The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 113. Shawn Ryan: Beating Addiction, Military Industrial Complex, Trump Presidency Outlook

Starting point is 00:00:00 Pharmaceutical companies and the food companies basically paying off the FDA politicians to vote a certain way. Same thing with war. Vote this way. We want to prolong this war. We're going to develop more supplies for it. It just makes you wonder if any of the elites have our best interests at heart because in our industrial food supply, the majority of our nutritional research is funded by big pharma. I don't think it's about ending it. It's business. You were dealing with some pretty heavy mental illness. It's still just not in vogue to ask for help. Everything that you've worked so hard to accomplish, you're at the apex of what you do. And now nobody cares because you're not in that anymore. There goes my whole identity. You have to learn how to reinvent yourself.

Starting point is 00:00:40 They call it an ego death. Tens of thousands of our military men and women that are permanently on the chemical hamster wheel, which is further destroying their life. Why are we preventing people from accessing these kinds of therapies? What really did the trick was psychedelics. The most profound experience of my entire life. And I don't say that lightly. For you and military men and women that are in your group,

Starting point is 00:01:05 what does this election mean to you? Part of the reason we got to where we were is because people in this country are scared to... Today, we are thrilled to have a remarkable guest on the Ultimate Human podcast, Sean Ryan. Sean's journey is one of resilience, purpose, and relentless dedication, from his days as a Navy SEAL and a CIA contractor, to becoming a powerful voice in the veteran mental health community. Through his acclaimed show, The Sean Ryan Show, he's given a voice to the raw experiences of veterans shedding light on PTSD and the healing

Starting point is 00:01:49 potential of alternative therapies like psychedelics. Today, Sean will take us deeper into his story. He's going to share the profound ways that his spiritual journey, mental health advocacy, and commitment to self-resilience have shaped his life and his mission. Join us as we uncover powerful insights into what it truly means to be an ultimate human. Hey guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. I'm your host, human biologist Gary Brecker, where we go down the road of everything wellness, longevity, anti-aging, biohacking, and everything in between. And every once in a while, I am blessed enough to have a truly iconic guest on the podcast, not just a guest that is known to the world, but a guest that has had experiences in life

Starting point is 00:02:32 that are just so uncommon, but yet so profound. And today is one of those rare moments on The Ultimate Human where we get to have a really, really impactful guest with an incredibly special and not very common background. Welcome to the podcast, Sean Ryan. Hey, thank you. It's an honor to be here. It's an honor to have you, man. You know, military icon, you know, the work that you do for veterans, the awareness that you brought to post-traumatic stress disorder and, and, and even being very authentic about your own journey. Um, you know, I find it very, very inspiring and, you know, if you've ever watched my podcast and my audience knows, and it sounds like I'm just repeating the same old line, but so often the people that I have on this podcast that I feel

Starting point is 00:03:21 are making the greatest impact in the world are people that have solved a problem in their life, right? And whether it's post-traumatic stress disorder or, you know, alcohol addiction or a relationship issue, or they had chronic Lyme disease or whatever it was, and they solved that issue. And because of that journey, they're making a massive impact in the world. And I think you are definitely one of those people that turned a very storied, you know, military career into an impactful message. And I, and I just want to say on the eve of Veterans Day, what Veterans Day is the 11th, what's today? 8th. 8th. Okay. So it's March 8th. I mean, it's, I can't think of a more impactful

Starting point is 00:04:04 guest to have on the podcast. So I'm just, I'm so excited. I mean, it's, I can't think of a more impactful guest to have on the podcast. So I'm just, I'm so excited. And sometimes, you know, I tell my friends and family this all the time. I'm like, I don't feel like I work a day in my life because I really get to sit down with inspiring people like, like yourself. And so I've watched a lot of your podcasts. I mean, lots of people have watched a lot of your podcasts. And this is a very self-serving question, but of all these incredible military stories and incredible feats that you've had on your podcast, what is the biggest standout for you, if there was?

Starting point is 00:04:39 Guest-wise or subject-wise? I would say let's do guest-wise and then let's go into subject-wise. I mean, guest-wise, military guys, man, there's so many. That's hard. That's hard. That's a really hard question. We were actually just talking about the sniper that did a 2.1-mile shot and made a kill. I mean, these are the kinds of stories you'll find on this podcast.

Starting point is 00:05:07 If you're not familiar with Sean Ryan, you should be. And just the infinite amount of complexity of that, you know, a 10-second bullet trajectory. But you've had so many of these icons on, and you even started a foundation to preserve these stories, right? I didn't start a foundation. I help with a couple of different nonprofits. But I think there's been a lot of really big, impactful stories on the show.

Starting point is 00:05:35 So I don't want to say my favorite one because I don't really have one. But some of the most impactful ones that I think there were was uh earlier on in my podcast i had this guy on dj shipley uh seal team six guy uh really like poured his heart and soul out and i mean talked about his suicide attempts talked about his infidelity and the challenges that his wife and him went through talked about he talked about a lot of stuff that um that that that that is really important that it's it's a peek behind the curtain that nobody gets to look at and um another guy that i think is is you got to meet dj by the way you guys would get along really really good is he Is he a science nerd? He's a, he's a health nerd.

Starting point is 00:06:25 Is he? Okay. He's my guy. And a beast. Yeah. But, um, another guy, Tom Satterly, uh, one of my favorite humans on the planet. Uh, he was, he was a Delta guy. Um, sure.

Starting point is 00:06:38 You've heard the story about Black Hawk down back in Mogadishu. And, uh, he is a lot of people say that kind of the main character in that movie was Tom. Tom was a very junior Delta guy at the time and went through that. Talks about it very, very in-depth, very detailed. And served all the way through, you know, OEF, OIF, and just a, just an awesome human being. But there's been, there's been a, there's been a ton of guys. Because I always wonder, you know, when you see these elite special forces and you were SEAL Team 2 and SEAL Team 8, right? And for folks that don't know the difference, I mean, we always hear SEAL Team 6,

Starting point is 00:07:25 but what are the difference between the different SEAL teams? What are the numbers really indicating? A specialty? So, yeah, the numbers. So you go through BUDS, everybody. You go through BUDS, you go through SQT, everybody becomes a SEAL. And then so all the odd number teams are on the West Coast.

Starting point is 00:07:44 All the even number teams are on the west coast all the even number teams are on the east coast out of little creek virginia or dam neck um west coast teams are all out of coronado california and then there's an sdv team that's out of hawaii and that's uh this like the mini submarines but and then seal team six so get through, you go to a regular SEAL team and either go east or west coast or Hawaii. And then you, I don't know what it is now, but you used to, you could basically kind of do one enlistment or two platoons. Two platoons means two deployments. And so after you do two deployments, then you can screen to go over development group. And so screening is kind of a series of things.

Starting point is 00:08:31 It's an interview with your current command. It's a physical fitness test. It's a you go interview over a development group, and they you know, if they think that you would be a good fit. And so that's, that's, if you're going to make it a career, that's the next step. You go to the next level. And what is that, what is that kind of career when you say be a good fit, be a good fit to continue being a SEAL? Well, so when you go to development group, you go through a whole nother training course as well. So, so, um, so you go to the SEAL teams, you, you do your deployments and then basically you try out, it's a tryout for

Starting point is 00:09:13 the next level. Wow. And so, yeah, so. So there's another level above like the SEALs. Yeah. I mean, there's like the ultra SEALs. I mean, pretty much. That are like super SEAL seals. Um, you know, I, I, I've, I've heard you, um, you know, talk about some of your real world, um, experience. One in particular was, uh, Haiti, I believe where you guys were, um, you know, patrolling at very low altitudes. And I mean, Hollywood has kind of sensationalized that, but, um, this was a very troubled part of the world, you know, at that period of time and a very ruthless part of the world. And I don't think that they really wanted us to be there. And can you talk a little bit about that experience for, you know, for folks that have never actually faced combat experience. Um, to me, it's fascinating because I feel like you can train yourself for just about anything, but I would imagine that no mission goes exactly like you, you plan. I mean,

Starting point is 00:10:14 you, you, you have to find yourself in a place of the unknown. Um, and this place of the unknown has got to be one of the darkest, most frightening places, because usually the types of unknowns that someone with your career would find would be things that could end your life, right? And it's a metaphor for business and it's a metaphor for life. It's a metaphor for relationships because, you know, like when a mother has a baby, there's no manual on how to raise the child. When, you know, when you get into a marriage, there's no manual on how to have a good marriage. When you start start a business there's really no step-by-step manual on how to grow a business and we i think in life we find ourselves in so many places of

Starting point is 00:10:51 the unknown like we started out with one intention you guys go in with one mission um and then holy things don't go as planned um and maybe my exit strategy is now I don't have it any longer. And the support that I thought I was going to have is no longer with me. And I wonder if you could talk about that a little bit about when your training takes you to a place where you're outside of your background and your preparedness. I'm excited to offer you free access to my premium membership, the Rule Brekkas. As a Rule Brekka, you'll be able to join me for monthly Q&A sessions, VIP access to all the challenges I host, and advanced access to my most exclusive content.

