Realfoodology - CBD and Destigmatizing Drugs with Joe Sheehey of Cured Nutrition

Episode Date: August 24, 2022

108: On this weeks episode I am joined by the founder of Cured Nutrition, Joe Sheehey.  If you are not familiar with Cured, they are a CBD and Neurotropic company that I am obsessed with.  Joe sits down with me to talk about CBD, CBN, why you want to be taking it, dosages and we have a great conversation about the stigma of drugs in general.  Check Out Joe and Cured: Joe's Instagram Cured Nutrition Online (Click for a discount) Cured on Instagram Cured Birthday Sale AND LAUNCH OF SERENITY!  Offer Valid: 8/25-8/29 Products Discounted: CBD / CBN Oils - 40% off Capsules, Salve, Dog - 30% off Rise, Aura & Zen - 20% off CLICK HERE Sponsored By: Organifi www.organifi.com/realfoodology Code REALFOODOLOGY gets you 20% OFF Magic Mind http://www.magicmind.co Code REALFOODOLOGY gets you 20% OFF Check Out Courtney: Courtney's Instagram: @realfoodology www.realfoodology.com Air Dr Air Purifier AquaTru Water Filter Further Listening: The Power of Mushrooms

On today's episode of The Real Foodology Podcast. with cannabis, like side by side. We have a system that can be regulated by cannabinoids and other things as well. But the endocannabinoid system is responsible for many normal human bodily functions. Hi friends, welcome back. I am your host, Courtney Swan. You are listening to The Real Foodology Podcast, and I really enjoyed today's episode. I feel like I say that a lot, but you know, I bring on really cool people and we have great conversations and I really enjoyed today's episode. I feel like I say that a lot. But you know, I bring on really cool people and we have great conversations and I really, really enjoyed this one. I brought on Joe Sheehy of Cured Nutrition,

which is a CBD and nootropic company. They actually also happen to be a sponsor of this podcast, which I'm so grateful for. I am obsessed with this company, for lack of a better word. They really are doing amazing things in the CBD space. And that's a lot about what we talk about, what makes them different from other CBD companies. There's a lot of different CBD products out there and there's a lot of them doing it wrong. So we dive into what makes cured nutrition different. We also just talk about in general what CBD is,

what CBN is, why you wanna be taking it. We also talk about dosing, how to figure out what your dosage is. We also have a really great conversation about the stigma of drugs in general and how our generation has really been changing that. And we're trying to de-stigmatize that because we shouldn't be so scared of these substances

that have really amazing properties that are helping a lot of people in a lot of different areas, whether it comes to anxiety or depression or even seizures. There's a lot of studies right now that are showing that CBD, really high doses of CBD

have been helping people with seizures. So we talk all about that. We talk about ways that you can find a good CBD company. So ways to ensure that you're getting a good high quality CBD product and so much more. I really, really enjoy this conversation. Joe goes a little bit into his struggles in the beginning with some of his mental health

and I found it super relatable and I hope that you will too. And I really hope that you love this episode. If you want to try any of the Cured Nutrition products that we talked about today or really anything on their website that you are interested in, make sure that you go to curednutrition.com slash realfoodology. Also use code realfoodology and you're going to save 20% on any of their products. That's curednutrition.com. As always, if you are listening to the podcast and you're enjoying and loving it, if I could ask you to leave a rating and review, it helps me

so, so much. It really helps this show. And also, if you feel so inclined and you want to tag me on Instagram, please do that. Share with your friends, share with your family, with your followers. I appreciate it so much. My Instagram is at realfoodology. Thanks so much for your support of the show.

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There's only two grams. It helps balance your hormones, cortisol. It has cortisol and stress support. It's essential with micronutrients and fiber. There's also an effective dose of ashwagandha, like I said. And it just acts as a daily reset and a cortisol support. It's small batch, handpicked. It's also organic, which we love.

Every product from Organifi is organic and glyphosate residue-free, so you're not getting that carcinogenic herbicide in there. If you want to try it today for 20% off, go to Organifi.com slash RealFoodology and use code RealFoodology. That is O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I.com. I want to dive into all things CBD. But before we go into CBD and talking about Cured and your amazing company, what inspired you to get into CBD and health in the first place? Yeah, it's a great question. It's funny that we're talking about college in the beginning of this

because it all started there. My last, well, most of my college career, I lived this two separate lives type of approach. I was pursuing a aerospace engineering degree. I actually went into aerospace for a little while after college. So it took a lot out of me. Like I had to work really hard, had to study hard, grew up playing sports, grew up very focused on taking care of myself, pushing my body to limit and got to college and like had that as a core piece of me. And then was also pursuing a very, a hard degree. It was difficult. Engineering was difficult. But on the flip side.

Did you do that at CU? Sorry to interrupt you. Yeah, yeah. That was at CU. For listeners' context, we both just figured out that we went to the same college. We weren't there at the same time, but okay, so you were studying that at CU. I love that. CU Boulder, yeah.

And I always say my first senior year, because I took five years to graduate, in my first senior year, everything really came to a head. So I was like pursuing something and pushing myself as hard as I possibly could, but I was also on the flip side, living a very destructive life. I was partying five out of seven days a week. In the beginning, this was like, ooh, this is fun, there's no rules.

But then over the course of time, it just created this gap between who I really wanted to be and who I actually was. And in April 2012, it was 2.30 a.m. on a Tuesday morning. I came out of a blackout on a bridge. I had climbed over a guardrail and I was inches away from ending my life. I almost jumped off. Somebody down below the bridge stopped me. and what that guy was doing there at 2.30 AM. I mean, it was a college town, but he was there and literally told me to stop and pulled me back over the guardrail. And the core of the story is I was so far off from who it is I wanted to be that this gap between the two people was causing an immense amount of anxiety because I wasn't showing up being the

person that I truly said I was. I was living a very destructive life. I had this pretty big friend group, but I made decisions based off of the people I was surrounding myself with. And every party drug underneath the sun, you could find in my system. And when I was brought to the hospital the next day and put on 24 hour watch, the doctor asked me, you know, we're going to run some tests. Is there anything that we can find in your system? And I was just like, you know what, you're going to, you're going to find everything. And my parents were standing over me at the hospital. And I just saw the life just completely suck out of them because not only did they see that their son almost, they almost lost their son, but they saw that his, their son had

lost himself. And I, and I did, I really lost myself and I had become deeply depressed, but hadn't actually recognized how bad it was until I recognized that, wow, I'm literally inches away from ending my life. And the weeks after that, I was instantly put on antidepressants and my parents pulled me out of Boulder, Colorado. I moved back to Littleton, Colorado. And the year and a half after that, I basically spent very alone and like on the edge of making sure that I could still get this degree, get the job, not make a decision that was going to ruin everything that I worked so hard for. And thankfully ended up getting a job. I worked for Lockheed Martin for about seven years on NASA programs, and it was an amazing career. And at the same time, I still felt like there was something missing.

