Makes Sense - with Dr. JC Doornick - My Ayahuasca Trip to Peru - Part Three - This too shall pass - Episode 126

Starting point is 00:00:00 Have you noticed that the world that we live in has been doing most of the thinking for you? That your beliefs, perceptions, reactions, fears, and doubts have been shaped by unsolicited outside noise? How easy it's been for you to slip into that default sleepwalking mode and label it as life and reality. Yeah, that ends here. Welcome to the Make Sense with Dr. J.C. podcast. This is your opportunity to start thinking for yourself, reclaim control, and step back into that role as the shock caller and dominant force of your own reality. It's when you change the way that you look at things, that the things that you look at begin to change. So let's wake up,

Starting point is 00:00:41 let's rise up, and let's make sense of why and how shift happens. Well, hey there, good to be back. This will be the third part of the Sacred Valley experience that I had, and I recently got home from in Peru. And this is an interesting episode that we're going to go over a story that represents the dark side of the plant medicine experience. But what's interesting about that in general, you know, there's a lot of side talk and rumors and you can read things on the internet about experiences that people have. But what's interesting is whether you have a blissful experience or a dark experience, like the one I'm about to share with you, what you'll find is that they all have a silver lining. And that is something that I just love about the experience is that it represents

Starting point is 00:01:39 the obvious nature of being a human being and where growth takes place outside of the comfort zone is that sometimes you have to go through some tough times in life, don't you, in order to get to the other side? And I talk a lot about that in my book as well. So this will be the second night of my experience in the Sacred Valley at the Arcana Spiritual Center, in Peru, and I call this, this two shall pass. The night, the darkness became my teacher. And just as a disclaimer, I'm not masochistic. It's not something that I look to do. I mean, I understand where growth takes place, but I don't like to have a bad time. I want to make sure everybody understands this, because one of the prominent questions people ask is, why do you do

Starting point is 00:02:27 that, especially if you're looking at it as some sort of extraordinary unnecessary. thing and you know you don't have an understanding and that's just human nature that we always question and sometimes criticize things that we don't understand. So I don't like having a bad time. I do lean into the challenging things in life and I'm always looking for the lesson, but, you know, that's not why I go out there to struggle. I would always love and welcomely accept the idea of not struggling and just having the questions that I ask in life be answered, which I, I I thought I had done on the first night. So I hope you enjoy this.

Starting point is 00:03:06 This is night two, my second interaction in sitting with ayahuasca. So first I want to say plant medicine in general, and there's various types. We're talking about ayahuasca right now, but it has a way of laughing at our assumptions. That's what's interesting about it. You know, if you go into these things thinking that you have control over your life and you're very confident and you're not somebody that believes that you could lose control. Plant medicine, just like God, I would assume. And just like life, you know, they say God laughs at people that make plans. Well, plant medicine has a way of laughing at our assumptions and our

Starting point is 00:03:46 confidence and sometimes cockiness. So after this massive breakthrough that I had that you listened to in the last episode of Night 1, I shared with you the two funerals, the dissolving of some of my old fears and this wonderful underwater realm that I was in and the melting skyscraper and all of that stuff. I really, to be honest with you, felt complete. You know, I felt it's very rare that you experience that because it's usually a process of going through several sittings with grandmother, but I felt complete. I felt like I had all the answers. I felt like everything I went on this trip was accomplished. You know, I kind of felt like emptied. You know, I felt emptied out in the best possible way. You know, I truly believed that I had received everything that I

Starting point is 00:04:32 came for. So on night two, I basically told myself, I'm not going to drink the medicine at all. I don't need to. You know, that's an interesting thing that you can ponder is like, why, if I didn't have a reason or I didn't need something and all my answers were answered, why would I drink it? I'm not there for the thrill of it. It's not a lot of fun. It's hard work. So I-Awaska. is not a recreational thing. Like, you know, you'll never meet somebody that, unless they're like a shaman and it's what they do and how they live, it's not entertainment. In fact, the best way that I can explain ayahuasca in general is I remember the first

Starting point is 00:05:12 time I ever went there and I saw this guy who was leaving who had just went through a week and I had no idea what it was like. And I said, what's it like? What's it like? Which is what our analytical mind wants to do. It wants to figure everything out. And I remember him looking at me and kind of like laughing like, oh boy, this guy has no idea what he's in for. And he just said, well, I can tell you, it ain't no fucking vacation, right?

