local provider and I've seen the results of
her work without the therapy, right, just ketamine injections, and
they are sometimes just miraculous, right, love seeing that. So
I went and I had my experience in different from
what we're being trained to do. She set me up
in a nice, dimly lit room and gave me some headphones,
(14:06):
to which I played my own soundtrack because she didn't
have any music, and she asked me if I wanted
Ice Sheds, I'm gonna keep my eyes open. And I
had a blast. I had a full time. But it
was I mean, it was a very therapeutic, you know.
I had visions of waves and warm motions and uh
as I've shared here on the podcast with many other people.
(14:27):
I made the mistake. I used the Johns Hopkins psilocybin
research playlist okay, which is very intentional, very like grifted
and prepared for the research they're doing, which means you
probably shouldn't hit random it's and I did, and it
(14:48):
wasn't a good idea. So it was all over the place,
but it was Yeah, but there was a song that
really really affected me negatively. Come on, I had a blast.
Let the neuroplasticity set in for a couple of days
and nothing else. By the time we got to Bowlder,
I'm like, all right, I've had one experience. I want
to do this one up a little bit more. But Rohini,
you know, she h she was gonna give us a
(15:10):
pretty big dose anyway, and then we had the option
for a booster. Did you take the booster and did
you just take it off?
Speaker 3 (15:16):
Well, they didn't allow us to take it all there, yeah, right,
But I I I don't remember this, but I was told,
you know, when my when my buddy asked me if
I wanted the booster, apparently, I said.
Speaker 4 (15:33):
Oh, yeah, yeah, And I still wish I would have,
but I was in such a good place when she
came around the second time.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
I was like, no, I'm good, And I don't know.
I don't know if it would have meant made much
of a difference other than keeping me in there longer.
I know, my partner Greg, he he took his and
you know, he was journeying for quite a while. He was,
you know, for a while. But I do remember the
way the room was set up. Doctor Roheeney and her
(16:07):
assistant started on that end and I was on the
other end. I'm like, dang it, I want to be
one of the last to get my dose. And at
first I was like I was being a little selfish.
I was like, oh, hurry up, I want to get here,
but I had. I mean, it was such an honor
and a blessing to watch everybody else go in, to
watch you go in, okay, and I got to wait
(16:28):
a while. And maybe I've never shared this story with you.
I've shared the story many times. I believe you went
in pretty quickly because it was still a while before
they got to me. And you were you were having
some great verbalizations. Man, you were digging it a lot
of oh wow and old man and you know, and
(16:51):
you could tell you were jamming to the music too,
not as much as your partner the next day, he
really he was moving here, movement. So yeah, so I
went in and had a good time and ketamine. Man,
I don't know about you. I love ketamine. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
I still have only had the one experience, but it
will not be the last one in my life.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
It was, it was I just thought it was really rich.
And I mean I walked out of there with a
deep into confidence. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
At times I can be a pretty confident person, but
it definitely wax as it WANs.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
I can be a pretty moody person.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
I think that that a lot of times my confidence
is dependent on my mood. Really, since the mid November.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
I have had more I would say, more sustained confidence
him over several months than I have at any point
in my life. Yeah, it's really nice, you know, it's
it's fascinating. I didn't know you before, kennymine, right, but
for a few hours remember you saying that as as
we're you know, in kind of our sharing circle, and
I was just like, really, I mean we had a
(18:11):
good conversation staring at the mountains and everything, and now
experiencing you in different ways at different times professionally, like,
it's just so cool, right because I'm like, I don't
I don't know who that person you're talking about is,
but I don't see him. It's yeah, it's really yeah
to seeing you. The impact you have on other people
in the different communities were a part of has been Yeah,
(18:35):
no lack of confidence. I just like, nah, not Lance,
not that guy.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
I mean I I can hide my insecurities. I became
a master at that, so you might not be the
only person who have said that to me. Is sure prized,
but yeah, I kind of overcompensated at times.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
I would say, okay, fair enough, did you have I
know a lot of us were in a group chat
for the psilocybin, and we'll get to that here in
a second. Did you experience the contraction right to kind
of we talk about how both of these substances are
mind expanding, right, you feel much more open, you get
(19:17):
that neural plastic city going, but then there's a natural contraction.