So from a very dark place to then being in a place where I was actually doing what I thought I was supposed to do and working very hard to get there, I still felt a hole. And at the core, what I was recognizing was I wasn't really showing up in a way that I thought was impactful and meant I was living my purpose. And what I recognized was I was on this journey from being extremely depressed and completely losing myself. And in that journey, what I was really doing was trying to figure out like, what does it mean to truly be healthy? What does it truly mean to pursue a life of impact? And I had started this podcast several years into my professional career, and this was on the side, but the podcast ended up getting rebranded to what was called Higher Health. And I was having conversations with individuals in the health and fitness industry. And we would talk about

what brought you to this world. And a lot of the times there was like some trauma or some like difficult story that led people into this life of pursuing what it truly meant to be healthy, happy, and fulfilled. And there were wonderful conversations, but the thing that was so present was we would have a podcast conversation. We would get off of the podcast and individuals would see me using cannabis on social media, using CBD, using to be completely transparent psilocybin at times. And they would ask me questions outside of the podcast and say, I see you doing this specifically around cannabis. And they said, hey, I use cannabis too. I just don't talk about it openly. And it kept happening

over and over and over and over again. And I said, okay, I asked the question, I was like, so why? Why don't people want to talk about this publicly? And it was because there's such a stigma around cannabis and there's such a stigma around so many things. And at the core, it's because we as individuals that grew up in the DARE program, as people that were children of parents that grew up with, you know, like reefer madness and propaganda that's lasted for so long, are products of narrative. We're all products of narrative. And it was so apparent to me that as I met more and more people that truly wanted to say, hey, like I do X, whatever it is, it helps me live and become a better, live a better life, become a better person, take care of myself. And I'm nervous to talk about it. And so seven years into my engineering career, lots of things happened. But finally a boss just like belittled me so much that I was like, this is it. I'm done, I need to go do something else.

And I had this idea that I could start to more or less rebrand cannabis, like change the story around it and allow people to truly understand the power of it. And that is what led into what is now Cured Nutrition and the company that sells CBD products, cannabis products, functional mushroom products. We're basically, I say that we're a supplement company of the future. There's the past and there's the future. And the future has pieces of history in it. Like cannabis has been used for

thousands and thousands and thousands of years. Traditional Chinese medicine is extremely powerful and has been used for a very long time. And I think that I like joke about this, but it's not like we're going to return to nature and all go live in the woods. Like we sometimes want to, but I think we're going to return as a society to understanding the true powers of nature. And that's our mission. So it was like, I went engineering to cannabis. And that's a hard left-hand turn at one point. But the core of it was I wanted to share something that had been helpful for me and recognize that so many other people

had benefited from it, but they just wouldn't talk about it openly. And so now it's five years in the making. Cured Nutrition was started five years ago. And here we are trying to change a narrative and it's working, but conversations like this help. It's funny, there really has been this renaissance with the last like five years or so. Because I've noticed that too, in my social circles, like, you know, again, product of the D.A.R.E. program. Growing up, it was so stigmatized to talk about any of this. The only thing that felt like it was okay to talk about was drinking.

Right. Which is, it's so funny, right? Because you look back on that and I'm like, I had my most destructive nights when I would go out and get hammered with my friends in college, you know? And thankfully nothing ever like too crazy happened. But it's funny because like we could just openly be like, oh man, I got trashed with my friends over the weekend.

But then like if someone was like, oh, I got, you know, really high over the weekend, I smoked some cannabis or I went on a psilocybin journey. Like I remember looking back on college. So, you know, we both went to CU and CU had a lot of drugs floating around. And the only thing I ever did was drink. I was terrified.

I had a horrible experience smoking weed when I was in high school. And I literally didn't touch it for like 10 years. It was the worst, most traumatic experience I've ever had. Not ever, oh my God, that is way too dramatic, but it was bad. And so I didn't do it for like 10 years. And then I was so scared after coming through that,

the whole D.A.R. DARE program that my school had done that I didn't wanna touch psilocybin either. And I had friends in college that were making like psilocybin tea and going on these really wonderful like journeys and experiences and I was terrified. I didn't touch any of it, but then was like a really avid drinker.

And looking back, I'm like, that was way more terrible for my health. You know, like now everything that we know about like psilocybin and cannabis and how wonderfully healing they can be for people. I've personally, I've talked about this a lot on the podcast. I've had some really healing experiences with psilocybin. And I love that Michael Pollan wrote a book about it.

He has that new Netflix special, which is really amazing. Yeah, and so it's just cool that everyone's slowly starting to come out and talk about this because we really are, we're changing the stigma so much that literally my dad, I hope my dad doesn't get upset with me talking about this, but over Christmas last year, my dad called me and he's like, hey, do you know how to get your hands on some mushrooms? And I was like, what? And he was like, yeah, I was kind of like, you know, I've been hearing things. I'm reading some articles about Michael Pollan. Like I'm

kind of intrigued. And like, he's like, the last time I tried it, it was like the seventies and I went on a journey in the woods and I feel like I need to try that. And I was like, I love this. Well, so what happened in the sixties and seventies was it just, we didn't do it right. And so the, not that we didn't do it right, I guess it just, there was such a narrative around like counterculture and who these people, I'm doing air quotes for those of you that are just listening to audio,

is that like there was this idea that this is counterculture, that nobody can be a professional, well-respected individual and still accomplish a lot in life and use cannabis or psilocybin, you name it. And the truth is, is that that's so wrong. But until you can actually experience it in a state where it's used very intentionally and correctly, you can't change the narrative for yourself.

And like you, your experience when you were younger with THC is, it's all dose dependent and then the idea of set and setting is so important. And then even more than that, when I say that I was this person when I made these decisions in college, cannabis and psilocybin were part of it, but then name all the other party drugs were also part of it.

And alcohol and blacking out was the thing that led me to the edge of the bridge. And it wasn't, not saying all those things are okay, all those substances are okay. What I'm saying is I was the problem. Like I was the problem. It wasn't those substances. So as I spent several years sober and was pursuing, you know, I was, I was in the bodybuilding world. I was in the physique competing world and I was like pushing my body to its limit. And after I

spent some time doing that, which also has some unhealthy components to it as well. I recognized, I was like, okay, Joe was the problem. The user was the problem. And I started to explore as cannabis became recreationally legal here in Colorado, I started to explore all the other cannabinoids, CBD, and I started to notice that, oh, this helps me sleep. This helps me relax. This helps me recover. So if that's true, it wasn't that like the plants,

the issue it's the user could be potentially not using it correctly, or it's also dose dependent. So there's so much to talk about. There's so much to understand. And that is what like our mission is, is like, if we're not putting out the correct information and trying to change the narrative, then it's going to be a short-lived renaissance that we're in. But we want this to stay. We want to actually show people that there's another option. I'll sit here and I'll say, I'm thankful for modern medicine. My daughter was born early. She was in the NICU for almost 10 days. And I'm so thankful for it. I'm so thankful for the times when I did need to use certain medications. And I think there's another option. I'm not saying that they're one way or the other,

but I'm also saying that there's a lot for us to question. Just like the work you do, when we talk about what goes on in our industry, the supplement industry. You talk about the food industry, you want to talk about quality control and testing and everything in our industry. All of that's important. All of that needs to be part of the conversation.