Starting point is 00:05:34 It's not entertainment. It's not fun. It's work. It's deep. It's disorienting at time. It's ego shredding work, you know, which sounds good on paper, but by no means is it fun. So after such an intense but positive first night, a part of me thought that the wise thing, so I'm kind of rationalizing and I'm making an assumption. The wise thing to do was to just sit back and be with everybody,

Starting point is 00:06:00 hold space with the group, and just simply observe. And, you know, I've never done that, but what I can tell you is just being around people that are in the medicine. And once the medicine is in you, what they say is that it's always in you. It doesn't leave, right? So I figured even if I didn't drink the medicine, I would still have an experience and maybe take that time to process and also be part of the group. But what I typically do and what I think is a smart thing to do because when my analytical mind claims that it knows, I've been around long enough to know that that's sometimes not the case. It's a little bit dangerous as well. So what I typically do is I seek counsel from people that know more. You know, it's interesting when you think that you know, there's always

Starting point is 00:06:48 somebody that knows more. So I was there to grow and what I did was I presented that to the shamans. They said, so J.C. Dragon, what is it that you want to do on night two? We have like a briefing before you commit to whatever you're going to do. So I just told them my story about the first night and I said, I think I got everything I wanted, but I will relinquish the decision to people that are of higher power, the shamans. So I basically told the shamans, you know, I don't think I need to drink tonight. I don't think I need anything else. You know, I got all the answers. And I just remember when it was translated to them, you know, both of them kind of smiled at me in the knowing, right, in my state of knowing.

Starting point is 00:07:33 And here's what they said. They said, well, why don't you tonight take a small dose, you know, an even smaller dose, just like an almost not impactful dose, you know, a very small, just to kind of open up the channel. as they said. If there's nothing more for you to see, she will let you rest. I liked that idea. I liked the idea of taking a small dose that was not threatening, because there's always this pending fear that it's going to be out of control. So I like that idea and I figured, hey, I'm just going to go have a chat with her. It seemed harmless enough. So I took what most people would call a baby dose. And that was about 15 milliliters. You know, this is what somebody that's never done

Starting point is 00:08:14 ayahuasca that's frightened to death of it, they would give them a small dose. Now, this is a very powerful batch of ayahuasca, you know, for whatever reasons, but I took this baby dose of 15. And I got to be honest with you, I kind of felt a little bit wimpy about doing it. I remember how I was thinking, oh, maybe I should up it, but then I caught myself just trying to be cool. Anyway, I went with it. I went with their recommendations. And I thought, you know, maybe a third of what I drank the night before in this small dose, you know, and I just had this intention of just simply checking back in with grandmother. And I just wanted to say, like, is there anything else for me to learn? So that's that idea of seeking higher power and not claiming that I know, which has always been a

Starting point is 00:09:01 good idea for me. So it was my ego that thought this was a brilliant plan, right? Well, grandmother thought otherwise. And that's what's interesting about all of this stuff is, just like in life, we don't always get to choose. We don't have, we're always taught to detach from outcomes, but I caught myself thinking that it was a brilliant plan, and that was me kind of getting attached to this projected outcome. And she thought otherwise. So here's the way it typically works.

Starting point is 00:09:32 Typically, you know, what they do is everybody drinks, and they have these nice little candles. And then after everybody drinks their brew, the lights go out. And when it gets dark in there, I can tell you that it is so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face, that there's literally not even a leak of light anywhere. You can't tell the difference between your eyes closed or open. You can't really escape the darkness. So a lot of people ask, are you supposed to close your eyes or open?

Starting point is 00:09:59 In this environment, it doesn't matter because it's just black. So in a typical situation or the way it works from my experience, ayahuasca takes somewhere base minimum 30 minutes to two hours. to activate, and I shared some stories with you about that and the funny conversation I had with this little man and stuff like that. But some people require, in fact, a second cup. Like, there were people in there that were drinking three, four times as much as me. And an hour and a half later, when they offered a second dose, a second cup, they're not feeling anything at all, right? So that's very common. As people two hours in and say, I feel nothing, it's not working, so they'll drink more. Not me, not that night. So I would,

Starting point is 00:10:42 say conservatively, 15 minutes in she came back. And that's, I would say that's not normal, but I think I've been working with plant medicine frequently enough that I have this relationship with it. So I don't struggle to allow it to happen. I typically allow it to happen as it happens. And I think that's why it typically hits fast, but she hit me harder that night than I would say any night before. And I think it was probably like my 15th or 16th time doing ayahuasca. So that's a pretty bold statement to say that this little teeny little, almost microdose of ayahuasca came on faster and stronger than any night that I had ever done ayahuasca before. So I think that's an important lesson in life, you know, to get attached to outcomes and things like that. So here's the way it unfolded this crazy night. And

Starting point is 00:11:40 I'm kind of getting like a little bit of an anxious feeling inside of me, just, you know, kind of recounting it. But it started first with this heaviness, and I think I mentioned that before. And that's the kind of heaviness that just makes your limbs feel like sandbags, you know? And there's a little bit of a buzzing in your head and that familiar tightening in the chest that I think I explained. And then all of a sudden the visuals begin. Now, this is 15 minutes in.