Starting point is 00:11:40 To get your free 30-day trial of Rule Brekkas, head over to joinrulebrekkas.com. That's joinrulebrekkas.com right now. Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. In training, you want to talk about it? No, I want to talk about it in real life, real combat. Okay. Because you're one of the few that's actually seen real combat. And I was listening to some of your Haiti stories, and they were just terrifying about how roadside bombs were taking out your guys. And you're flying at very low levels, which is very dangerous. I imagine small arms fire could get to you at those levels. So, I mean, you're in a constant state of fight or flight. Um, I I'd love it if you could talk about a

Starting point is 00:12:28 situation that you found yourself in where you were truly in that unknown, like I didn't expect this. Uh, maybe I didn't train for this. Um, maybe the exit I planned is cut off and now what, what do I do? Yeah. Uh, there's a lot of those um so i was hoping there was only like one or two but now there's a lot of them but uh yeah you know i actually um i didn't i didn't do a whole lot in haiti it was um it was 2004 there was a lot of civil unrest there um aristide was the president at the time. He got yanked out. Wasn't me.

Starting point is 00:13:07 I would have loved to have yanked him out, but it wasn't me. One of your guys yanked him out? Yeah, I think it was Team 6. But we were basically going to all these outer cities in Haiti to kind of get a pulse on what the rest of the country was like outside of Port-au-Prince, the capital. And it was just, there was, I mean, no shots were fired, but a lot of prisons were not functioning and prisoners

Starting point is 00:13:34 were, you know, criminals were just everywhere. There were a lot of bodies kind of floating around and stuff on the shore. But, but the majority of my content combat stuff was all afghanistan iraq uh yemen and so what's one i haven't talked about in a while we did this one i was at um this is actually when i was at the uh cia we were at a i think it was around 2012 time frame. I don't know how. Because after the SEALs, you went into the CIA. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:14:13 So around 2012 time frame, I don't know how closely you followed the war, but there was an area of Afghanistan. It was supposed to be what was basically getting ready to happen there. It was going to be the biggest offensive push push by the u.s marine corps since fallujah and everybody knows everybody knows about fallujah fallujah was um by far the bloodiest deadliest uh battle of of both both those wars and so a big push to go and um and kind of push taliban al-qaeda out of out of uh the cities there let me say push them out of the cities you're going in to kill them yeah okay yeah not me yeah i'm agency no you've never heard anybody way back here no we're back behind no we're in the thick of it but but you know we are that's not my job anymore you know is to go in and and do that

Starting point is 00:15:07 honestly it never was that's more of a infantry uh conventional type operation but but anyways uh before that push uh even got kind of got started it was was just a couple of teams of us, uh, embedded down there to, to do surveillance and do some liaison stuff with, with the local government down there. Um, and, and, and basically just collect intelligence. And so, but one thing that we, we kept fucking up, can I say that on here? Yeah, you can say fucked up. So there's some things when you're working intelligence or surveillance that are just, it's just a no-go. Don't ever be time-place predictable.

Starting point is 00:15:57 Don't take the same routes. Don't take the same routes at the same time. Don't have different routes into wherever you're going and when i had gotten there uh there was just a big bombing it was horrible a lot of a lot of agency personnel died basically they had a double agent come in uh present a fucking birthday cake to the chief of station a lot of a lot of people at the agency get like kind of attached to to their assets and um emotionally and he was a true double agent yep so he was trusted by the cia the cake yeah and he went but he was and he took himself out too yeah and he took out took out all the leadership took down oh my god took took a lot of people out and uh so that had just happened

Starting point is 00:16:46 when i showed up here and i'd said hey uh we're time and place predictable the fuck are we doing yeah and um of course nobody wanted to listen because um when people like me come around for those type of operations a lot of times i think we get in the way but there's a reason we're there that's why and uh nobody wanted to listen next morning we got up boom uh there's like a hundred and something taliban fighters on the other side of the river they know exactly where our compound is so they they started hitting the compound we're in a little house woke up in the morning you're in a little house. Woke up in the morning. You're in a little house. Yep. 100 heavily armed fighters out there. And shots just start coming through the house. And there's only a couple of us.

Starting point is 00:17:31 And so the reason we knew there was over 100 Taliban fighters is because we had drones on station and they were reporting in and so um that wound up going until about midnight uh that night they started maneuvering around they they got in this big uh probably 10 15 story building started shooting at us from over there and um nobody would come get us. So, wow. Why not? Yeah, I thought that's a great question. Yeah. But it just wound up being, wow, we didn't have a lot of supplies. Meaning a lot of bullets. Bullets. We didn't have a lot of anything.

Starting point is 00:18:19 And, yeah, so it was a lot of switching out people on the roof and burning classified materials and thinking, holy shit, we're going to fucking die here. I knew this was coming. We were time and place predictable. And the British actually wound up coming in around midnight to get our asses out of there. British Special Forces. Just British Army.. British Special Forces. Just British Army. Not British Special Forces. The big machine rolled through the town and got our asses out of there.

Starting point is 00:18:54 Wow. Now, how were you communicating with them? I mean, how did... Radios. Sharing intelligence? Well, there was a... So, remember, they were getting ready for the biggest offensive push since Fallujah. So there was, there were some Americans around.

Starting point is 00:19:10 There was a big, there was a big kind of ISAF base close by that had Polish special forces. Those guys were going out, getting some like every night multiple times a night really uh and then and just getting engaged yeah they were i don't know what they were doing yeah but they were going out a lot okay and um and then uh big brit base so the british british army came in and pulled us out of there thank god but but uh i mean i could could go in. But you were able to hold off a hundred armed soldiers for dusk. I mean, daylight today. It wasn't like, it wasn't like they were like right outside the door. You know, we couldn't, we couldn't even see the hundred Taliban fighters who were amassing on the other side of this river that we were on.

Starting point is 00:20:06 It was, it was, we started taking contact. Then they started, then they infiltrated that building that I was telling you about. They were, you can find this. I should find the clip and send it to you. Wow. But, but they were hitting us from that building, and then they were sending teams around kind of this neighborhood. We were kind of like in a – it sounds weird, but it's the only way to really describe it in terms that Americans would be able to kind of understand it. It would be kind of like a small gated community, but we only have one little section of it. And so they had guys coming around the walls, like trying to figure out exactly which little area was ours. And then when they pinpointed it, they got on that massive building and started shooting RPGs,

Starting point is 00:20:59 small arms fire. RPGs? Yeah. They sent the local, we sent someghan forces to go try to take care of it and they were dropping grenades off the top story of the building um trying to kill those guys who were coming up to get them and and uh yeah wow and and you know i think for people that weren't really close to that war following that that war, I mean, most of us get our information from the media, which is probably 2% of that is accurate. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:21:31 I'm giving them a generous percent. I'm just kidding. I'm giving them a win, you know. I'm feeling kind of bad for them in the wake of what just happened. Oh, don't feel bad. Yeah. You haven't sent any flowers out to you no dear no i'm trolling all the uh the mainstream now i know the legacy media earlier i like trolling them now yeah you've never

Starting point is 00:21:54 watched you've never watched so much msnbc in your life have you no oh man that's okay if you gloat over the over the meltdowns it's all. It's all right to take a victory lap. But, you know, when I think a lot of times, you know, over here, you know, the populace thinks of, you know, the Afghan armies. You know, they're like a bunch of just ragtag kids, you know, with the bandana, barely know how to shoot a gun. You know, they're probably working in a supermarket and then at night they're fighting and and um you know as as i will watch your podcast and hear some of the stories and they're a lot more sophisticated yeah and and and even a lot more trained um then then i think the the average person believes that they are i mean it's i i think the average person they see a lot of these videos on tv nobody's in the same uniform, their trucks aren't, you know, perfect governmental vehicles.