And at the end of the day, if we can put the right messages out there, have the right conversations and educate the consumer correctly, then everybody can make proper decisions, conscious decisions to explore things that can truly help people. And I'll also sit here and say,

it's still not for everybody. Nuance, our world needs nuance and sometimes it just doesn't exist. That's the thing, everything is so nuanced. And with social media, we've gotten this horrible habit of thinking that life is just two boxes. It's either this or it's that. And what people don't understand,

or hopefully a lot of people understand this, but it gets lost in social media, is that if you make one statement, then everyone just assumes that what you didn't say is also what you agree with. You know what I'm saying? There needs to be more room and space for nuance and people need to understand that just because like, for example, you and I are having this conversation and we're saying, you know, CBD has really helped me and psilocybin has really helped me. Are we saying

that literally every single person on the planet needs to also try it and it's going to help them? No, you have to figure that out for yourself. And so it's, yeah, it's very frustrating. The nuance thing is, I really struggle with that with social media and making statements online. And it's all about education. Like at the end of the day, I feel like both of us kind of have a similar mission

that we just want to educate people on how they can be the best versions of themselves. And for you, you provide this amazing product that provides relief in many ways for people, whether it's helping with sleep or helping with anxiety. And you want to just educate people on how to do it, how to dose it, the best, like how to look for the best quality, which I want to get into that with Cured. So yeah, it's all about the education component of it. I read a pretty shocking statistic the other day.

Apparently, 25% of students age 16 to 32 take Adderall one to seven times a week. And that's not even prescribed. And then there's another five to 10% that do the same thing with another amphetamine that I cannot pronounce. But the point of this is that that brings us to 30 to 35% of students

are on amphetamines right now. And it reminds me of my days in school of being on Ritalin and Adderall. I wish that when I was in school, I had access to Magic Mind. Magic Mind is a productivity drink that I drink every single morning alongside my morning coffee.

It is a blend of matcha, nootropics, and adaptogens. And I call this my natural Adderall. It really helps with my cognitive function and my productivity. And you don't get all the side effects that you get from nasty prescription drugs. All the properties in Magic Mind are very health supporting. The nootropics, the adaptogens, and the matcha.

You also get L-theanine in there. And then you get antioxidants from the matcha, which is really good for you as well. They have given me a code to share with you guys. If you go to magicmind.co and use the code realfoodology, you're gonna save 20%. That's magicmind, M-A-G-I-C-M-I-N-D.C-O and use code realfoodology.

So first and foremost, M-I-N-D dot C-O and use code REALFOODOLOGY. So first and foremost, for people that are really super new to CBD, what exactly is it and what are the ways that it can impact people's overall health? Yeah, so CBD is one cannabinoid out of over 100 cannabinoids in the cannabis plant. And a really important distinction is like cannabis is the top if you're looking at like a family tree or more or less. Think of cannabis at the top and then think of hemp and marijuana below. Hemp and marijuana are both cannabis. Hemp is different from marijuana in that hemp is classified as cannabis with less than 0.3% THC. And then marijuana has greater than 0.3% THC by dry weight. And then marijuana is regulated on a state-by-state level.

And then hemp is legal federally. That's why we ship our products nationwide. So we extract our cannabinoids from the hemp plant. And CBD is one cannabinoid that can be expressed at a high concentration based on breeding and genetics from a plant. But CBD or cannabidiol is one out of over 100 cannabinoids in the cannabis plant. THC is tetrahydrocannabinol, which is typically associated with the intoxication of marijuana.

There was this time where people were saying CBD is not psychoactive. CBD is psychoactive because it has calming properties. It can do things in the brain. It does have an effect, but it's not intoxicating. So we're talking about two cannabinoids here, THC and CBD, and then there's a bunch of others that have so much potential and have different effects. But CBD is typically used for its calming properties and it has anti-inflammatory like properties so if you think about for recovery or anybody that's trying to work on as they're aging they have aches or just like pain management CBD is great for that and THC actually in very very low concentrations is very good for that as well but you know somebody will have a poor experience with THC,

they'll get too high and they'll never use it again. But CBD, hopefully that makes sense with CBD. It's one cannabinoid out of over a hundred in the cannabis plant. It has great anti-inflammatory like properties and all the cannabinoids in the cannabis plant interact with our body because we have what's called an endocannabinoid system. It's always been there. It didn't just appear recently. It's always been there. There's this belief and really it's true to its core is cannabis has been used for over 5,000 years. Like in record, it showed up in pharmacopoeia

about 5,000 years ago and even passed in like ancient texts. But we as humans have more or less evolved and grown with cannabis like side by side. We have a system that can be regulated by cannabinoids and other things as well. But the endocannabinoid system is responsible for many normal human bodily functions, sleep-wake cycle, mood, appetite, it really helps the body achieve homeostasis and really, you know, attack or balance the stress response. So that's kind of what CBD is, how it can affect the body, what's going on in our body. And to sit here and say, well, there's over 100 cannabinoids in the plant and we're just talking about one of them. The question for me is like, what else are we going to be able to do with this plant? I was literally just sitting here thinking the exact same thing. It's so funny, the thing that I have learned and come to realize the most in my journey of all the years of like

learning about health and nutrition and everything is that the more I learn, the more I find out that we know so little. It's crazy. We think that we know so much and then we unlock this new thing, like the stuff with CBD, and all of a sudden it's like, wow, it's like a whole new world.

We have so many other components of the cannabis plant that we have yet to discover. So it's pretty exciting. So, okay. So now we know that we have this cannabinoid system and when we take CBD, so this is what I actually don't fully understand. So when you take CBD, it hits like certain points of your cannabinoid system. Is that why it works in sync with our body? Yeah. So what I didn't say about the endocannabinoid system is there, there's CB1 and CB2 receptors and they're all over the body and cannabinoids, depending on

which one it is, can either bind with the receptors or modulate the receptors. So if you're modulating receptors, you could have a stronger uptake of something else. You know, you could say, it's almost like what's believed is that it's almost has like a similar effect to GABA. So when we talk about the calming properties or anti-anxiety like properties, CBD actually modulates the system in a way that helps calm you. But these receptors are all over the body.

There's a bunch in the brain. They're literally part of who we are. And what's even cooler is that like things like black pepper modulate this system. So what we're saying is we have these receptors in our body, exogenous, so outside the body cannabinoids can regulate the system, but also we have the ability to produce cannabinoids ourself. So it's like we're literally like set up to utilize something that is a plant that's been stigmatized and created such a poor narrative around.

And where does that lead and why haven't we been able to make progress? Well, we haven't been able to make progress because we live in a world where most of the regulatory bodies are kind of incapable of maybe just being more open-minded. I'll just put it that way. Like, I think that that's a way to, I'm not going to say that like we shouldn't have regulation. We should absolutely have regulation, especially when it comes to food and supplements and everything.