Starting point is 00:12:08 So I remember they were subtle at first, but then they started to multiply and go viral, you know. And these are not like just hallucinations. When you're in the medicine, there's no questioning it. It's happening. And like I said, you can't close your eyes or open your eyes and get away from it. But these images started multiplying and expanding and kind of exploding into geometric chaos. And all I can tell you is that you just have this overwhelming feeling of being overwhelmed. But I've been there before.

Starting point is 00:12:38 So these visuals, by the way, they're not like fantasies or imagination. Like you don't think them into existence. You don't really have control over it. You don't have to try to imagine them. You know, like if I close my eyes right now, I can kind of imagine some things. Like what I meditate, I have thoughts and feelings come in. And sometimes there's a visual associated with it. This is different.

Starting point is 00:13:00 These show up fully formed, alive and undeniable. You know, and I've shared stories with you. that kind of like augmented reality or virtual reality where Rizwan Verk, who was on my show, who wrote the simulation hypothesis, shares the story that when he was in a virtual reality playing ping pong, it was so realistic that he went to lean on the table that wasn't there. And that was the first time he realized he wasn't actually playing ping pong. So it's like that. And these visuals, these hallucinations, they were not gentle. They were violent, relentless, and overstimulating. So there's a theme to it.

Starting point is 00:13:36 You know, there's a feeling and a sense about the visuals. Are they friendly or unfriendly? And that's an interesting thing to ponder because it was me that determined that they were threatening and they were violent. I always wonder if somebody else would have seen it differently, but I realized that I was in trouble. And once again, I'm getting a visceral feeling thinking about it. So just imagine like thousands of glowing fractals shapes popping up like fireworks in

Starting point is 00:14:06 front of you. And they're not subtle. You know, they're multiplying and duplicating. You know, imagine like these things unraveling at hyper speed, totally uncontrollable and overwhelming. Imagine shapes, colors, sounds that are not happening outside of you, but they're like inside, taking up space and camping out inside of you. And they're bursting from the walls of your mind. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? The only thing that I could say is you could assimilate that the way I was feeling was the likes of a panic attack or an anxiety attack, but just that general sense of overwhelming. So what I tried to do is what we're taught to do. There's these things called the four pillars. And I think I mentioned that before. So the four pillars are what you're supposed to do

Starting point is 00:14:53 in the medicine, but it's kind of a nice lesson in life to combat the overwhelming feeling. So if you're feeling like you're under attack or you're feeling like it's too intense, they say to apply the four pillars. And the first is posture. So sit up straight, right? Get your act together. Sit up straight. And then the second is, is focus on your breath. And I think the value of focusing on your breath in life is that it's happening in the present moment. So I focused on my breath. I sat up straight. I also returned to the baseline of why I was there, my intentions. So, you know, it was about becoming fearless and worryless about those things and experiencing the calm that I just noticed sometimes I lose sight of. And then the last thing is to anchor to those Icaros, you know,

Starting point is 00:15:41 the chance that the shamans are doing. And in my situation, because I knew one of the organizers of this event, he put me right in front of the shamans. So like they were like five, six feet away from me and facing me. So it was pretty easy to focus on the Icoros. They're chanting. But For the person that's not going to ever do ayahuasca, I want to say that the four pillars would be a great idea in general for you to arm and equip yourself with during times of struggle. Focus on your posture, focus on your breath, that's present moment stuff. Return to the reason you're doing things. You know, they always say God laughs at people that make plans. So sometimes it's a really good idea to remember where you're going and why, what your intention is, your why.

Starting point is 00:16:27 And then as far as anchoring to the Ikaros, if you're not listening to shamans, you know, you could always put some gentle music on, kind of in a meditative fashion, and do the four pillars in that. And you'll always have a positive result. But in this case, that didn't work. I joked the next day. And that's key to recognize that I was joking the next day. But I joked the next day that it was so bad and I was under such attack that I tried the four

Starting point is 00:16:54 pillars and grandmother was like, are you kidding me, player? She was like, she's like, you think that I don't know how to get past the four pillars. And I just remember feeling just so weak and helpless that I'm instigating this thing that typically is working and I've been instructed, here's what you do when you're having a rough time or it was coming on strong. And I wasn't worried yet, but I was worried when I recognized that it did nothing. It did nothing. It didn't help. And she kind of like humbled me and like said, yeah, great, four pillars, but not tonight,

Starting point is 00:17:30 not tonight. So it didn't work. And that was a helpless feeling. So the shamans kind of sat in the darkness and they're whistling their Icaros over the brew and all of that stuff was taking place. And these are these ancient songs. And what's interesting about the Icaros, when you hear them chanting, you can't understand what they're saying, but what they're doing is they're basically warding off negative

Starting point is 00:17:53 energy. They're protecting the environment. They're not trying to do something to you. So it's important to know that they're there for us. They're protecting us from evil and things like that. So these songs kind of usually guide you into this calm state and you kind of recollect yourself, some sort of order and clarity. But this time, every chant and every rattle seemed actually to play into the situation in a negative way to amplify the chaos inside of me. So there, once again, I was kind of seeking protection from the shamans. You know, I remember intentionally, I'm like, they'll help me, they'll help me. And I'm doing the four pillars. And, uh, you know, it just amplified. It just kept getting worse and worse and worse. So that's a very helpless feeling