Starting point is 00:22:50 Everybody's kind of hanging on the back of a pickup truck. And it just looked like a bunch of loosely gathered drinking buddies with a, with a rifle, but it's not like that. No, I mean, not at all. I mean, you got to, I think something that Americans grossly underestimate is the Afghan army and the people that are fighting over there. And I think where they really mistake it is just because those people don't have, you know, they live without a lot of things doesn't mean they're fucking stupid or doesn't mean they're not effective. And so, you know, I think a lot of Americans are like, oh, that's that guy dresses like that. He doesn't have the proper equipment. He doesn't. He can't.

Starting point is 00:23:39 Bullshit, man. Those people are extremely resourceful. They're very intelligent and, and, and they're very effective. And, and I think that's a huge misnomer, right? That they're just a bunch of dumb hillbillies. There's also the experience too. I mean, you can take, you can take a guy like me that spent 14 years in and out of there. Well, 14 years in and out of there is nothing compared to just 14 years straight or over 20 years straight. Or some of these older village elders that have been there since the Russians invaded and been through that and then now all the way through this. I mean, I come home.

Starting point is 00:24:24 I do a six-month deployment. I come home. The agency I go 45 days, maybe 60 days, come home. They live there for 20 years. They don't go on vacation. They don't go home to their families back in the States where everything's fine. They're just gaining all of that experience throughout those years. So their commandos are more experienced than ours.

Starting point is 00:24:52 Wow. I think that's a real level set as to what we face, because I think it was always shocking when we would hear these stories of mass casualties or so many, you know, of our, our, our military men and women, you know, not coming home and you go, how, how are we not just steamrolling over these people? I mean, we're the largest military force on the globe. We're the most sophisticated, we're the highest, highest trained. And then we, we, we, this should have been a, you know, virtual walk in the park. Is that that a lot of because there's also a political war keeping you guys from doing what you really need to get done um or is it because they were a lot more formidable than than you thought or than when than our than our military brass thought can you can you so like i'm seeing like where we were we on did we underestimate them is basically what I'm saying.

Starting point is 00:25:45 Or I've also, again, through your podcast, I've seen a lot of stories where the guys on the ground, the fighting forces, wanted to finish a job. But for political reasons, they couldn't engage or they were redirected somewhere else and and it you know it seemed like there was this tug of war between um the command at the very very top sort of running things maybe out of washington and i don't profess to be a military scholar by any means but you know running things out of washington you know um and then what was going on in the ground and sometimes we just didn't give our guys the authority to just finish the job yeah would you agree with that absolutely yeah i think is that part of why just drug on and drug on and drug on well i think it drug on and drug on because war is a business um but in

Starting point is 00:26:38 the beginning i mean i don't think it's hard to say. I would say that the disconnected upper brass of the military, the D.C. crowd definitely underestimated the capabilities. Guys that are actually on the ground experiencing what's going on, maybe underestimated at the very beginning, but quickly became a new reality when you did see what they were capable of. So now what changed the war? I don't know exactly what the turning point was, but, but, you know, at the beginning, uh, there were, it did seem to be that we were there for the right reasons. The ROE, the ROEs were loosened up. They made sense. Uh, they leaned on the benefit of the U S service member, you know, and, and, and at the beginning of the Afghanistan war, that was, that was a, a, and always should have been a special operations war.

Starting point is 00:27:51 Very precise. Precise. Yes. Yeah. But it, it, it, you know, at some point in time, the big machine wanted to come in. Then in came all the bureaucrats and then the whole everything changed and i think that i think that change happened right around 2005 i think that operation red wings um that was if you've seen the movie the lone survivor that was that operation uh that time

Starting point is 00:28:26 what was that one about him that was so there they had inserted a team of snipers um on a mountaintop to overwatch a valley there was a hvt down there that they wanted or something i can't remember exactly uh goat herder sent uh went up the mountain uh found the sniper team kind of by accident they made a judgment call hey let him go back he went back and then a whole army came and uh and uh killed everybody on the sniper team except one guy who got away. We sent some helos in. It was a QRF. That's a quick reactionary force, kind of like a backup. And those helos got shot down.

Starting point is 00:29:13 It was the biggest loss in SEAL team history until Extortion 17. So that operation. And that was a SEAL team. That was SEAL snipers. And they were just what? Just overpowered. Yeah. I mean, there was a SEAL team. That was a SEAL sniper team. And they were just what? Just overpowered. Yeah, they were. I mean, there was only four of them.

Starting point is 00:29:30 You know, Danny Dietz, Matt Axelson, Murphy, Lieutenant Mike Murphy, and then Marcus Latrell, who was a survivor. Wow. And then the helos that got shot down to come and reinforce those guys. Wow. the helos uh that got shot down to come and to come and reinforce those guys wow and so that was a lot of controversy uh around that operation within the seal teams and within special operations uh my team was actually the one that went in to relieve those guys um seal team two went in to relieve team 10 after that had happened and and they just shut down all all operations uh it seemed like what do you mean when i went i mean we just kept

Starting point is 00:30:13 we we would kept putting putting in these packages uh for operations going after people um and it was everything was getting denied and um i i just being there at that time and knowing what everybody was doing before then versus after um that may have been a turning point it did get very political uh there was a lot of politics being played between upper leadership at the SEAL teams versus SOCOM. I think that may have been part of it. The other thing I think that happened is Dick Cheney and Halliburton. Really? Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:30:59 Wow. Because you said war is a business. War is a business. And sadly, there is a military-industrial business and sadly you know there is a military industrial complex oh yeah and a lot of it's privatized and i don't think that um you know most of america is even aware of the money that's made from foreign wars i mean you know you often wonder like what is our interest in just continuing these endless wars i mean we've we've gotten so many of them in the last three years and i'm sure you have an opinion on that and i'd love to hear it um we didn't have any for

Starting point is 00:31:32 for four years and then um now all of a sudden you've got conflicts in israel and you you've got you know conflicts in iran and you've got conflicts obviously in russia and ukraine and it seems like the whole world's going to hell in the handbasket quick. And we pull out Afghanistan, we leave $83 billion of our military equipment, which I saw the parade that they were kind enough to do the other day. I mean, and, but this, this military industrial complex, I mean, what what's behind that? Who's, who's driving the,

Starting point is 00:32:02 the private companies are that are pro-war because i mean it's it's uh yeah that's that's who's driving it i mean back then you got to look at where dick jiktane dick cheney you can just call him dick yeah he is a fucking dick isn't it but uh yeah so if you just want to say dick i mean we'll we'll know who it is you can even call him the dick big dick but uh he was ceo halliburton and halliburton was the logistics company halliburton kbr is was the logistics company that put in all logistics for uh operation iraqi freedom and and the Afghanistan War. And so what does that mean?