And that's so important. But I think we need to be more open-minded because at the end of the day, don't we all want this existence to be the best it possibly can be? And if we don't open our minds to other options, well, then you don't, just like you said, we don't get to recognize how much we don't know. And when we recognize that there's so much that we don't know, that's actually a really beautiful place to be. I had a mentor say one time, he was like, when I was 18, I knew everything and it was really easy. And I was like, yeah, when I was 18, like I knew everything too. Life was really easy.

But it wasn't like your world's so small. When you think you know everything, your world becomes so small and you don't have the ability to change and grow and develop. And so, yeah, I think open-mindedness at a regulatory level is important. And then it takes the people on the ground level that, you know, experience whatever it may be to be participants in saying, this is how we believe that we can create a better world. We can create a better future. And, you know, I don't know, I could ramble on that for a while,

but I think that like that's the path is we need to be clear on that. Yeah, well, and this is important for people to understand because when we're closed off and we're closed minded to a lot of these things, we could actually be hindering ourself from things that may really help us.

A lot of us are struggling in this modern world with anxiety, depression, especially after the last three years, the craziness. I mean, we all went through this collective trauma and everyone is suffering in varying degrees, whether or not they want to admit it. And so why don't we utilize these things that we do have access to that have been proven to help people? And like we said earlier, they may not help everyone, but we need to be open to knowing more about this, learning more about it, and also open to exploring it

because it has provided relief for a lot of people and in a lot of different areas. Like outside of just depression and anxiety, I know you might have to correct me on this, but I believe it's the THC that actually helps with this with children that experience seizures. When they give them a certain dosage of THC and maybe CBD as well. It is CBD, yeah.

There's actually a drug by, of course, the pharmaceutical companies are coming into it because it has that potential. But there's a drug called Epidiolex that is for seizures. And it's very, very, very high dose CBD. Actually, I don't know if I shared this with you, but we had a dog that passed away several months ago. He had a brain tumor and he struggled with seizures his entire life.

He passed away, he was only three years old, but we gave him CBD all the time. And my wife and i we were like well of course we were meant to build this company like of course we were meant to experience this with our boy dusty because he did suffer from something that was so traumatic to watch and experience but it did give him relief and you're're right. It does. Like there is an actual drug that has, oh, there is another drug called Cetivax, which has THC. I don't know if that's used specifically for seizures, but CBD Epidiolex actually is. Well, and you know, what's really interesting,

I think a lot of people don't know this. Most pharmaceutical drugs are either a component of a plant that already exists in nature or an exact replica of a plant that exists in nature. Like that's where we get our pharmaceutical drugs is from plants. And I think until the general public really grasps that, I think we're going to be scared of like psilocybin and CBD and THC and all this, but pretty much everything that we provide for people from pharmaceuticals come from plants. Yeah. And I actually was on a podcast yesterday with a doctor and what we discussed was through, and we can get into quality control discussion with this, because when you take the cannabis plant or the hemp plant to get to the products that you see,

the oils, the droppers, the topicals, you go through an extraction process. So you cultivate the plant, you cure it, so you hang it upside down and it cures. That's where the name cured nutrition comes from because we have plants. Curing is like a literal process in creating, taking herbs, plants, whatever it may be,

and turning them into a dry powder. But you go through the curing process. And then it goes through the extraction process where you take out the cannabinoids and you take out the terpenes, which are like more or less the aromatic parts, which also have a benefit to them. But you just go through a refining process and you get down to, you can get down to what's called CBD or THC isolate. And that's literally just the molecule in its single form. It's just that we, as a company, we do offer products that go that far down the road, but we basically try to stay more in the least refined process. It's more whole plant type approach. But yeah, I mean, the more you refine something,

the closer and closer you get to a pharmaceutical. It's just true. So I mean, yeah, I don't think enough people know that. And I'm glad that you brought that up. And yeah, we could talk about that process and quality control because it's so in alignment with everything that you talk about with our food system. Yeah, let's talk about it. This is one of the reasons that I fell in love with your company is because we had a call a couple months ago and you showed me on your website that you guys do testing and you provide all of those lab tests on your website. So anyone listening can go.

I'll put it in the show notes. You can go and look it up yourself. But you guys are very transparent and your commitment to the quality of your supplements is really what draws me to Cured. And I just love that about you guys. Yeah, and if we don't do that, I don't think we're helping people to our full extent.

So it's been part of the mission since day one is we want to set a really strong example. My business partner and I actually met at CU. We were both in engineering. We both went into, we were both in engineering. We both went down different paths. But when we came back and we started this company together, one of the things that we talked about was we're going to do this right. Like we're going to do this right. We're going to go through all the testing that's required

and we're going to be fully transparent on it. Because if we're not, then we're doing a disservice to the industry. So what we do is in the marijuana world in California and in Colorado and other states that has legalized marijuana, they require that to get in a dispensary, the extracts go through heavy metal testing, they go through pesticide testing, they go through microbial testing, and then they also go through homogeneity testing they go through microbial testing, and then they also go through homogeneity testing. So if you say there's a thousand milligrams, there's a thousand milligrams. That doesn't exist in the supplement world. That doesn't exist in the hemp

world. That doesn't exist in a lot of worlds. And that like when my eyes, when the like the blinds, when the curtains were pulled back for me, it'd be like, oh, wow, there's a lot that could be changed in a lot of industries. We should do this right. And so every single batch, every single batch of products that gets manufactured, we do those tests. We're not required to, but we do that because we believe that we're not going to make a mistake.

We're not going to put something out into the world that's supposed to help people but could have the potential to not because hemp can actually be used to remediate land. So you can suck up toxins from the land and it could end up in the extract. So we say we test for heavy metals, absence of heavy metals, absence of pesticides, absence of microbials, and then also homogeneity testing to say, here's all the cannabinoids that are in this product. And here's us confirming that we say that what we say is in this product is actually in this product. And then we just put it out publicly. We're like, you know, like if we're going to do all this testing, why not display it publicly? Because then we can educate the consumer and also say, if you're not going to shop with us,

just use us as an education platform to go look at the test results and then say, hey, you go find another company and say, hey, can you provide these for us? And I think that that's us just doing right for the plant, but also just doing right for people. Because at the end of the day, if you don't have what you say is in the product and it doesn't work for somebody, for the plant, but also just doing right for people. Because at the end of the day, like if

you don't have what you say is in the product and it doesn't work for somebody, not only is that a disservice to the consumer, it's a disservice to the entire industry because you're creating a bad name for the industry when we know that we can actually help people. So yeah, in the footer of our website, there's a quality control section and you can go look at every single batch. And if you get a product on the bottom, there's a batch and you just match the batch with the testing results

and you can look at all of those things. And we're happy to answer questions on those. But I think it's like, it's our duty to do that correctly. And that stuff, does that exist in our food supply chain? Does that exist in the supplement supply chain? Like not at all, not at all. So it's a problem.