Starting point is 00:18:38 that you're kind of like exhausting all of your attempts to collect yourself. And just so you know, my fear in that situation was not one of a physical nature. I was not afraid of like dying. It wasn't that kind of an attack. I was actually afraid of losing my mind. I was so overwhelmed by what was coming on from this experience. And it didn't mean anything, by the way. I was afraid in my mind, I started telling me myself this story

Starting point is 00:19:05 that I'm not going to get through this. I'm going to lose my mind. So if you're into that sort of thing. So my mind really couldn't keep up. And I know that you know what it's like to be overwhelmed. That's a scary feeling in general. Just imagine that times like 5,000. My nervous system was kind of overrun, you know, and I was exhausted already.

Starting point is 00:19:23 Like, I'm an hour into this, and it was exhausting. And all I can distinguish is that something was going wrong. And I remember thinking I was a little bit of a victim of the fact that, wait a second, I just did a baby dose of this. This is not supposed to happen. And that was part of my mistake. I realize now is that I kind of felt like unlucky. It was inconvenient.

Starting point is 00:19:46 Like, why is this happening to me? And I remember apologizing. I was like, I'm sorry, whatever I did, why are you picking on me so much? You know, I just came here to have a chat with you. I really apologize. I really did. But this storm that was kind of representing itself and it was happening in my mind. It was like a thought thunderstorm. I could not get on top of it. It's just only intensified. Even when I apologized, I kind of like succlaimed to it and submitted to it and it just kept getting worse and worse and and things were not looking good. So just to give you a little bit of an idea,

Starting point is 00:20:19 the visuals that I was having kind of escalated into something, I guess I would say grotesque, not in a perverted way, but they were like grotesque and surreal, meaning there's no way it could happen. And that was scary as well because they were just extraordinary

Starting point is 00:20:34 and it was just too much. It's kind of like Donald Hoffman, who is on my podcast, talks about how we view reality in a computer. We look at the desktop. You know, the desktop is there with all the icons to make the experience of what you call a computer manageable. But he says, if you knew what was going on behind the desktop, behind the screen and all the

Starting point is 00:20:56 circuits and everything, it would be way, way too overwhelming for you to understand. I can only describe, and people laugh at this, and if you've done plant medicine, you'll fully understand this. The way I described the visuals is that they were like Transformer, Mickey Mouse, Jiffy Pop Clown Show. You know, it's just like, it's so. over-the-top extraordinary, that's the only way I could explain it. I mean, like you're seeing the fractals and like transformer like robotic people and then just things like Mickey Mouse and

Starting point is 00:21:26 clowns and all of these like kind of potentially frightening but extraordinary things, just pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, just too much, too much. Totally overwhelmed. And I'd never been in that situation before, by the way. This is extraordinary. And it was from a teeny little microdose. Now, I don't want people to think that this is what always happens. I've been doing this for almost five years, and I'd never experienced anything like this. So part of me knew, unfortunately, that this was just my journey that night. So if you're having that calling and you've always wanted to experience it, this doesn't happen to everybody. In fact, people enjoyed the story the next day, another key, the next day. And they just, they understood it, but they'd never experienced it. So anyone who's

Starting point is 00:22:12 been through some heavy work with ayahuasca knows exactly what I'm talking about, even if they didn't experience it, because they might have experienced lighter forms of it. When the mind is overwhelmed, it really distorts things. And I know that everybody understands that. The mind has a tendency of panicking, and it creates kind of like nonsense that it's experiencing, and it kind of like is this collapsing feeling. And mine, my situation was collapsing. fast. So just imagine that uncontrollable feeling of just falling and falling and falling and falling and it's getting worse and worse and worse and there's nothing you can do about that. So I felt attacked. And when I say attacked, I didn't feel like I was being attacked by entities, you know,

Starting point is 00:22:59 or darkness or anything like that, but I was being attacked by my own inability to survive and surrender to it. It didn't make any sense to surrender to it. I was trying to fight it because it's seemed like if I stopped fighting that I was going to completely lose. So I had to do something about it. You know, the medicine wasn't hurting me, but my fear of what was happening was extraordinary. And that's what was hurting. So the next thing that happened is apparently I was making some noise, right? I wasn't aware of it until one of the facilitators came up to me and shine the light and kind of leaned in. And I remember a feeling, oh, thank God, like somebody's here, somebody's aware of this, but it was still terrible. And he said something like, hey, JC, you know,