Starting point is 00:32:52 That means they are the ones building all of the barracks. They're building the chow halls. Any infrastructure that needs building, KBR builds it. KBR delivers the mail. KBR cooks the food. KBR has the cleaning crews. KBR has the fuel points they deliver the fuel they have every possible logistical thing you can think of was done for war kbr in two different wars and the vice president of the united states was the former ceo of calaburton when that happened

Starting point is 00:33:21 so now you can see you know wow the conflict of interest i mean we see we see the same thing you know i'm much more cognizant of the food supply in our country but it just makes you wonder if any of the elites um have our best interests at heart because you know in our in our industrial food supply the majority of our nutritional research is funded by big food big pharma um which is what we were talking about earlier that's why lucky charms are listed as more nutritious than grass fed steak um you know the majority of our um research that gets gets approved through the food and drug administration you know funded by um big pharma which actually leads to the drugs

Starting point is 00:34:03 the food makes us sick and the drugs fix what the food well they prolong what the food causes and it's why we have 65 almost 70 percent of our diet coming from highly processed foods um you know because you when i think when private enterprise is allowed to influence public policy um especially in war. I mean, people are dying for that. I had a podcast guest on the other day that said, we've privatized the profits, but we socialized the expense. Meaning the profits go to private enterprise,

Starting point is 00:34:40 but the expense goes to the American taxpayer, expense goes to the people. And you see this over and over again. I mean, see the pandemic, where did the profits go and who picked up the bill? Yeah, when we know where the profits went and the taxpayer picked up the bill. And I just didn't have as much of non-myopic view

Starting point is 00:35:04 into war time, but it doesn't surprise me I just didn't have as much of, you know, non-myopic view into wartime. But it doesn't surprise me that, you know, you have people that stand to make billions of dollars, you know, off of a war that, you know, is either unnecessary or could have then been done in a much different way. I mean, you know, think about it. I mean, Ukraine's got think about it. I mean, Ukraine's got to be the same thing. I still haven't figured out Ukraine. Yeah. So it's the same, it's the same thing. I mean, you're talking about the pharmaceutical companies and the food companies basically paying off what the FDA politicians devote a certain way. Same thing with war, right? So you got, I mean, oh, we left all those helicopters and,

Starting point is 00:35:43 and tanks and everything over in in afghanistan right you don't think that i don't know lockheed martin northrop grumman boeing raytheon all these places we're like oh just leave that shit there we'll build you new ones you know oh we have all this extra equipment extra equipment cool send that over to Ukraine. We'll build you some new shit. You know what I mean? And so that's how it happens. It's, hey, vote this way. We want to prolong this war.

Starting point is 00:36:13 We're going to develop more supplies for it. Yeah. How do we spend $110 billion? Or maybe even more. I haven't even heard $200 billion. And things are at a stalemate. Like, what do we get for $110 billion? Did we get any shift in the dynamic of the conflict?

Starting point is 00:36:31 Or did we just basically take the can down the road and we still have this prolonged stalemate? I don't think it's about ending it. I think it's about its business and so it's it's it's it's all of these companies selling their technology and their their their wartime products their weapons their bullets their their radios jammers logistics companies all of that you know they want the war to continue moving on so that because that's their business and if there is no war these guys aren't making any money. It's just back to research and development. Do you think Trump's going to put an end to that? I know you've got to be pretty pleased with the events of the last week.

Starting point is 00:37:13 I hope so, man. Some big promises. But, I mean, look, it's already happening. I mean, shit, it's been, what, two, three days since the election? Yeah. And Hamas has already said, we're done. We're done. I saw that come out in Newsweek. Yeah. And I'm hoping that we can believe those, you know, some of these positive messages that, you know, Hamas is saying, hey, we're, we're going to close up shop and, and

Starting point is 00:37:37 Iran is going to, you know, engage in ceasefire talks right away um i mean those are really positive things because you know i think you know again i am not a war historian or you know uh you know profess to know anything about um wartime strategy but you know when you when you have these these big countries and they think that there's feckless leadership there's like an open you know an open door where there's no consequences at least they know that there's going to be consequences and so they're like you know we don't want any part of that yeah we got you know two three months until shit's really going to hit the fan for us let's come and have you know peace talks yeah i mean putin's already wanted to come to the table with negotiations i mean when i interviewed trump he said that war would be done before he steps into office so i remember he said that i was like that is a bold statement i know i mean i know that is a bold bold statement i mean because the mullahs

Starting point is 00:38:38 in iran putin they don't seem uh like they've been to anybody else's agenda. Now they'll bend to a two by four to the face. But I don't think that, you know, really tough talk, like don't, I know I really don't think that those things really frighten them. So to see them move this fast is, is, is pretty interesting. So, I mean, what, do you have, are you aware that we have US military special forces involved in those conflicts right now? I know they're in the region,

Starting point is 00:39:13 but they say that we don't have our special forces and our men and women in harm's way. And you're not seeing like the death tolls clicking on, on the media, but I can't imagine that there's conflicts of this scale and that our men and women are not involved i'm sure there's a couple okay but uh there's definitely going to be a couple in there but i don't i don't think that there are a's a large majority of of u.s personnel in harm's way and in uk Well, at least I'm happy to hear that.

Starting point is 00:39:47 Are you hopeful that this thing can be resolved? I mean, from where you... Yeah, 100%. And how does it end? Do they annex some territory to Russia? And Ukraine slightly shrinks in size. Do they have to leave NATO? Like, I'm always curious to figure out, like, you know, there sometimes seems to be such an easy solution, and that's a very myopic view, to ending this war.

Starting point is 00:40:10 And you'd think, well, why didn't somebody think of that for the last several years while we were funneling hundreds of billions of dollars? Yeah, you know, I think we've been lied to about the reasons that we're over there. So I don't know, you know, exactly what it's going to take to end it but but i do think that um i've read and i've interviewed some people uh that say that that the the the the the region that is being fought over is uh extremely rich in natural gas and so you know while it's kind of funny, while the Democrats all are, you know, pro-Ukraine, let's go, we've got to do this. I think the real reason that we are there

Starting point is 00:40:53 or that we are aiding that is because I think that if Ukraine holds onto that, we will be the ones to build the infrastructure to pipe in all the natural gas into Europe. Now, if you remember before, that was Russia that was piping in all that natural gas to Europe. Trump had even said, you guys are stupid. Your enemy is supplying you with your energy supply. So while the Democrats or the previous administration or whatever the fuck you want

Starting point is 00:41:25 to call it you know paints it out as some kind of humanitarian mission i think the real reason that we were there is to actually build the infrastructure around those natural gas reserves to pump that into europe because that boosts our economy that is i mean whether you agree with it or not hey big surprise us is involved in another fucking oil war. Right. Or, you know, I guess not in oil this time, natural gas. Well, I mean, look at the Keystone Pipelines. But it also puts a major dent in Russia's economy

Starting point is 00:41:55 because if they're not supplying all of Europe with natural gas from their pipeline and U.S. builds the infrastructure in Ukraine to pipe in the natural gas well then i mean that's that would be that would be amazing for our economy right you know i don't i think that would be a hard so so we're getting back to being energy independent on our own soil um well which is not necessarily because because what i'm saying is we own the basically what I'm saying is because of all the money that we dumped into Ukraine and because of all the, you know, because how involved we've been in that war, we have to be paid back somehow. We didn't just give them, however, I hope not. Hundreds of billions, hopefully.

Starting point is 00:42:44 Yeah, hopefully got an iou but you know that might seem like chump change compared to the natural gas that's going to feed europe that we're going to take control of and so i think that that plays a little bit more of a role than people might be aware of uh than just hey this is i mean look it, look, it's fucked up what Russia did. They're trying to take land that doesn't belong to them. Right. Hey, everyone. If you've been tuning into the Ultimate Human podcast

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Starting point is 00:44:10 Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. And I remember when they were, I still remember very vividly when they were amassing along the border. And I was like, what do you think is going on? They didn't really hide it. It wasn't a clandestine, like, you know, in the dark of night kind of, you know, surprise raid. I mean, they built forces up right on that border for months. And I, well, I mean, I remember Biden talking about it, but that's probably not a good reference. But, you know, he was like, you could just do a small incursion or whatever he was whatever

Starting point is 00:44:45 he he was saying but it seemed like you know we were more aware what was about to happen that we were like shocked oh my gosh i can't believe that they actually went to ukraine and they've been putting tanks on the border for the last four months yeah um and you know i always know that there's some more than meets the eye and when I meet people that have a profound depth of understanding and knowledge, like, you know, I listen to Bobby Kennedy talk about the history of how, you know, in his words, the U.S. really put them in a position to have no choice. And it's such a unique perspective, but he lays things out in such a beautiful manner about, you know, how we refused certain treaties. And they, we had, we had made agreements with Russia not to allow certain things to happen, like certain countries to join NATO. And then when we recanted on those, you know, we're somehow like surprised that they're behaving that way. And I, you know, I didn't intend to start

Starting point is 00:45:45 this podcast and talk about the Ukraine war. Seriously. I'm like way out of my topic zone, but you know, just to have you on here and get some, some insight into it, but I want to rewind the clock a little bit and get, and get back to, um, you know, your story, because your story is fascinating to me, um um that when you got out of the military um and and you were dealing with some pretty heavy issues um mental mental illness you know some psychological issues and we were talking in the kitchen before we came in here about how it's it's still just not in vogue to ask for help, still not in vogue to, you know, raise your hand and say, I'm not okay. It's usually the families or the spouses or, you know,

Starting point is 00:46:35 someone close to them that really tries to reach out and get them help. And I think there has to be a dynamic between somebody that is so highly trained like a member of a seal team and is has seen that kind of combat i mean these these are the men of men right and then to come back and have to be vulnerable um i wondered if you if you talk a little bit because you've been very vocal about ptsd and very vocal about your journey and i wonder if you might a little bit, because you've been very vocal about PTSD and very vocal about your journey. And I wonder if you might even talk about your journey and some of the issues that you solve. I love your psilocybin journey, by the way. I mean, I am fully on board for the psychedelics

Starting point is 00:47:15 versus the chemicals, synthetics, the pharmaceuticals, and some of the other treatments that we can do. Ketamine, under medical supervision to address the severe inflammatory conditions in the brains of a lot of these soldiers that are really causing them to be tormented inside of their own bodies. So if you wouldn't mind, I mean, I'd love to talk a little bit about your journey with that and how you solved that problem.