It's a serious problem. Yeah, it's a big problem. And I love that you guys are setting that standard. And I know specifically for CBD products, I'm trying to remember, it might've been a 60 minute segment. So my dad is one of those people that's a little like wary of anything

that's not big pharma. And one of them being CBD. And my mom and I are fully on the supplement train. We're on CBD and all this stuff. And my dad's like, I don't believe it. I don't know. And he was watching some news segment that was talking about how the majority of CBD products don't really have the amount of CBD that they claim. And you and I talked about this too.

But I just thought it was so funny that there happened to be an actual segment on this. And it's because there's no regulation. And like you said, this happens in food. This is happening in so many different industries right now, which is why more than ever, we need to, as the consumer, be vigilant about the products that we are consuming.

Like we unfortunately have to be little investigators. But yeah, and like you were saying with CBD, I've had a lot of people tell me like, oh, it didn't really work for me or I don't really get the hype or whatever. And I think what's happening is that people are getting these CBD products that have little to no CBD in it or what also is happening,

and I know you can speak more to this, but they were saying this in that news segment, is that the amount of CBD that one needs in order to help with, let's say, for example, seizures, or if you're dealing with really crazy anxiety or whatever it is, you need pretty high doses. And a lot of these companies are like, I call them gas station CBD oils, where you walk in and on the counter,'s like next to the like boner pills

where it's just like CBD and you're like I don't believe that has any CBD in it no like that's the same place that you buy a Snickers bar like maybe we should just ask ourselves a question like maybe you shouldn't get the thing that's supposed to be healthy for you at the gas station I'm glad that you said that exactly it's uh it's a serious problem before Before COVID, there was notably 1,500 brands in the space and most went out of business in the last two years, which is awesome because they shouldn't have been in business

in the first place because what happened was there was this huge rise of, usually for like 2018, 2019, you saw it everywhere. It was like CBD infused this and CBD that and CBD that. And most of it was because this three-letter acronym

was really trendy. And so of course, somebody's going to try to profit from it. And that's exactly what happened. And at the end of the day, we have to ask ourselves, why don't those regulations exist? It's because that is going to pinch companies' margins so much that it's hard to be extremely profitable.

When we live in a capitalistic society, don't get me wrong, I love the ability to be able to make money and produce a life for my family and myself. I'm not saying capitalism is bad, but when it comes down to what's our bottom line, when you're always trying to improve your bottom line, you're going to cut corners. If you don't have to test,

we spend thousands and thousands of dollars on testing every single month and that increases our cost of goods sold, which lowers our margin. At the end of the day, that's why it's happening. Maybe not always why, but that's the world that we live in. And so I wouldn't buy CBD from a gas station ever. Yeah, guys, please don't.

Look into the companies that you're buying for, but also why mess around with anything else when we have cured? Because we know that it's the best. At the end of the day, I will always say, go wherever you want to go, but just ask the right questions. And that's why we do what we do is I want to help people at my core. And I wanted to step back because you help people, I help people because we've experienced what it feels like

to actually truly feel really good. We also know what it feels like to not feel good. And when you start to feel and experience what this life can actually be, why wouldn't you want to share that with everybody? Like, why would you want to hold that for yourself? Like you want everybody to feel good and be happy and like be, have longevity and make the right decisions.

Like, why wouldn't we want that? Why would you hold that for yourself? So like, of course we do what we do. Exactly. I mean, at the end of the day, like I can only speak for myself, but I just want to see people happy and thriving. That's all I care about, you know? That's why I share all of this.

That's why I have this podcast and why I'm so passionate about it is because, yeah, like there was a time when I was not feeling my best and I was desperate for the answers and didn't know where to turn, what to do. And it required a lot of looking into things, you know? Like it's what I talk about all the time on this podcast

and what we were just saying, like unfortunately you have to be really vigilant about the things that you put on your body, the things that you put in your house and spray everywhere. Like we just unfortunately live in a time that we have to be vigilant about the things that we put in our body in, on and around.

Because we are, yeah, we live in a capitalistic society where anyone can make anything and not everything is regulated. And there's a lot of stuff that's really harming our health, unfortunately, but we have to be tuned into that. And it feels really good

to know how to take care of yourself and when you hit that place of health where you have the energy and you feel great nothing can replace it it's our responsibility to understand that creating that life is all on us nobody's going to do it for us but we have to be open and find the resources and do the

exploring because like, have we done, have I done everything right? Hell no. Like I've done a lot of things wrong. I've gotten a lot of things like even just in building this business, like I'm a way different person than I was five years ago. I'm a better leader. I'm a better person. I'm a better teammate, like all of those things. And it only comes from just exploration and like taking ourselves out of our comfort zone. Cause that's when we do do things wrong. I had this analogy of like, you know, this idea that when you want to become a different version of yourself, it's like, it's like you learn this new habit or you learn this new routine. You're like, I want to select the

foods that i eat differently are you going to get 100 right the first time no like you're going to make mistakes and there's this idea like my wife and i had uh our daughter was born a year and a half ago and when she starts to was starting to walk i had this idea of like when you start to become a new version of yourself and start to make different decisions, it's literally like a baby walking for the very first time. The baby is walking in that version of themselves for the very first time and they trip and they fall and it's clunky. And everybody needs to give that grace to themselves because when you get all this information, if you're shaming yourself for

not doing it right, right off the bat, like, remember, you are that baby that's walking in this new version of themselves for the very first time. And you're not going to get it right. The very first time you're going to trip, you're going to fall, but you got to just keep going. You got to be okay with being uncomfortable. So I just wanted to share that because I think that that's like, we can sit here and be like, Oh, like, check me out like this. But like, no, like I've gotten so many things wrong. And it took all of those things. It took that exploration, recognition of to become a different person. You're literally like a baby walking for the very first time in that new version of yourself. I love that. And I'm still getting things wrong. Oh, yeah. I think that's right. Like, I think that's what,

it's funny because I've been, I've been getting a lot of comments lately on my, so I do these grocery store reels on my Instagram and I will call out foods, drinks, whatever it is for having certain ingredients that are not great for us. And then I'll have people coming for me for things that I'm seemingly not doing perfect.

So like when I had, I had nails recently, like I had like painted nails and I got all these comments that are like, well, what toxins are in those nails? Like as if I'm some like perfect human. And yeah, it's just funny that we're, yeah, there's this level of like people thinking that just because we're like educating from,

like, so I'm just trying to educate on how you can do better, but I'm not saying that I have it all figured out that I'm perfect just because I'm sharing this one tidbit of information doesn't mean that I have my whole entire life perfectly, you know, fit out and I have not a single toxin that goes in my body

or in my apartment. Like, no, that's not realistic. We're all human. We're all learning. We're all trying our best. And I think it's a reflection of those comments are just a reflection of that person trying to hold themselves up to this perfect standard that's also not realistic. And then they're trying to hold me up to this standard. We all need to be me up to this standard. And it's just, yeah, we all need to be kinder to ourselves. It's not about being perfect. It's just about being better. It's about being better every single day. And like, that's why I say like,

I mean, like, you know, what have I done wrong this week? Like, did I, I got in an argument with my wife? Like, you know, like I ate a donut the other day. Like, you know what? Like, that happens. That happens. It's not about being perfect, but it's about being conscious of our ability to make better decisions. And as we make better decisions, we feel better. And like I said earlier, of course we want that for other people.