Starting point is 00:23:47 you're making a lot of noise, which I felt, I remember feeling bad about that, which was not helpful. But he says, try to take your process inward. And that was a nice way of him saying, shut the fuck up. But take it inward. And I didn't realize I was, I was causing a ruckus. But I looked at him and I said, oh, it's way past that, dude. I mean, like, there's nothing I can do to take this inward. I'm like, I'm struggling. And he had something else that he had to do, and he says, I'll be back. And the reason why is he had to go and offer the second dose. And he was right close in front of me. And I remember when some subtle lights came on so that people could know where to get the second dose, I saw him. And I was a little bit excited to see that,

Starting point is 00:24:29 but at the same time, I recognized that I couldn't make any sense of it. So even looking at some form of reality, that was skewed as well. So after he, he was, he was. So after he, he was, he was, did that. He came back and he says, how are you doing? And I said, I'm not doing well. I said, I'm under attack and I got to be honest with you. I've never said this before, but I don't think I can take any more of this. I didn't know what his solution would be, but I needed to let somebody know that things were going sideways. What's interesting is, it was obvious to me that this was not abnormal from him because he's been doing it so much. And this is a shout out to Sean, who was just an extraordinary. The facilitators at these places are just so warm and they just make you feel safe and

Starting point is 00:25:16 there's no way you could get through these things without them. But he didn't flinch. He didn't doubt anything that I said, which is kind of funny, right? And it was kind of nice to know that like he didn't think this was extraordinary. But he also didn't soothe me with false comfort. Like he kind of like sat there with me. He said, well, what do you think we should do? And I just remember recognizing, oh my God. Here you are, J.C., the podcaster, author, coach, and leader and all that stuff. And here you are just crumbling as just the weakest form of anything you can ever imagine. So I said, maybe I need some lime juice because I had heard that lime juice takes it down. And he says, well, then you're going to purge.

Starting point is 00:25:58 And I said, I don't care. I don't care. Something's got to be done. He says, I have an idea. He says, let's get you some space. You know, let's change the scene. Let's change the scenario. So what happened is, is that he kind of picked me up, but I could barely walk.

Starting point is 00:26:14 I mean, standing up when you're like this is just extraordinary. But here I am. Now I've got my arm around him and he's walking me. Like I'm just like this old feeble man. And I mean, it was a bit embarrassing, to be honest with you, even though I had some bigger nuts to crack. So what he did was he guided me to what we kind of like as a group jokingly call the bad boys area, like the timeout area.

Starting point is 00:26:36 they always have at these plant medicine retreats like an area that they evacuate somebody to when they're causing a ruckus or they're problematic. And it was just in this situation, it was just this simple corner of the Maloka that was away from where I was seated, a little bit less loud, not next to all the people, but it's reserved for those people that are going through extremely intense processes, you know, like the night before there was a guy that just couldn't stop throwing up and he knows who he is. He's listening to this. And it's not a place that you go as some form of punishment. You know, there's no judgment, you know, but it's because some work requires more room, more air and more distance. And we also have to be cognizant of if you're struggling,

Starting point is 00:27:22 there's people like just a couple feet away from you on left and right. And you don't need to escalate their problem. Sometimes you can spread a disease that doesn't exist, right? So I was evacuated. That's the first time in all the years that I've been working with ayahuasca that I went to the bad boys area to time out. When I went over there, there was a little couch and he started to prepare like a bed for me next to it, like another version of my cushion. But I sat on the floor. He gave me a bucket just in case I had to purge because I'm in a new area. And I was praying for a purge. I was praying for some sort of a release like I had the night before. You know, the night before I purged and it was a wonderful experience. It just cleared things out and I was able to listen to Maddie's music and everything. I was

Starting point is 00:28:06 looking for anything to break the intensity of what was going on. But in a very frustrating way, I recognized that grandmother, who was still attacking me no matter what, even with him there, she refused to let me even purge. And I remember thinking, like, just let me purge, right? So she kept me in the pressure cooker, you know, she just kept me in it. And that was another, you know, really sad time. It's like I, there was nothing. There was no reprieve, nothing to do. But I'm now at least in a different area. And it didn't fix things because the nightmare was still going on, but it changed things. So that's an important thing. Sometimes we just have to relocate and go to a different environment. And although I was still struggling, I just remember

Starting point is 00:28:56 thinking like, well, I'm happy that I'm just in a different environment. There was a little bit of fresh air coming in. And over there, I could see a little crack of a light in the bathroom that was in front of me. And that was kind of nice, but still, struggling. But something shifted inside of me. And I remember to ask different questions. Now, a lot of the work that I do with the interface response system is about that.

Starting point is 00:29:19 It's about getting open and curious and saying, hmm, this went on for hours, by the way. Couldn't escape from it. There was no lesson to be learned. are you doing this? What is this about? Why are you picking on me? What am I supposed to learn from this? Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing. But I remember to ask the right question, which is a different question. And I stopped asking, how do I stop this? I stopped asking, why is this happening to me? But I asked a different kind of an IRS interface response to some question, a dragon-like question. And I remember I said, because I still have my faculties about me. Even though I was in this nightmare, I was still me.