Starting point is 00:47:44 Sure. Where would you like me to start? Do you want me to talk about how bad it got? Yeah. Yeah. I want you to talk about as comfortable as you are talking about how bad it got, because that's, that's the problem. Yeah. Right. And, and the good news is that, I mean, here you are today. Right. So, yeah, you know, I think there's just a i mean to kind of try to put it into a perspective that you might understand i mean it's very obviously you've

Starting point is 00:48:12 done you've done extremely well you're at the best of what you do you built a fucking entire empire that is extremely impressive me yeah thank you wow now that's really kind of you now i'm going to take all that away please don't right now and you have to figure out how you're going to make a living feed your family what are you going to talk about what are you going to tell people you do you're proud of what you built right so that all goes away and you're just nothing you have no idea where you're going to take the rest of your life you know these guys most of these guys are under 40 years old, you know, so they still have their whole life ahead of them. So you're dealing with that, number one.

Starting point is 00:48:50 Everything that you've worked so hard to accomplish, all the cool stories, you're at the apex of what you do. Nobody's better. You've reached the ceiling, you know. And now nobody fucking cares because you're not in that anymore it's not relevant and that's you know i think you see that a lot with pro athletes when they retire when they get hurt when they're done you know it's like well there goes my whole identity and um so you have to you have to learn how to reinvent yourself on top of that you're also dealing you guys were talking about this earlier,

Starting point is 00:49:26 addiction to adrenaline and the fight or flight response. I mean, busy minds. You know, you're always, I mean, I still love a good adrenaline rush. But, I mean, when you come out of a job like that, I don't know what the chemicals are. You would know a lot more about that than i would obviously but you know it becomes that adrenaline dump becomes an addiction and so you you are subconsciously looking for ways to kind of fill that void uh when you're not on deployment and then when deployments are all one of them, when they're all over it, it, it is, it's a, it's, you get anxiety knowing that you're not going to feel that again.

Starting point is 00:50:14 You're not going to feel that, that, that it's not even a rush, man. It's, I mean, when you are involved in heavy combat, it is, I mean, it's just, it's primitive, man. It's primal. It's, there's nothing in the world like it it is like i mean you are as weird as it sounds it is a fucking amazing experience if you survive it and walk out of it and that's all you want to talk about and that's all you want to feel and that's all you want to do and so that's i mean that's that's the reason i got out of the seal teams was i wasn't getting enough of it really yeah that's a big reason i got out of the SEAL teams was I wasn't getting enough of it. Really?

Starting point is 00:51:05 Yeah, that's a big reason I got out. Why, you weren't being deployed as often? I wasn't getting, I talked about Afghanistan earlier, you know, and that when I got there, things had kind of changed, started getting political, bureaucrats started getting in. I mean, when I went in, I wanted to go out every night, multiple times a night.

Starting point is 00:51:24 That's all I wanted to do was go out. On patrol, you mean? Go to war. Really? On patrol, combat. Combat. And I just, I wasn't getting enough doses of it. Wow.

Starting point is 00:51:37 That's incredible. Like, I'd be the opposite. I'm like, I want to go home. Well, but I mean. Maybe because I don't have that training. Yeah. I mean, you gotta, you gotta remember too. I mean, it's years. It's for me, it was, I mean, I joined the Navy, went through buds, buds is six months.

Starting point is 00:51:59 If you make it through for me without any hangups, almost nobody makes it without any hang-ups so you're looking at a good eight months i would say eight to nine months would be average just to get through buds then you go through sqt that's still qualification training there's another four or five months then you get to your seal team you think you're a badass guess what you're not you got another year and a half of training at your civil team to go just to go to the fucking war, you know? And so you're looking at a good three, three and a half years of training just to get the opportunity to go to war. Wow. So you're ready by the time or you think you're ready by the time you get there. But, um, and so I'm,

Starting point is 00:52:47 I'm kind of going through back to what we were talking about. I'm kind of going through like all the things that guys deal with. Then there's, then there is PTSD, which, um, now they're saying special ops guys, it's called operator syndrome. They're kind of starting to transition that, but you know, it's, it's survivor's guilt it's all my friends that are now dead oh i'm not saying me but you know people oh i had to kill a woman oh i had to kill a kid oh fuck that person was probably innocent you know i mean all the

Starting point is 00:53:21 so there's so there's just uh the the stuff you were talking about earlier with sleep. Nobody I know that comes from this job sleeps or sleeps well. And because you're in that constant state of, for lack of a better term, paranoia, even though once you've done it for so long it doesn't seem like paranoia it's just it's just life and so when you even that long after yeah wow and so you know when you get home your identity has been stripped you have all these chemical imbalances in your brain you've seen more trauma than just about anybody on the planet. And, and, and then your own injuries, you know,

Starting point is 00:54:11 that you're fighting as well with, you know, banged up knees or, or heaven forbid amputees, you know, stuff like that. And it's, these are all the things that, that are kind of going through your head. And so for me, when I left the agency, I was looking for that adrenaline.

Starting point is 00:54:32 And so I moved to Medellin, Colombia and found that adrenaline by getting involved in cocaine rings. we'll bring you to medellin you just went there yeah yeah yeah pretty much okay and uh yeah i was there for uh right about in and out for five years and um and realized i had a a was really scurred in the line there, OD'd a couple times and pulled through that. And I never even did drugs as a kid. Did you do them in, you know, it wasn't your military service.

Starting point is 00:55:20 I mean, obviously you're not doing drugs in the military. No. It's after you got out. It's just life's just not exciting anymore. Uh-uh. So you went down to Medellin with a buddy of yours or something? Yeah, it started with a buddy. It started in, I started going to Cartagena with a buddy.

Starting point is 00:55:35 And then I just started flying solo down there. And started kind of building a lot of contacts and stuff. But got really addicted to cocaine uh had two pretty close calls uh where i overdosed and this is just from just used it for too many days too often um it was just too much coke all the time just coke Coke. I remember I was always paranoid that I was. Turns out Coke makes you paranoid. Who knew? But THC, same thing.

Starting point is 00:56:19 But no, I remember my best friend was with me down there. I would always get worried that I was going to OD. There's a good friend. Yeah. And he's dead now. Okay. But he said, you I was going to OD. There's a good friend. Yeah. And he's dead now. Okay. But he said, you don't need to worry. You don't need to worry about your OD-ing. If you're on speed, you don't need to worry that you're OD-ing unless things start to slow down.