Did you feel any of that after Kennemine, Well, I
don't know if you remember, but like the so, I whatever,
day one.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Day one was the day I took it, Day two.
I sat with my partner the morning the day of
day three, which you know, our day, the day we left.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
You know, I was still on a high.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
And you know I was on East Coast time, so
I was I'm a pretty early riser anyway. So I'm up,
you know, three point thirty Colorado town coming right right. Yeah,
and so and I, like in the last year, have
gotten back into running. I got my back to a
place where I'm at, so I go for a run.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
I ran down to the University of Colorado. I'm just
you know, I don't.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Know if you ever there's a reminds me of where's
a Charlie Brown episode?
Speaker 1 (20:11):
And when I was a kid, and he's like Charlie
Brown's gonna win the race, and he just insteaded taking
the last turn, he just kept running straight. Of course
he lost. That was kind of me.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
I was just running and I was just so happy,
and I hit to her with my ankle, just bit
it like I held a water bottle in one hand
and my.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Phone and the other. They went, you know, flying, skinned
up my knee hands. You know, I.
Speaker 3 (20:42):
Threw my back out a little bit, you know, I was.
I knew I was getting on a plane later the day,
and you know there's contractions, not the word, I don't
know what the word is, but it's it was like crashy,
like I yeah, and I don't know, you know, I
don't have an experience that didn't have that didn't have that,
(21:04):
but you know, I came back that morning to our
group and you know, our processing. I was just I
was franky. I was you know, I was, I was mad.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
And then I got.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
The lovely experience of sharing that with people who cared.
They had made a difference too, and they demonstrated that,
oh man, that that really sucks.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
And it just.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
The the high of you know, having people love on
you returned and I ended up being grateful that I
crashed there rather than you know, maybe back home when
I'm trying to get back to work and you know,
trying to be a dad and a husband and all
the all the all the roles where I could just
(21:55):
kind of received from people and it really, you know,
hat that frappy experience was sort of transformed into something
kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I was talking about this right after coming back from
Oregon last week, Like, regardless of the molecule, regardless of
the medicine, it's not about the medicine. It's having all
those people around. I mean broken people, people with their
own struggles, but people that as soon as you start talking,
put their put themselves aside and like, all right, tell
me about you, tell me about you know, duffing it
(22:31):
on the curve and you know, rolling around your water
bottle and just to be that present is so much medicine,
so healing. And then you know for us still, I
mean our keademy and group just met this morning. I
didn't get to be a part of it, and our
psilocybic group is still chatting away on a different you
know chat app. So so much connection and I think
(22:56):
that's the magic behind it, right, Anybody can go out
and I'm sure, I mean, hopefully it's hard to find
Kedemy these days, but mushrooms, you know, people have been
finding those forever. It's not about just you know, throwing
a bunch of mushrooms in your face and going into
a concert, but the truth, therapeutic values, all that stuff
we did leading up to it and getting to know
each other and then I mean, that whole process. Man,
(23:20):
it's amazing. It is. You know, you're reminding me. I
went into.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
The Kenemy weekend not really expecting to connect with people,
and that's not.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Usually like me.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
I'm usually kind of you know, exciting. But I don't know,
I think maybe I just was letting some of the
disappointments of you know, connections that you make with people
and then they sort of drop off. You know, I'm
fifty three years old. There's as many people that I've lost,
way more people I've lost then I've stayed in contact with.
(24:02):
At this point, nobody sort of prepares you for all
those losses in life. And I think I went in
a little uh, I went in a little garden, and
you you noted that uh annoyed me?
Speaker 1 (24:16):
With that that me annoying you? Obviously talked to my
wife before.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
But it it did something. It the ketamine shifted something
in me, and I became a lot more open to
the folks around me, you included. And uh, I'm I'm
really glad for that.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Like uh, it's you.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
Know, the phrase love the one you're with comes to mind.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
And you know, I spent some time overseas when I
was younger, teaching English and.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Korea, and I got involved with this community that you know,
they they'd been there for a while or you know,
a group of ex pats and they did that really like,
you know, I was there for a year and I
you know, I'm still in contact with some of those
people because they just they made such annette impact of
my life.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
But they yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Mean where I live now, there's a lot of military
people who you know, you meet and you're like, oh,
this is my fast friend, and then then two years
are gone and all that loss is hard to deal with.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Well, I think, you know, in our profession, we go
to enough conferences and conventions and educational experiences that that
happens all the time. You know, oh yeah, you have
a great time and it's intense and it's intimate, it's
intimate and then it's like, all right, well see a
piece out and you know, you may text back and
forth for a while, but then it's like takes work.