Starting point is 00:29:55 I still knew what I did for a living and I knew that I was in Peru and I knew about, I had family and everything like that. I was just in a real bad way. So I wasn't completely gone. I was just experiencing this nightmare. And I said to myself, which is what I teach a lot of my students and the stuff that I talk about in my book, I said, hmm, M, which by the way, if you spell it out, stands for, haven't made up my mind. I decided to stop making up my mind about what was going on. And I remember one of the things that I basically asked myself is I said, why are you interpreting this whole thing and giving it a negative meaning? Because I wondered, I said, maybe somebody else that was experiencing what I was experiencing.

Starting point is 00:30:38 And this was fascinating, would think it was extraordinary. It was like an electric light show. And they would report that it was the most amazing thing that they've ever experienced. But I started to say, what's really going on here? What else might be true about this? and why are you looking at it this way? Is there a lesson in the no lesson? What am I supposed to see from it?

Starting point is 00:30:58 And why is my mind turning this spectacular show into some form of a nightmare and some sort of hell? And that's when I guess I would say the tide turn and the answer kind of landed. Now, it landed softly, meaning it didn't fix things right away. It was kind of a quiet recognition of something. and I just said to myself, it's all about time. Time is my secret weapon. And I forgot about the ally that I had at all times during this whole experience. I forgot about the ally of time.

Starting point is 00:31:37 The one truth that I knew could dissolve all suffering, even this, no matter how bad this was or anything that you're going through in life. And we've all been through some tough times. no matter how overwhelming this situation was or anything I've ever been through, no matter how trapped I felt, I recognized, and I said it out loud, I said, this two shall pass. Just like the clouds in the sky, the stormy clouds that make it a bad day and block the sun and make things look dreary, they will pass on by. No matter how overwhelming, no matter how trapped I felt, this two shall pass. because everything changes.

Starting point is 00:32:19 It doesn't necessarily infer that it's going to get easier and better, but change is inevitable. Things always pass. It must pass because that's what it does. And I remembered that, because I had experience with this and in life in general, I remember that, you know, in a couple of hours, when the daylight comes and they turn the lights on and everybody's done with the ceremony and it ends, the medicine fades away. I knew that. I recognized in that moment that as extraordinary as it was, it would pass.

Starting point is 00:32:51 The storm would quiet and my mind would reset. Time is undefeatable. You know, there's so many wonderful lessons in that right now. Sometimes we just have to be patient. So what I whispered, or at least I thought I was whispering to the darkness, I remember I almost got angry, but I just got fed up with grandmother. And I remember I said to her, I go, you know what? Because I made that distinction that this two shall pass.

Starting point is 00:33:20 I said, all right, grandma. And I'm serious. I'm talking about this. People told me they heard this. I go, go for it. Do your thing. Continue with this show. Run the carnival clown show.

Starting point is 00:33:31 I will sit here and take it. As a matter of fact, go ahead and make it even worse. I was so confident in this idea that this two shall pass that I started to say, you go right ahead. And that was an interesting turn because I knew in that moment that this was something that couldn't be taken away from me, this universal aspect of time and this two shall pass. And something incredible happened at that moment. And there's so many lessons in this, whether you do plant medicine or not. Something happened right there.

Starting point is 00:34:07 The visuals didn't stop. They were still going on. The chaos didn't vanish. but my relationship with it changed. Now, one of my favorite quotes, and it's one of the tenants that I always use in the Make Sense Academy, and it's in my book,

Starting point is 00:34:23 and I first heard this from Wayne Dyer, and that is that if you change the way you look at things, that is when the things that you look at begin to change. When your relationship with fear changes, it doesn't make fear go away, but what happens is that the fear that is still there loses some of its power. And I think everybody listening will understand that. Grandmother didn't retreat out of anger or defeat, but she kind of perked up. And I remember

Starting point is 00:34:54 this was the sensation I had. Everything's still going on. But she kind of stepped back almost as if she was saying, wait a second. How did you know that? How did you figure that out? Or she was like, finally, you figured it out. All I can say is it was a power. pattern disruption. So she didn't retreat. She didn't get angry or anything like that, but she stepped back a touch, you know, almost respecting what I had just figured out. And it was kind of like she said, there you go. Finally, you remembered. And there was this turning of the tides. And I remember saying to myself, wait a second, I'm in control here. How powerful is that? Just imagine your worst nightmare ever. And I even caught myself saying like, hey, as a matter of fact, why don't you get the fuck out of here?

Starting point is 00:35:45 You know, it's like all of a sudden, I realized the power that I have and everybody listening right now, you always have that power. This two shall pass. And sure enough, one of my friends the next day said he heard me say this. He heard me say, get the fuck out of here. And that was my way of saying, hey, you know what, why don't you get the fuck out of here and bother somebody else? go give somebody else a nightmare. And kind of jokingly, I remember, like, a couple minutes later, hearing somebody like all of a sudden start freaking out in the room,

Starting point is 00:36:17 and I realized that that was kind of my fault. But she left me in peace. So an hour or two later, I went back to my bed, and, you know, I was back. I was back online. And, you know, there was still some visuals, but once again, I changed my relationship with them. And I kind of started enjoying it.