Starting point is 00:56:37 And I was like, huh. All right. I guess that makes sense. And then I remember the first time I felt it, things started slowing down. My speech was like, sounded like that fucking scene on old school where Will Ferrell's like, it's, it's,

Starting point is 00:56:52 it was everything just slowed down. My voice slowed down. My brain was moving faster than I could talk. I couldn't talk. And, and I just saw the lights. You were really, really wired at the time oh yeah so just your central nervous system was just absolutely yep frying done and and so the the vision starts

Starting point is 00:57:15 to narrow yep yep vision barrel the vision narrowed and uh and then i woke up on the on the floor of a club and club yeah wow woke up on the floor of a club. Of a club? Yeah. Wow. Woke up on the floor of a club that didn't do it. That was actually my very first time doing coke. But then it started – then it happened two more times after that, years after that. And so I realized I have a problem, had a problem, left Columbia, kind of got ran out of there actually, but left there, where i just i just completely just kind of not kind of lost hope i mean my routine gary lost hope that you would get out that you would i just didn't care anymore man like all my friends were still involved in the war uh either it in the seal teams or a development group or in the agency and to hear like what

Starting point is 00:58:37 those guys were involved in and what they were doing and i wasn't there and why couldn't you have stayed i mean why was it your choice to leave I mean, why? Was it your choice to leave? I mean, it was my choice to leave. It was your choice. But then you also missed it. Yeah, I missed it. And I really, I missed it for a long time. And so it ruined all my family relationships just because I was,

Starting point is 00:59:03 when I was, I was drinking more than a fifth of vodka a day. I would wake up, uh, my whole freezer was just completely packed with vodka, many bottles, my glove compartment, my car was packed with vodka, many bottles, everywhere I went had flask or many bottles. And, um, and that's how i would get through the day drinking that and then at night uh when i would go back home i would just pull out a fifth and tug on that until until the lights were out and while i was tugging on that i would take ambient xanax volume lorazepam uh hydrocodone anything i could to keep my mind from just going right all the time and how were you able to get that just dealers would put get their hands on it um well i worked overseas and uh you know turns out that most countries you don't need a prescription to

Starting point is 01:00:03 get whatever you want so i would just go behind the counter and tell them what i want and throw it in a in a shopping basket and stock up and bring it all home and uh you know i had done that for years and um so i had stockpiles of it uh at home and then and then i was also you know when i did finally start to to kind of get some help and i started going to therapy um i mean i would get it prescribed you know babe can't sleep need some ambient here you go oh here's some selenor here you go here's this here you go i mean it wasn't they weren't giving me everything i wanted but they were definitely you know right i could get it what made you raise your hand

Starting point is 01:00:49 what made me raise my hand raise your hand say enough are i want help a couple of things the what got me out of columbia is I went home to visit my family. And when I started ODN, I would call my dad. And me and my dad are really close. And I would tell him, hey, dad, I need to get the fuck out of here. I'm not going to make it out of here. I wouldn't tell him what I was doing. But he knew, and he was worried.

Starting point is 01:01:32 And I went home to visit him and, uh, in a super small town in Missouri. And, uh, and I, I don't even know what happened, man. I just, I know me and my dad were supposed to go to a Cardinals baseball game the next day. And I must have blacked out. You OD'd again? You took the drugs with you? You were traveling with them? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:01:55 I would bring them everywhere. I couldn't. Shit. I can't sleep without them. I can't sleep without them. Oh, these are prescriptions, so you can take them through an airport and all. You weren't taking, like, coke and stuff like no no no no no uh drug trafficking yeah but um but i would yeah i would just i was like a walking pharmacy for benzos and opiates and um and sleeping pills and i woke up and my dad was standing over my bed and he was like

Starting point is 01:02:29 tearing up. And I, I just could tell he was like, he didn't know what to do. And, um, and he wanted me to get some help. And so at that point I wasn't going to get any help, but I was like, all right, maybe I should like move out of Columbia. And so I did. And then, uh, and then the second kind of wake up call was, uh, my suicide attempt. Uh, again, don't really know what happened. Uh, I was at blue martini in Boca Raton, florida and the next minute i'm upstairs waking up uh in my bed alone and my whole house smells like gasoline came downstairs saw a glock on my bed or i'm sorry on the couch uh which i never and and it's not the Glock that I carry or carried for personal defense. It was something that I had pulled out of a safe.

Starting point is 01:03:33 So probably was going to do something there. But you don't even remember that. I don't. And then I walked out to my garage and I touched the garage door and i was hot to the touch and i was like oh fuck what is that is there a fire in there and um i remember thinking if i open this door and there's a fire in there it's going to get a big rush of oxygen it's probably going to fucking kill me so i opened it and god and nothing happened but my car was running in there and uh i drove a an audi a8 at the time and seat was all the way reclined back so i i pulled in the garage closed the door

Starting point is 01:04:18 left the car running decided i was lights out let the seat down somehow i fucking woke up the it was so hot that the uh exhaust melted a hole in the fucking gas tank and the gas tank was leaking onto the exhaust uh muffler wow and there was like a little bitty like fire in there so um so i called my best friend uh dave rutherford and kind of told him you know the situation i was in then i called uh a really uh good friend of mine out of boston who helps veterans. She's like an angel to a lot of people named Peggy Matthews. And then I called my therapist in Boca and they were all like, yeah, you, that's what that was. So you think you pulled in, prepared to do it, and then something got you up and you just went upstairs and went to bed and just don't recall that i think that was god and probably fumbled around the safe and got the gun out and i think i thought about it this is what happened pulled in the garage um had an

Starting point is 01:05:37 argument with somebody that um i cared about a lot and then left the bar, pulled in the garage, was going to kill myself there, went into the into the living room, pulled out the gun. Took all my clothes off on the couch and then probably passed out there and then went upstairs to my bed at some point at the night. And so that was another wake-up call and um and um so i made a promise to my therapist that i wouldn't drink um vodka anymore and so uh i had i had successfully transitioned to wine wow and um so then and i was good you know know, I started getting my life back together. I quit all the benzos. By yourself. You were actually strong enough to get off of those by yourself.

Starting point is 01:06:30 I got off all the benzos. Because those are really tough. For the most part, I got off all the benzos. I had my emergency stash. So, yeah. And then I met my wife, who's been sober for 14 or 15 years now. And, um, and that obviously helped a lot. And then, and then, um, in the last three years, what really, you know, what really like did the trick was psychedelics. Yeah. I want to go down that road because you went out of the country to do this and it wasn't just the psilocybin.

Starting point is 01:07:13 You did other treatments. Yeah. But I remember you describing it as pretty instant, like meaning the impact of the treatment and uh came back and just sort of knew the difference between what was poison and what wasn't and you said that's poisoning me that's poisoning me that's poisoning me but you just were clear about it and um so tell talk talk a little bit about that journey because clearly you are in a very dark place. Yeah. So, yeah, I just, I kept interviewing.

Starting point is 01:07:58 I mean, you know, my interviews, I interview a lot of former colleagues and warrior elites. We'll call them that. And so, you know, in my interview process, I talk about, we do a life story. This is how you grew up. This is what you experienced in combat. This is how bad it got. This is what got you through it. And then we talk about what they're doing now, their business, to help elevate that. And so in these interviews, the first guy that I talked to was eddie gallagher who had brought up psychedelic

Starting point is 01:08:26 therapy and i was like huh this shit sounds like it's for hippies and um yeah and then another guy came on to talk about it and i was in it and then another guy came on to talk about it then um you were in the thick of it then when you were even yeah wow and so then uh i mentioned dj earlier dj uh interviewed him and and uh he was kind of like it was sinking in but after i interviewed him um he had he was like hey you know i know you're considering this like you should really fucking do it man psychedelic stuff it's it works and i understand i understood some of the science behind it at this time by now too so so i booked um i booked a trip and and went down to mexico to do an ibogaine and 5meo um therapy treatment and and how are those done ivy no um you go so 5meo you smoke it's a toad venom the sonora desert toad i think is where it comes

Starting point is 01:09:41 from so you just i just wonder who figures this shit out all right who like found the first toad it was like hey frankly you know let's let's let's crush him and smoke him and see you know wow that really made me feel you know like ayahuasca yeah you know it's deadly poison i think a lot of people are saying the same thing about some of the stuff you're talking about this is very true but like yeah i don't know and then so you smoke that um in ibogaine uh i think it comes from a root in somewhere in africa gabon or i can't remember but um but that is like it came in a capsule and so um the ibogaine experience was like 12 hours um i don't know how in deep depth you want me to go on that but was it 12 hours of like a trip like you were on mushrooms or lsd like

Starting point is 01:10:35 a like it's a trip it's a trip it's a trip and um i mean i've never done ayahuasca but a lot of some people swear by it some people are very afraid of it. You know, for me, the jury's still out on it. But just because I don't know that much about it, to say one way or the other. But I have seen stories of people, excuse me, very credible people that have had these incredible journeys. Like life-changing, like what I feel you're about to describe and where they were really in a dark place

Starting point is 01:11:11 and really couldn't figure it out. And first of all, thank you for being so vulnerable and really describing that situation like that. I know it must be tough for you to even think about it, but they literally, they said it was like flicking a switch. that situation like that. I know it must be tough for you to even think about it. But they literally, they said it was like flicking a switch. They actually were able to, as they describe it, almost get out of their own body and look at themselves

Starting point is 01:11:33 and be really honest with themselves. And it was like, they actually had an honest evaluation of themselves. Like I'm really fucking this up. These are the behaviors that are really causing me to stay in this constant wheel of um despair and disappointment and i'm not getting any traction in life and they said it was so clear yeah um so it's fascinating to me you know and you said you you know a little about the science. Is that of the psilocybin or the. The way, the easiest way for me to explain it and, and, and I could be wrong, but this is what I've learned through my interviews is that, you know, the older we get the, I think it's obvious, right?