(25:46):
That's yeah, which it is. I mean going back to
the kedemy and experience truly a tessment that you know.
I know you and I are both involved in that
little group every once in a while. Hey, good to
hear from y'all. Now let's hop into what happened last week. Okay, right,
because ketamine was amazing, I'm bringing into my office. I
have clients lined up already, very excited for how that
(26:10):
is going to help people. I cannot offer psilocybin anytime soon,
but you bet I'm going to find a way because
what we experienced last week was again nothing short of
damn near maraca. I don't want to say miraculous because
people have been using it for thousands of years, so
it's not like it's new, right, which it was new
to us. Well, yeah, so how was it for you?
(26:36):
I mean, I still remember, but you're sick of the audience.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
It was different than I expected, So I don't know
if you've told your audience, but what you know we
learned in that in boulder was h Psilocybin is a
punch in the face, ketamine is a view from space.
MBMA is a warm embrace.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
I see, I thought that that one the other way around.
Hold on, I thought it was I gotta mean is
a punch in the face, and psilocybin's of you from space.
That's not what I remember. All Right, Well, we're gonna
have to ask. I'm gonna email Emily and find out
because and I've always felt like each one is both
like Kennemy can punch it in the face, but oh okay, yeah,
(27:17):
I'll take psilocybin was a punch in the face for me,
But let's talk about you first. Well, it was not
a punch in the face for me, That's what was.
It was really gentle. Now.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
I also fell asleep after I ingested the mushrooms right after, yes,
before they kicked in.
Speaker 1 (27:38):
Damn you, Lance, That's why I told you. I told
you a couple of times. Your peaceful, giggling journey is
what totally set me up for feeling like, oh man,
Lance had it easy. My partner, who I'll talk about
in the future podcast, I mean, mister Yoga literally did
five hours of yoga all on mushrooms, and so I'm like, oh,
(28:02):
this is going to be amazing. I'm going to take
a nice nap and have some pleasant dreams. Nope, not
so much, but you did. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
I mean, I'm a I'm actually a napper pretty much
every day. And it was like kind of right around
my nap time, and I was I was tired anyway,
and I laid down p Dya shades on and I mean,
I don't remember fall honestly.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
But my partner said I was snoring, so I likely was.
I remember hearing a little bit of that because I
was just next to you over there. But now remind
me you what did you take? I took thirty four
milligrams I took, and the mass attech the same mathoe, okay,
excuse me. Thirty four milligrams being the largest legal dose
(28:48):
in the state of Oregon. So of course all this
was legal and supervised and in accordance with the Oregon
State Health what do they call it? Yeah, I don't know,
but we signed a lot of forms. I know that
forms may have a lot of papers.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Yeah, so it's hard to know when I woke up,
but you know, and I my the the back part
of the little backstory there too is my my wife
came with me and and we flew from East Coast
to flew into Phoenix, spent two days in Sedona, two
(29:26):
days at the Grand Canyon, you know, went through I've
never been in the desert before, so it's just really
fascinating and beautiful. You know, every day we felt like
four days because we just really filled it with a
lot of really just amazing hikes and drives. And so
(29:49):
in my psilocybin journey, I was flying around the Grand
Canyon like it I you know, I can picture them.
I can still see it in my mind.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
And the interesting thing.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
And as I reflect on it was in my journey,
I never see the sky. It's like I was in
the canyon.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
It was it was all earth.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
That feels that feels significant to me. Maybe I've talked
about that in our group that we talked a lot
about grounding, being grounded, and because you know, you can
I need that sometimes on a challenging journey. And it
was like all I saw was ground like and and
(30:37):
it was also like I kind of knew that this
was my own interior, like this was the space inside
of me felt grounded and beautiful and just like a
nice place to be.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Yeah. Yeah, and again from from just you know, down
the wall, from you next to you, pretty much like
that's what it looked like. Man, you look like you
you know, they're smiling and a little bit of giggling.