Starting point is 00:36:35 I felt so grateful that I had made. made it to that other side, but I was also very respectful of it, you know, because I realized that anything could change. But the ceremony kind of came to an end, and the candles kind of lit up in the room again. And I felt drained, extremely weak and humbled, but deeply grateful. That's such an interesting thing, is how I just went through one of the biggest nightmares of my life that I would never want even my worst enemy to go through. That's how terrible it was. And here I am feeling grateful for it and thankful for it. It was the hardest night of my life. I mean, if I could go back in those three hours that this happened, that was one of the hardest things I've ever gone through

Starting point is 00:37:22 in my life. I can't figure out anything harder. Darker than night one by far, more chaotic than anything I had ever experienced in life. But it gave me the less. that I didn't know that I needed. So I just want to pause here for a second and say, are you aware that there are lessons that you don't know that you need, that you need desperately? Well, that makes total sense to me because that's what's so hard about life. And that's what's so tough when you get hijacked by a scenario, a negative situation that you end up growing from is you are unaware that you needed it. Time is the ultimate medicine. Time is the ultimate attack and defense system and strategy for anything. Time is a healer. Time is the light at the end

Starting point is 00:38:17 of every tunnel. And I don't think people give time. I don't think people, it's one thing to recognize. I mean, everybody here knows the saying, this two shall pass. But, Do you give time for it to pass? Or do you just assume that you need to quit on something and move to something else? A lot of addiction is associated with that as just running away from things. Nothing permanent can harm you. Only fear convinces you otherwise. And that was the lesson.

Starting point is 00:38:51 My fears back home, money, losing everything, being unstable. My role as a father, as a failure. you know, safety, uncertainty. I started to recognize that all those things, even the lessons that I learned the night before, they were just clouds. The night before I thought I needed to fix something, you know, the money problem,

Starting point is 00:39:13 the fear of my daughter not being safe. I thought I had to fix it. I thought that that night I fixed it. But what I didn't recognize is the ultimate fix is not to get rid of things. It's just to recognize that they're just clouds in the sky. They're not the sky. They're just passing weather.

Starting point is 00:39:32 And oh boy, what a wonderful breakthrough that was. So night two, although it might seem like it, and somebody is thinking, well, forget ayahuasca, I'm never doing that. But night two wasn't a punishment. It was a gift. It was one of the greatest gifts that I've ever received. And it wasn't about learning something new. It was about remembering something that I forgot.

Starting point is 00:39:53 I call it a brutal, unwanted, and unhinged gift. but a gift nonetheless. And it's the kind of gift that you remember for the rest of your life. I cannot unsee that gift. And it used to be tucked away as an unread book on my shelf, and now it was right up in front of me. And I've already used it again in my life. So what I want to do before closing this section or this night too

Starting point is 00:40:19 before we move on to the next day is I want to zoom out for a moment and kind of break down the deeper lesson for you that emerged. from that nightmare night. Not just for me, which this is very helpful for me, by the way, maybe more helpful for me than others, but I know that you can relate to this somewhere in your life, whether you've done plant medicine or not. But this is for anyone who finds themselves trapped in the illusion that what they fear is worth fearing. Here's the truth. Most people never slow down long enough to see this. It's rarely the situation in life itself that creates. creates our suffering, is it? It's the meaning that we assign to the fear. Remember that moment where I was

Starting point is 00:41:04 saying, why am I assigning the meaning of darkness and nightmare and hell to this? I didn't know it at the time, but I was creating that. And if I could go back to that moment, maybe I wouldn't be able to get out of it. I think I needed to go through this to figure it out. I needed to go through such a hard time to learn this valuable lesson. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been open to it. Or I would just said, yes, of course, this two shall pass. When he was still alive, the great Alan Watts, one of my favorite minds that has ever existed. Look him up if you don't know. It's Alan Watts, W-A-T-T-S. But I remember him speaking beautifully about this topic before. And I remember what he said was, in some sort of way or fashion, he observed that human beings think far too much. Isn't that

Starting point is 00:41:49 true? Yet at the same time, examine the contents of their thinking, far too little and where those contents come from. I talk a lot about the program mind and the condition mind. I think that what happens is, maybe you can relate to this, we obsess over our worries the way that we obsess over distant stars in the sky. We look at stars as tiny points of light that we assign enormous importance to. That's a star. But we never take the time to look at a star and recognize what it really is. This is a valuable lesson right here. Alan Watts gives the example of looking at a star in the sky. From where we stand, looking up at the dark sky, it appears that that star is small in nature, and we know it's bigger, but it's far away. It's singular and it's significant. That's a