We're not saying you're doing it wrong. We're just saying there's, like we said earlier, there's another option. And I think that that's what's most important to us is, is the pharmaceutical world going to go away? Is all of this stuff going to change in our food supply chain? No, but there can be both options and we're not going to do it perfect. And there's all this talk about food supply shortages and issues and whatever whatever happens happens. But like if at the end of the day, I had to eat like canned food for a little while,

like I would do it, right? It's nuance. We're back to nuance. We're back to nuance. And what you were saying, this is again, why it's so important for us to put our money in companies that are doing the right way. Because that is one way that we can all make an impact and a difference. Because I think a lot of people feel like, I'm just one person and this food industry feels like a huge Goliath. Like, how are we ever gonna change this? And things are shifting.

I mean, just think about how you just mentioned that before COVID, there was X amount of CBD companies and a lot of them dropped off. Well, that's because people were not putting money into those companies. People are putting money into companies like yours that are actually providing a good, high-quality product.

And we need to think about that the same way with our food. And look, I know budgets are a huge issue, especially more than ever with inflation and stuff. But we are making a difference by putting our money into companies and products that are actually providing healthy, good products for us and for our families. And we need to remember that we do make a difference in that way. and products that are actually providing healthy, good products for us and for our families. And we need to remember that we do make a difference

in that way. Yeah. My good friend has this quote, he created like this ethos of living. And one of the rules in his ethos is, the rule is there are no rules, but karma and responsibility are real. So like, if you hold both of those, the rule is there are no rules, but karma and responsibility are real. So like if you hold both of those,

the rule is there are no rules, but karma and responsibility are real. So when we say companies are going out of business, karma is real. Like if you do things for the wrong reason, I don't believe that you should be successful. Like I don't believe that. If you're not taking responsibility for your mistakes, I don't believe you should deserve to have a different life. But, you know, really, there aren't any rules. It's just our choice on how we show up on a day-to-day basis. And yeah, I just, yeah, I appreciate that we've aligned and partnered and because, not even aligned, like we were already aligned, but it's, I appreciate what you're doing in the world because one at a time,

these conversations can actually reach, you know, one person, another person, another person. And there's going to be people that listen to this and they're like, like, you know, if that's you, I love you still. Exactly. Yeah. And look, there's, we have to meet people where they are. And I think about where I was five to 10 years ago on my health journey versus where I am today. There was a lot of growth and

evolution in between that. And there were certain messages that at a certain point in my health journey just weren't getting to me yet. And that's okay. Everyone's on a different point in their health journey. And people are witnessing you and I a lot further along than if someone is just getting their legs, like just learning to walk in the health world, you know? And so we also, again, it comes back to the compassion, not to compare yourself. If someone's trying to compare my health journey to theirs and they are literally just starting out, you can't, I've been doing this for 20 years. So like you can't expect to be in the same place as someone that's been doing it for a lot longer, but that's okay.

This is not a comparison. Everyone's life is different. We can't, we gotta stop comparing ourselves. It's so much worse with social media and just like stay on the task at hand and like stay true to you, you know, like focus on yourself and not on other people. And that's going to better you. And you're going to find yourself a lot further along on the journey

before you know it, you know? So to kind of, to bring it back to CBD, because I'm very curious about this for myself, and I'm sure the listeners are wondering this as well. How do you figure out dosing? Like, how do you know enough is enough? Yeah, that's a great question. One thing that I will say is you can't overdose. If you took quote unquote too much, you would just be really tired and you would sleep. Typically, a lot of people will start in around the 20 to 30 milligram range at a time. But a lot of people, including myself, I'll take around 60 milligrams a day. And that's what you were saying earlier

is you do have to take pretty high dosages. I think there's some studies out there that show around 100 milligrams is where it's most efficacious for sleep. And that can be not necessarily cost effective. So every, and so it's not a blanket statement, but everybody needs to try it for themselves. But what you'll notice is since it's a system that can be regulated, your endocannabinoid system, think of like having a vitamin D deficiency and getting to like a

proper level. So the proper level for every person is going to be different. But at one point, like more is not actually going to be more helpful. So, you know, you start around maybe the 20 to 30 milligram range and you notice, okay, I'm more calm or I'm feeling better. I can move my body better. I wake up, I feel rested. A lot of people will notice that it was actually working when they didn't know it was working because they'll take it for a couple of weeks and they'll come off of it. And they'll be like, oh, what changed? I stopped taking CBD.

And that's just like a new diet or a new workout regimen. It takes time. It takes multiple weeks to get to what you might consider a therapeutic level. But many people would start and feel the benefit around 30 milligram range. And with most of our products, that's a serving size is 30 milligrams. You can take it morning, you can take it night, you can take it any time of day. Some people will notice that lower dosages almost have a stimulating effect, which is really weird, like very, very low dosages, like five to 10 milligrams is almost more stimulating.

And then the higher dosage, you'll feel more relaxing, but I'll take it, you know, I'll take it before a podcast because it helps me calm and like collect myself. I'll take it before speaking to my team. I'll take it before a speaking event. But it's definitely dose dependent, dependent on the person, weight, what you're really trying to, what benefits you're really trying to see. And then of course, like I said, just you have to use it for a long enough time to actually notice and recognize that you've built the proper level in your system where your endocannabinoid system has reached homeostasis more or less. Did I answer your question? Yeah, no, that was perfect actually. And you're speaking to my experience that I had with CBD. So I, for a while was just taking it on days where I felt, I've always struggled with anxiety my

whole life. And I've talked about that a lot on this podcast too. Just kind of like a chronic low-grade anxiety. And I didn't initially really notice a difference with CBD, but because I was only taking it on days where I was remarkably feeling the anxiety. So what I realized is that once I started taking it consistently, like I just got in a habit where I was like, I'm just gonna take it every single morning for a while.

I'm not gonna wake up and be like, am I anxious enough to take it or not or whatever? Because I kind of have this weird relationship with any sort of substance. And I'm talking about even just like supplements where I don't want to feel like I'm reliant on it. However, I've found with CBD that I need to be consistently taking it. And then I had the same experience where then when I stopped taking it, I looked back and was like, oh wow, I actually really noticed a remarkable difference in my stress and anxiety levels. So for me, and I've read that this is really common

for people, you need to be consistently taking it to really feel the effects of it. And I also wanna note, you said this earlier, but I really wanna reiterate this because this is a question I get a lot from people on Instagram. If you're just taking CBD, you're not going to feel high like you do from weed because THC is what creates that high feeling and there is no THC in CBD if you just get a straight CBD product.