Not as much giggling as there was ketamine weekend, but yeah, man,
you really seem to be just enjoying or so.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Yeah, it wasn't as intensely pleasurable as ketamine, but it
was it was peacefully pleasurable. And sometimes think, I don't
even know if this is an actual if I'm using
these terms right, but I think about that the difference
between dopamine and serotonin, and dopaminees like the up chemical
(31:36):
like pleasure like what you get on cocaine sighting, and
serotonin is more the chill to sit and watch the sunset. Yeah,
and yep, I am definitely a dopamine chaser.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
You know, I like adventure and.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
You know, go go go, and I my wife likes
serotonin and you know, sit by the fire and I
get bored a lot. As I've gotten older, I appreciate
the serotonin and I see how much I need that,
Like it's so good for me to stop chasing the
(32:14):
dopamine and send in some serotonin. And that's what like
ketamine felt like a dopamine journey, and silicide really felt
like a serotonin journey.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
It was just there was a lot of it was chilled,
It was beautiful. I had tears, you know, like.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Kind of for the beauty, but also sort of had
this picture that well, yah, I rewinded what I said earlier,
you know, the when I after read Michael Poland's book,
I was like, I wanted to do psilocybin again because
I want I want to be changed, I want to
(32:55):
throw I want to And the message I got was that, hey, man,
you have done a lot of growth.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
In fact, the last year has been pretty good. That
the two years before that were some of the worst
of my life. And you know, a real desert experience
for me, and I sort of just knew in that
journey that that desert was not wasted.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
It helped form me, It helped help me, let help
me shed some things that I just didn't need. And
also the gratitude of being out of it was also
really really strong as well.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Yeah, I love what you said there, right, that desert
wasn't wasted. In logo therapy, we talk about you know, hey,
we're all going to suffer. Take your suffering and find
something in it, find achievement in it. And if I
synthesize what you were saying, like, yeah, that desert. Nobody
wants to go through it, but we all go through it.
And somewhere in that philocybin journey you realize and I
(34:04):
remember you talking about that, if I can out you like,
I want to find what all that was for. I
want to make sure that I've integrated and grown from it.
And the journey told you like you're good man.
Speaker 3 (34:16):
Yeah, yeah, it wasn't this sense like I don't need
any more growth.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
I don't wasn't that at all.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
But it was like, you don't have to strive so hard.
It's the growth has come, it will come.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
You know.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
I'm probably shared this in the group too, Like I
I've worked with a lot of men who, maybe especially
with the couples, who are just there because their wife
told them to be right and they resist. You know,
I'm fine, I don't need any help. And I think
i've you know, rejected that and Matt wanted to be
(34:56):
that guy, and so I feel like I feel like
that's what I sound like I when I when I
talk about I, Oh, I looked around the room, you know,
and people shared had a lot of really powerful growing
The challenging experience was kind of what I thought I wanted,
but what I got was just you're you're okay, and
(35:19):
it's just, uh, it's really I even find myself now, like,
do I really believe that I experienced it? It's cool
because it didn't have to be a belief, like I
had an experience of that.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah, nobody can take from me. I I can't deny it.
I was there. That's a real cool idea, right. It's
like in therapy, so awful we try to convince people
to think a different way, like, hey, let's change your thoughts,
let's reshape them, refocus, reframe them into these healthier ways.
(35:54):
But yeah, well psilocybin, man, you don't need eight twelve
weeks to somebody being like, here's how you change your thoughts.
They change, you experience, your thoughts change, and there they are.
You know, like you said, you get the sense of yeah,
I'm okay. Yeah. I think that was one of the
(36:16):
cool things about being in that group too. I mean
a bunch of therapists. Not to generalize, but all of
us pretty growth oriented individuals, right, Like, this is a
group of good therapists that invest heavily in their in
their training and education because this is not an inexpensive program.
And everybody had a little bit of that, like this
(36:36):
idea that like, wow, it's okay, okay to quit pushing
so hard. Yeah, it's okay to be me yep. And
I think to your point, that's a lot to do
with that. If I remember, right in one of our lectures,
psilocybin just hits. You know, if antidepressants get a few
(36:58):
serotonin receptors, you're in there and help them out like psilocybins, like,
oh yeah, I'm gonna bombard every serotonin receptor you have
in your brain, if there's all kinds of different ones,
and uh yeah, that sense of just you know, there's
there's that kind of a stereotype of the mushroom using
hippie just always being like yeah, me and everything's okay. Yeah,
(37:24):
but it man, I don't know about you. It's a
week and a day out and I still feel that
a lot. Just veryful.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
Yeah, even when things get a little crazy, I can
find that easier than I could more.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
Than a week ago. Yeah. Yeah, So, I mean, I
guess the big question, would you do it again? I
will do it again? You will. There's not a would,
there's a will. Excellent, Okay, next question, will you do
it with me again? Hell? Yeah, yeah, you know, that's
just we need to find a way to make that happen.