Starting point is 00:42:42 star. If you were to take the time and take that star and place that same star under a high-powered telescope, you'd realize that that star is not a star at all. It's actually. It's actually. It's actually a miraculous swirling nebula, floating in space, floating in space, with clusters of millions of others, something immeasurably larger, more complex, and almost entirely outside of our control. Way more. Like the desktop icons, we look at a star and we realize that that star is almost another galaxy. Planet Earth alone sits in one of those galaxies. It's also nice to know how insignificant we are. But our fears operate the same way, don't they? Let's take money worries, concerns about our children's safety, relationships, anxiety about the future, or even the

Starting point is 00:43:36 belief that we alone must hold everything together in life. How much time do you think like that? From a distance looking at those things, those fears look concrete, discrete, and represent viable points. We justify that. But after we zoom in, and really take a look at them, well, just like the stars, we begin to see the truth. Most of what we're trying to control exists far outside of our control, doesn't it? We do the best that we can with what is ours to manage our desired outcome. We work hard regarding money. We save responsibly.

Starting point is 00:44:18 We live with integrity. We teach our children, everything we can teach them, and we lead by example. we model it in front of them. But beyond that, there are millions of variables at play, aren't there? Millions of unseen forces, influences, and intersections, and tough lessons for them that don't belong to us at all, meaning we don't control them. What's called this unexamined massive assumptions, collectively, stuff. Stuff we react to because we've never taken the time to pause long enough or allowed ourselves enough honesty, truth, and transparency, and rationale to examine them more closely. So that's where my interface response system comes in, that four-step

Starting point is 00:45:06 process to help you reframe things. It becomes a lifeline and somewhat of a game, to be honest with you. I love to look at life as a game. I know this, but I had forgotten this that night. Whenever I feel those familiar spikes of anxiety, overwhelm, worry, frustration, or that tightening in the chest, what I've learned to do, and I was reminded of this, because times get tough, I've learned to stop and ask, hmm, what else might be true? What part of this do I actually control? And what part have I imagined that I control? Where am I trying to drink water with a fork or build an airplane in the sky or teach a goldfish to climb a tree. And nine times out of ten, maybe nine point nine times out of ten,

Starting point is 00:45:51 I discover the same thing every time. The emotional suffering that I'm feeling, and I think you can relate to this, is directly proportional to the amount of uncontrollable material that I'm trying to control. Once I name what's mine and what isn't, the grip loosens and the power of that meaning that we gave the fear starts to dissipate.

Starting point is 00:46:14 It doesn't go away. but it loses its power. This prompts me to zoom out even further where I discover in the grand scheme of things. The things that I cling to so tightly, money, reputation, outcome, safety, certainty, all of them are happening on a tiny spinning rock that we call planet Earth, which is floating in a thin cloud of gas in a galaxy among two trillion others. Each of those galaxies hold billions of other stars and countless other nebula. When seen through that lens, most worries that we have dissolve like dust in the wind, don't they?

Starting point is 00:46:52 This is what the medicine showed me that night. Not something new, but something I had forgotten. It reminded me that nothing I fear has permanence or power that I once believed it did, and that everything, absolutely everything, passes. This too shall pass if you allow the time. that is needed. And by the way, there's no fast forward button to move the clouds along faster in the sky. They take time, but they pass on by. And with that lesson, still echoing through my body,

Starting point is 00:47:24 the next morning arrived like a blessing, a chance to exhale, a break from the Maloka. Ahead, on this next day, we had a day without drinking the medicine, a day off, a chance to integrate, explore, breathe, and return to our bodies. Wednesday, the next day, day three, including night three, we were set to go deep into the sacred valley to visit the ancient ruins of Pissac and Olente Tambo, a journey into history, architecture, mystery, and the awe of the Incas. After two nights of death, rebirth, and cosmic humbling, I was more than ready to touch those stones, those 60,000 ton stones that somehow got up the mountain, experienced the sunlight and the grounded beauty of the outside world again. And that's

Starting point is 00:48:11 where day three begins. Thank you, my friends, for coming along this journey. You probably are a mix match of people thinking that I've lost my mind and I'm crazy. There's some of you that are curious and open to this, or some of you are saying there's no way I would ever do that. But the lesson does not need to have plant medicine involved in it. This lesson is universal for all of you in your lives. Just to remember, this too shall pass. We'll see you next time. That's it for today. To support the Make Sense with Dr. J.C. podcast, be sure to subscribe, like, and share, as well as follow the Make Sense substack for free daily quotes, live streams, and blogs. And remember, learning without action is just another form of distraction. If something hit home and you learn something today,

Starting point is 00:49:00 give it away. That's the only way it's going to stay. See you next time. Make sense.

Makes Sense - with Dr. JC Doornick - My Ayahuasca Trip to Peru - Part Three - This too shall pass - Episode 126

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