So I just want to clarify that for people. Yeah, our products, they're labeled THC-free or full spectrum. A full spectrum extract will have low concentrations of THC in it. So if you took enough, you could get to a dosage that you would feel. But if you're worried about feeling high or you have to take drug tests or anything like that, you would definitely just go for the THC- version and that has CBD in it but it also has some other minor cannabinoids CBG CBC CBN which all are not intoxicating but they really help with calming okay awesome yeah I think it's important to clarify that for people because I'm trying to think of people that are very very new to CBD that don't really understand at all. Because again, like we were saying earlier, cannabis has a stigma where, you know, like people think they're going to take this and they're going to get high. I'm like, I take CBD every day and I'm not getting

high. I'm trying to think if there's anything about CBD or even like CBN or anything about cure that we haven't really covered. We didn't really talk about your farming practices. Maybe we can talk about how those differ from other companies. Yeah, that's a great question. And I'll also touch on CBN real quick because that's another product that we have. So we actually, when we first started the company, and this is something that we improved upon because we recognized that we couldn't do it all, we actually had our own farm. So we had our own farm in Boulder, Colorado, and we would do the farming. And my business partner has extensive amount of experience in the cannabis realm. And it was all organic farming practices, no pesticides. And then we got to the point where we couldn't handle the full vertical integration. So like the farming, the manufacturing, and the final,

actually like putting it in a bottle and then selling the product. So we actually partner with one of the biggest labs and cultivators here in Colorado, and they're ISO 9000 certified, NSF certified, and they have the most high tech manufacturing facility that could possibly exist. And that is all CGMP, FDA registered. So it's like the most high quality facility that you could ever be in. And we also make sure that from their standpoint, they're only partnering with the farms that have the organic farming practices.

And now what's even cooler is that some of these farms are actually USDA certified. So there's some things that are like, okay, what's going really going on there? But it's pushing in the right direction. And those are the farms that we're working with. And then the whole chain of custody, we work with some of the best labs in the nation, actually, probably even the world. But that's a really big claim to say. So in the nation and in Colorado, to ensure that quality control and those facilities are always inspected,

same with those farms. They always inspected. Same with those farms. They're inspected on a constant basis, especially in Colorado. I mean, this is why I love your company. Your commitment to quality is really, really commendable. It's really cool. We just want to do it right. And we want to last. We want to be a company that lasts the test of time. And if we don't do it right, we just won't be because karma and responsibility are real. Yeah, it's so true.

Well, not to mention, if you're not creating a high quality product, people aren't going to feel the difference and they're not going to stop buying it, you know. And that's what thankfully a lot of people are realizing with their food and everything is that we're all looking for higher quality food, products, supplements, everything, you name it. So it's important that people have that in their business ethics. So let's say someone's listening in another country and they can't have access to cured nutrition specifically. What are some ways that they can ensure that they're getting a good high quality CBD? Yeah. So when we were talking about those batch testing results earlier, you as the consumer have every right to email a company and say, hey, I would love to see the batch testing

results. Can you please send those to me? And if a company won't send those to you, I would not buy from them. So like we said earlier, absence of heavy metals, absence of pesticides, absence of microbial, and then homogeneity, as in there are the amount of cannabinoids in this product that the company says there is and is shown on the label. And there are definitely other companies doing this. So don't take it like we're the only people that do this. And so I would say if you're in Canada, if you're in Europe, wherever you are

in the world, there are companies selling high quality products. And if you ask the company for those testing results and they don't give them to you, I just, I wouldn't buy from them. Yeah, that's great advice. So, okay, I want to be mindful of your time. I want to quickly go over some of your products that I really love.

Specifically for me, I struggle a lot with falling asleep. Like once I'm asleep, I'm good, but I can't fall asleep normally without the assistance of something. And I've really been loving Zen and CBN together. Can you talk a little bit about like what those are and how they help with sleep? Yeah. So Zen, and I'll just briefly touch on this. Zen also has functional mushrooms and other adaptogens in it. And Zen is one of many of our products that were formulated by a clinical herbalist. We have an in-house clinical herbalist that works one-on-one with patients, but has helped us create products for mass market.

There's reishi in that product. So reishi is a really powerful mushroom that's great for relaxation and your immune system and overall health. But that helps you calm down in combination with a higher dose CBD in there. And there's a couple other things. There's ashwagandha in there and there's a little bit of magnesium and a couple other adaptogens, but that's great. More so people will say and report that that really helps with their REM sleep. So that helps with like the second half of the night, you do deep sleep and REM sleep. And then when you do that in combination with a CBN product, CBN is different from CBD where CBN is more, it's more on the sedating side. I always explain it like this, like think of the feeling of a weighted blanket on your body. That's what CBN feels like.

So CBN is really good for helping get you to sleep and then really get into deep sleep and then zen is great for calming but it also really helps with the second half of the night and i just say that anecdotally because people send us their aura ring data all the time and we're like wow cb yep there you go so cbn typically helps with the deep sleep and falling asleep in the beginning of the night. And then Zen helps with later in the night, but it can't help with calming. And a lot of people can't fall asleep because they can't calm their mind. Other people's not the same, but the combination of those two together is extremely powerful. We actually

sell it in what we call our sleep bundle. And the other thing about this too is typically when you find the right dosage, especially with the CBN, you don't wake up groggy. If you take too much, you can feel groggy. But at the end of the day, there's a lot coming out about melatonin not actually being something that you should actually take. I don't know if you follow Dr. Andrew Huberman, but there's some questions about melatonin. And I'll just leave it at that. So no melatonin in any of our products. And when you take the right, find and take the right dosage, you won't wake up groggy at all.

Yeah, that's been my experience. And I love that you brought up the REM sleep and the Oura Ring because that's something that I've noticed. And I initially didn't know what was happening, but I would check my Oura Ring in the morning and I was like, wow, my REM sleep is really going up. And then I think I'd heard you or someone was talking about like how a lot of people have been reporting that.

I was like, oh, I think that's what it is. I think it's the Zen and the CBN. Krista, you know, Krista Williams. She was one of the first people that told us. She's like, I take Zen and I lucid dream. I'm like, you know what? People say that over and over and over again. And I actually was just like, I thought my dreams were just like really intense. And I had more and more people reaching out saying that. And they're like,

Joe, what did you guys create? Like, this is like, this is like, this is something really crazy. I was like, I know it's really cool. And we hear it over and over and over again. It's really important to dream. Like deep sleep is like body restoration and then REM sleep is more brain restoration. That's oversimplified, but that's how I look at it. Well, it's interesting. I'm almost embarrassed to admit this, but I went through a very long period of time

where I wasn't dreaming at all. Or they say that when you say you're not dreaming, that you just don't remember them. But I, for whatever reason, was not conscious of my dreams whatsoever. And then now, I mean, I have the most vivid dreams every night. It's really wild. So very grateful for those products. I also really love your Rise product in the morning, the Nootropic. And can you take that with coffee? Yeah, we really created that to help people try to eliminate caffeine later in the day. So like, you know, I always drink coffee in the morning. I love coffee. It's part of my ritual. Sometimes if I take rise with it, I just drink a little bit

less coffee because it can be a little bit intense. Taken by itself, it's really powerful for midday. So like, again, it helps you with mental clarity and ability to sit down and, you know, focus on something that you're working on, but also the ability to remove caffeine later in the day allows you then again, to help you fall asleep at night. So it's kind of like it packs a two punch. Like it's like, it's great for mental clarity during the day. It really helps reduce brain fog and improve your cognition. But it also allows you to eliminate caffeine later in the day. Since caffeine has like a, I think it's like an eight hour quarter life.