Starting point is 01:12:21 The more, the older we get, we see it with our parents, right? The more set in their ways that they become. I'm that way. I think we're all that way. But the way that it was described to me several times is that the neurons in your brain travel back and forth through the default mode network. And so that's what from the front of your brain to the back of the brain. And it wasn't always like that. So right now for me and you, our neurons are just going, you know, back and forth, back and forth.

Starting point is 01:12:57 And that's how they're communicating. But when we were young, we had all these other neural pathways that these neurons were using to communicate and get information to wherever the hell it needs to go. Well, as time goes on, those pathways start to close up. The neurons get lazy. They're like, oh, we're just going to go to the default mode network and we'll just communicate this way. And so now you get stuck in your ways. You get stuck in that same hamster

Starting point is 01:13:25 that habitual pattern and so to my understanding basically what some psychedelics do is they actually put a block in that default mode network so they're not just going back and forth anymore now all these neurons have to find new pathways or reopen old pathways in your brain that haven't been used in years and years and years wow and so you so these neurons are are so it's opening it's it's literally unlocking your fucking brain wow and did you feel that that was going on during this 12 hours were you frightened or paranoid did you feel like terrified or like your life was going on during this 12 hours were you frightened or paranoid did you feel like terrified or like your life was going to end or anything like that i think calm i was pretty calm i mean um were you aware of it yeah like it's not like so that's the other thing is is uh

Starting point is 01:14:19 they i was i was a little nervous that I would wind up in some type of, um, mental or like a persistent state or something. Yeah. But, but you know, you're, you're, you are wired up to an EKG and an IV, but that's to get you out of something. If, you know, if something goes wrong and, um, and so, so you can be in the middle of your experience having your experience and then you know the nurse or the doctor comes around and like shakes you and they're like hey you doing all right you lift up your eye mask and you're out of the experience you're like yep all good buddy going back in. Really? Yeah. Really? Like that? It is like that.

Starting point is 01:15:06 It is like you snap out of it. You know what I mean? That is wild. It's almost, I mean, for me, it was almost like I had to concentrate to get into it. And if I want, you know, because you got to. Like kind of surrender to it. It's 12 hours. You got to take a pee break and all kinds of stuff.

Starting point is 01:15:22 So, yeah, you can you can like snap out of it sounds like you kind of liked it or you were curious about it i was like yeah i can tell you know you you put the mask back down you're like i want to see where this goes yep yeah yep and you know i i saw a couple things but I didn't like relive any super traumatic events. It was more like the way I describe it is it was like it was like I had two rows of TV screens going through my like vision with my eyes closed. And so it was just lines of them. And in each TV screen was like something that had happened in my life and there was there didn't seem to be like any it wasn't in chronological

Starting point is 01:16:13 order it wasn't like from age you know uh from birth to now it was just a bunch of it was like somebody just put a bunch of life events on a deck of cards shuffled them up put them in a line and said hey we're gonna send these through sean's brain and so there was shit that was like stuff that had happened with my dad back in the day stuff that happened in iraq stuff that happened when i was a teenager stuff you know and it was did you feel like you're like i'm seeing seeing that. I remember that. Yeah, but it was weird because every time I would try to jump into that specific experience, like, oh, fuck, I remember that. I want to relive that. Or, oh, that was any time I would try to concentrate on any specific event, everything would go away.

Starting point is 01:16:58 That's the ultimate torture. yeah so so i would have to concentrate on not trying to concentrate on any particular memory so that they could just all filter through and and uh i don't know what the hell that means i don't either i mean it was stuff that was that i hadn't thought about in in years but it was accurate these were vivid memories like as it was you were like i definitely remember that yep you know that was my that was my best friend i forgot about him like you know that kind of stuff i mean i forgot i had that girlfriend in yeah college like wow it was almost like my brain was just sorting through like thousands and thousands of memories and then there was like some um stuff that just still doesn't really make sense to me like some fear and loathing in las vegas

Starting point is 01:17:53 type shit like it was walls of stuffed animals and i was on some fucking horse like it was weird yeah i don't know what that was but uh woke up this so that was about a 12-hour experience and um woke up went downstairs you have a gray day they call it a gray day after it's like the worst hangover you've ever had in your life and um like actual headache pain horrible dizzy really vomiting like horrible just wow yeah and that lasted a day i mean yeah and i got up to go to the bathroom and i looked at my eyes and i remember thinking like my eyes look different and uh and they looked lighter and um and uh and sure as shit i came home from that. And one of the, the first thing my wife said to me was your eyes look lighter and the whites of your eyes look white, whiter. So it wasn't just me.

Starting point is 01:18:53 And so after that, though, we did the Ibogaine. Then after that, you have the, you have your day off and then you do the 5-MeO DMT. And the 5-MeO DMT, I mean, that is a very short experience, maybe 15 minutes tops, but the most profound experience of my entire life. Really? It was, and I don't say that lightly even more profound than the one you just described more profound than my kids being born like it was so intense and so revealing uh I it's I mean i still remember it like it's it's a death experience so for me is it something you'd

Starting point is 01:19:50 want to do again i've done it a couple times since really but it's i wouldn't say it's a good time you know it's not like uh because you said a profound experience meaning like this stands out to me yeah yeah this is so you've had some experiences too i mean it's a death and a father it's a you you die that's the only way to describe it you die you don't think you're dying you know you're you die you think you're dying like nobody can convince you otherwise it's not like i'm actually dead i'm paranoid you know uh pull me out of this no it's i'm fucking dying and i'm like nobody's there's nothing that can happen and so but you're conscious but you're aware that you're dead so you accept that you have a that's pretty much. I know it sounds really odd.

Starting point is 01:20:55 And once you accept it, is it the profound sadness of the things you didn't get done in your life? No. The things you didn't say? Okay. It's the complete opposite of that. So when you're dying, it is, it's, they call it an ego death, but you, first you kind of go through, and this all lasts maybe like 30 seconds, maybe. But you, first you go through the, holy shit, I'm dying and there's nothing I can do. And then it's, and then it's, oh shit, who am I leaving behind?

Starting point is 01:21:33 I can't leave them behind. And so for me, it was my wife and my, I think my son was like six months old. He was right around six months, six months old at the time and so i just like was grasping on for anything to try to to try to live for them i was like i can't fucking leave my wife and kid here this place is a disaster and uh and um but you really you think you you think you're departing and um and then eventually you do give up but i will say like you know at the beginning you'd ask me you know about uh combat experiences where i thought i was gonna die and i've been through a ton of those but nothing like this really this was more profound than that wow are. You've accepted that you're either dead or you are about to die.

Starting point is 01:22:28 Yeah. It was truly. It was the most anxiety, most fear, most sadness that I'd ever felt all, all at once. And, and then you,

Starting point is 01:22:39 I don't think any, everybody can get to this. Cause I know I've recommended this to everybody that works for me. I've recommended it to all my friends. It was, what it's done for me is just so profound. And even though the experience itself is horrible. Yeah. Because of what happens on the other side and and so if you can get to the point where you

Starting point is 01:23:05 can muster up enough courage to just die um then you you you like fucking cross over into this new realm and once you surrender and say yep okay god i'm ready to go and the minute that that that happens like you cross over and man this stuff sounds weird and i always thought this shit was all for hippies but it's not and uh but you know you hear people talk about energy and that person has a bad energy and that person has a good energy and and energy is everything you see that uh if you come out the other side it is i mean a lot of people do it on a blindfold and a lot of people say that they say that they see they go through a wormhole they see the big bang they see um they see uh family lineage they see friends that have died in combat.