(38:04):
That would be that that group I mean, dang talk
about First of all, obviously, mister East Coast, you were
the from the furthest Away. I'm from the second furthest
Away because most of the people in our group very
West Coast. Yeah, a lot of California people, a lot
of Oregon people, some Arizona and stuff like that. So
it was really cool just to see the different way
(38:25):
people relate to the world, unaltered in their culture. Yeah,
but man, I would. I would hang out with all
those people, right, And we still do through our through
our little whatever app we're using to connect so well,
I have the few times I've been on the West
(38:45):
Coast and in the mountains, I have felt like occupied
the wrong side of the country. Yes, yeah, well, as
I shared with you, we we leave Friday. We're packing
up the dog and whatever we can fit in the
small vehicle. Nice driving out. I'm gonna have coffee with
Dan from Ketymine and do some business with some other
(39:07):
therapists and stuff out there in Colorado. So I will
keep you posted and let you know how that goes. Yeah,
I'd love to hear. Yeah, well, my friend, it is
late on a Friday night. I should send you home
to your family. I know. I get to my wife's schedule,
the meeting with our priests this evening. So all right, Yeah,
I guess I get to learn how not to be
(39:29):
such a muck in my marriage tonight. So how to
be Yeah, that what's coming. I hope so, man, because
I could use it. That was one of you know,
going back to I know you took your wife on
this trip. I took my wife on the Kennemine trip.
But I think you know it's it's nice to have
them with us. It was equally nice for like, man,
(39:49):
I don't know how you did it, because those those
days in Oregon were long. Man.
Speaker 3 (39:55):
They were we're we're still on East Coast time.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
We were going to bed Burtty so an yo, dude,
me too. Like literally, I felt like an old man,
like if it was eight o'clock, what a Pacific time.
I was like, I'm I'm dying. I gotta go to bed.
But like you said, up at five, Randy to go.
And we didn't even have to be a class till eight,
So it was it was kind of nice being on
it in a different time zone.
Speaker 3 (40:20):
I'd rather go that direction than well, there's no no
place to go east for me unless I go across
the bone.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
But well, hey, our friend Nick, you know, he have
a thirty hour flight back to Athens. So yeah, no,
thank you. Well, last man, it's a pleasure. I love
chat with you, love hanging out with you. Thank you
so much for taking the time to share your experience
with whomever out there is listening. My pleasure. Thanks for
having me Dan, And uh yeah, we'll have to get
(40:48):
together and have some psilocybins sometimes. So that sounds good.
What a just fun, mild, mannered, enjoyable gentleman. Lance is
great therapist, right, so you know usually I tell you
to find out more about blah blah blah. No, no,
(41:10):
Lance is a therapist. Period The man sees clients five
days a week in Annapolis, Maryland, while supervising his little
team of therapists. I believe he said he supervises four
or five therapists and that's what he does, and that's
what he enjoys doing, straight up, all day, every day therapy. Bam. So,
(41:30):
unless you're in the Annapolis area, if you want to
find out more about Lance, get a hold of me,
and you know you can find more out about what
I'm doing at Danielafranz dot com. That's d A n
I E l A f r a n z dot com.
And uh, as you've heard me say and see me say,
(41:52):
if these these molecules, these plants, these substances interest you
in any way, do me a favor and seek profe
guidance on that. Seek my professional guidance, anybody's professional guidance.
You know. I think it's it's not the wild wild
West of the sixties and seventies like it used to be.
But there's a resurgence here. But there should be should
(42:13):
be a resurgence in a clinical and therapeutic way. As
you heard Lance and I talk about, there is such
power behind a therapeutic modality, a group therapeutic modality. So
if these are things you're interested in, give me a holler.
As always, it's my pleasure to bring a little bit
of meaning, purpose, and resilience to your day. Take care
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