If you're drinking caffeine afternoon, it's still going to be in your system at the end of the day. And then you're just fighting an uphill battle trying to fall asleep. So it's like two purposes, like gets you to be able to, you know, crush your work during the day, whatever it is that you need to do. And then potentially if you want to reduce your caffeine, all that said, you can take it with coffee. I would just not do the full dosage if you do it with coffee the first time. And that again is the same blend. It's got functional mushrooms, adaptogens, and cannabinoids in it as well. It was produced by our clinical herbalist. The mushrooms are lion's mane and cordyceps in

that. Then it has rhodiola, gotu kola, and ginseng. And then low-dose CBD. The low-dose CBD, as I said earlier, can be a little bit stimulating, but it also helps balance out the supplement because sometimes products like that are too stimulating and the CBD actually helps balance it. You know, CBD, we talk about the stress response, but just think about in one product, you have some stimulating components and then you have some balancing components. So it's like clean, crisp, clear energy, no jitters, no crash, and serves several purposes. I'm a big fan of those products. And then the last one that I want to touch really quickly is your Euphoria drinks.

Yeah. I really love those. I will say the only thing is that I'm getting a lot of questions from people because it has natural flavors. And I don't want to like call you out, but I want to ask you maybe like, do you guys know exactly what's in your proprietary natural flavors blend? What I will say is that they're sweetened with monk fruit and stevia.

So that's where the sweetness comes from. And our manufacturer has, will not disclose the proprietary blend flavor, man. So I hear you 100% on that. We took a long time to develop those products and that's why we do sweeten them with monk fruit and stevia. Oh, I love monk fruit and stevia. Sorry, I'm down with that. Yeah, but there is natural flavors in it. Yeah. And that's a huge, that's just like this weird

thing is that we work so hard to create a product that works, but then at the end of the day, it's so hard to create a product that works and then tastes really good. I know it's a struggle. And the mushrooms in there make it really hard because drink mushrooms without some type of component to help sweeten them or make the flavor change. And it's really hard. So yeah, I'll be fully transparent on that. There are natural flavors in there. And I hope that the flavoring companies that do produce those can start to actually just be more transparent on what they're doing. Yeah, I mean, this is a huge problem. A lot of people in the health space

are really waking up to this. This is something that I've known about, I've been talking about for a long time. But it feels like all of a sudden, everywhere we look, they're in everything. Like for a while I was like, okay, it's pretty easy to avoid them. You know, it's only in a couple of things. And I really, in my own life, practice balance. So like, for example, I love your drinks and I drink them. And I try really hard to avoid natural flavors,

but I've also gotten to this place of natural flavor fatigue where I'm just like, oh my God, it's in literally everything. And I didn't bring this up to like call you out or anything like that. Just more to have again, this conversation. I guess we kind of come back to the nuance of like, we try our best. Sometimes there's certain things in products that we really love and we want to consume them anyways, even though it has these natural flavors. And that's not to say that we even know if they're bad. That's just the only problem with the natural flavors is we just don't know what's in them.

Yeah, and I think that you bring up a good point is as we go on this journey, we just become very in tune with our body. And as you drink things, as you take things, at the end of the day, there's no one size fits all approach to anything. So we just have to be able to ask ourselves, how is this helping me feel?

Does it make me feel bloated? Is there something going on here that's like off? But if there was one thing that we can improve, that's definitely it. And that is something that we're working on. I gotta tell you, the drink space is really hard. Oh, I know. I invested in a drink company that I really love. One of my best guy

friends started Sound Tea. Oh, yeah. And I hear a lot from him just how crazy and competitive and hard it is to get in the drink space. A lot of it too is because like Pepsi and Coca-Cola own literally everything. And so for the little guys, it's really hard to get any sort of shelf space. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully, I know you're out in LA. We're in talks with Air One. We've had our Rise and Zen products in Air One and we're in talks with them with Euphoria.

So hopefully you'll see it out there soon. Yes. I love that. Well, let me know if I can connect you with anyone because I think I have a couple connections with Air One. So yeah, I could probably help you out with. So cool. Well, is there anything else that we haven't covered about cured CBD? Really anything we talked about that you feel like is important for people to know?

I think that we've covered quite a bit. And at the end of the day, the summary is like us, the responsibility falls on us as consumers. And so that's why we have the conversations that we have. I love that. Okay. So I have to ask you a question that I ask all of my guests. What are your health non-negotiables? I love it. So recently this year, Cold Plunge, I've been doing Cold Plunge every morning for the last, since it was like January 14th, I think we got it. So cold plunge. But honestly, just if I could tell you like two things,

cold plunge and walks, just like walking and being able to clear my mind. I do, if I listed off all the things that I do, I would be boring everybody. But those are the non-negotiables. Yeah, like sunlight, especially early in the day. So sunlight, walking, getting sunlight, getting some movement in.

And I really, really, really have been enjoying cold exposure. That's awesome. You and I are very much aligned with the walks. I do it literally every day. I went for a walk earlier before we recorded this. So yeah, it's important. Well, let everyone know where they can find you, find Cured and yeah, plug your important. Well, let everyone know where they can find you, find Cured and yeah, plug your company.

Perfect. Yeah. So you can find me on Instagram at Joseph Sheehy. Last name is S-H-E-E-H-E-Y. And then Cured, you have to type out Cured Nutrition. Instagram and Facebook and Big Tech does not like us. They've been shadow banning us for a long time. So Cured, C-U-R-E-D, Nutrition,

and you'll find our actual main page. There are other pages there on Instagram that we've built for risk reduction if we need to use them in the future, but Cured Nutrition on Instagram and curednutrition.com. And you can find all of our products there. And I highly recommend checking out our blog and our podcast because just like the education that we're putting out here on this platform, we do that consistently twice a week. And it's just our commitment to putting the proper education out there. Awesome. I love that. I really enjoyed this conversation.

Thanks for coming on. Thanks for listening to today's episode of The Real Foodology Podcast. If you liked this episode, please leave a review in your podcast app to let me know. This is a resident media production produced by Drake Peterson and edited by Chris McCone. The theme song is called Heaven by the amazing singer Georgie, spelled with a J. Love you guys so much. See you next week. The content of this show is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for individual medical and mental health advice and doesn't constitute a provider patient relationship. I am a nutritionist, but I am not your nutritionist. As always,

talk to your doctor or your health team first.