Starting point is 01:24:06 You know, I wanted to do it without the eye mask. And I remember looking out over the ocean down in Mexico. And I remember every time I do a psychedelic experience, it's always very, I don't get a whole lot of visuals. I get a lot of into it, intuition. And I could see energy flowing from islands to the ocean, to the beach, into the air, up the trees and the leaves and it was it was it was you hear a lot of people say oh we're all one everything's connected there's a oneness there is a fucking oneness man like really you can see and feel intuitively the flow of energy of positive energy and, and, and at the same time,

Starting point is 01:25:08 I, I, I could feel and hear like the earth's vibration. Wow. And you are just, you are so in tune with nature, God, whatever you want to call it, the universe. I mean, it's, if any evil, any negative energy, any evil came into the, into your field of view, it would,

Starting point is 01:25:38 it would stick out like a spotlight in the darkness. And, um, and it and it it you know and on the other hand it makes you realize that there is definitely uh life after death there is there is we're all going somewhere yeah and um now are you a man of god are you absolutely okay are you yes good for you yeah um saved at a promise keepers convention 20 1994 how many years ago that was what's that 1994 i got i got saved at a promise keepers convention i went awesome yeah um in 1994 i was in grad school and it was in soldier field um i gave my life to the lord and uh it was a they used to have a movement called uh promise keepers might still be around um but my lawyer tricked me into going to this it was it was a christian men's event i didn't know that he told me it's like a motivational thing to go see these motivational speakers and it was a um this movement called promise keepers

Starting point is 01:26:46 and i'll just never forget me i i joined hands with 70 000 christian men and started to say the lord's prayer and i just fell apart and went down to the stage and gave my life to christ well what why did your attorney think that you needed to go to uh because he's but he was a he was a you know a really strong christian guy and um and uh i thought i was fucked up but after your story i feel pretty good about myself i feel actually really good i'm just kidding um you know um yeah i was in i was i was in grad school and you know i was just typical you know, um, you know, I was in, I was, I was in grad school and, you know, I was just typical, you know, self-centered and, you know, I wasn't doing anything crazy. I was partying a little bit. I was, you know, I was going through grad school and, um, had a decent relationship

Starting point is 01:27:38 with a girlfriend at the time and, um, ended up, uh, becoming my wife back then. And he just was a really powerful Christian. He was like, hey, I want you to come to this event. I think you really love it. He's motivational speakers. It's so inspiring. And I thought it was going to be like one of, you know, like David Goggins kind of, you know, on stage telling you to get your shit together. He wasn't around then.

Starting point is 01:28:04 But so I was like, okay, you know on stage telling you to get your shit together um he wasn't around then but um so i was like okay you know i'll go um and it was a very profound experience for me man good for you but i didn't mean to interrupt you but so you say you're convinced now that there is something on the other side yeah i mean i didn't uh i mean now i'm a believer in jesus and um amen so and uh but at that time i just realized it honestly like it i it made it took me this sounds weird because it made me a better person but it it kind of took jesus and god out of the picture for me not that i was like like some standup Christian man or anything back then. Obviously I wasn't, but I was like, man, I always wondered about this.

Starting point is 01:28:52 Now I know that's not real or that's what I thought. But, but coming out of that, you know, gosh, you must be so profoundly sad. sad like it was that moment yeah but i mean i i did feel the presence of uh my best friend gabe who who died when i was he was down in columbia with me uh for a while another seal that i worked with at the agency as well but but anyways I I got home and I told you that my wife first thing she had noticed was uh my eyes were like my uh were a lighter brown and my whites were whiter and and um and and I went down there to be more in the moment too with my uh son because i was i'm a dad now and uh you know i know a lot of business people struggle with this how how do you you know i'm in love with my business i'm sure you

Starting point is 01:29:54 are too and so it can it can be a challenge to turn it off at night and and be in the moment with the wife and kids right and uh and that bothers me when I can't do it. And there's always something to do. Yeah. And it bothers her too. It took me right back into the moment. I was able to shut it off. It made me more, all these weird things happened

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Starting point is 01:30:51 perfect protein synthesis, we need to look at the process of protein synthesis itself. Because if the process is faulty, we won't get the correctly made protein, collagen, fibrin, or the red blood cells in our bloodstream or our muscles. We can even stop creation of specific proteins, which can affect us in so many different ways. Our DNA and our RNA are what direct protein synthesis, building new proteins. If our DNA or RNA get damaged from toxins, harmful bacteria, or just plain aging, we get faulty protein synthesis. So cells, enzymes, and hormones are less functional and we get premature aging. By adding nucleosides and nucleotides, the building blocks of the nucleic acids DNA and RNA, our cells get exactly what

Starting point is 01:31:39 they need to help repair faulty DNA and RNA and improve the process of protein synthesis itself. This is next level science and you need to try these. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast. Did you just realize what was not important? Yes. Cause I got to imagine on your, you know, deathbed, you know, people that are processing their life. They can't go back and redo it now. You know, it's at the end, but maybe you get a chance to consciously look back,

Starting point is 01:32:19 but you got a chance to consciously look back and then go fix it. And I think that's what sounds so profound about your experience, because I saw something on Instagram the other day, and it was a pastor who was delivering a graduation ceremony and he talked about how many times he'd been at the bedside of a a man or a woman in their last moments and he talked about the typical things that you would say you know they weren't like hey bring my trophies by so i can see them one more time or can you wheel me down to the garage so you so i can be around the car collection you know i just want to see them one more time? Or can you wheel me down to the garage so you, so I can be around the car collection? You know, I just want to see it one last time. And, um, you know, remember, remember when we took that company public and we sold it, it was, he said it was,

Starting point is 01:32:56 it was all just about love. Yeah. And the only people that he, he said it was the one common thing, you know, like the only people they wanted around were the people that he he said it was the one common thing you know like the only people they wanted around were the people that were really really close to them and maybe at that moment they appreciated them the most but you got the enviable opportunity to go back and maybe fix it yeah um so you're super efficient right um how about you know is addiction still knocking at the door no so that's this is the this is the i did not even go down there to quit drinking because like i had said in my fucked up mind i was fine because all i was drinking was a couple of bottles of wine a

Starting point is 01:33:40 night not vodka well you're him and the columbian bam bam and i tell you you're in a good place you know yeah relatively speaking but um but you know i mean so i just i lost like all my addictions and so i was still taking adderall that's gone uh i was smoking cannabis to go to sleep. I quit that for about six months. Now I'm back. Back and back. Yeah, but sleep's like the one thing I just cannot.

Starting point is 01:34:14 I'm going to hack it for you, man. When I go on your podcast, we're going to take the clip from this podcast where you couldn't sleep, and you're going to be like, holy shit, I'm sleeping like a bear. I got you brother um i'd still i'd still used um benzos here and there gone sleeping pills gone booze gone wow and there was sugar gone for about really for about six months and so sugar's back to sugar's back okay uh sugar and cannabis are back caffeine was gone for a long time uh still don't drink coffee now i'll have tea but but uh you know it it wasn't any effort either it was just it was just it was like my mind got a download and it was just, this shit's poison.

Starting point is 01:35:10 This is poison. This is poison. This is poison. Don't do it. And it wasn't like there was no urges. There was no cravings. There was none of that. It was just, I'm done with this shit.

Starting point is 01:35:24 I'm not drinking anymore and so this febru this valentine's day will be three years wow since i've had a drink that's amazing man i mean um like i said for the for me the jury is still out on those just i i don't have my arms around it enough but i've had people like yourself credible that have had these just profound experiences um that is an amazing story and and i'm sure that you now know other people that have gone through the same thing that have had similar tons of them wow it's incredible i know a guy really good friend of mine um i get i i'm just gonna say it because it's helping so many fucking people man but

Starting point is 01:36:06 this guy was blown up in afghanistan uh survived the worst he he was in the worst car bomb that i've seen somebody actually live through i'll put it that way um basically turned a toyota land cruiser inside out and he lived through that he drove over uh he got hit by a suicide bomber okay then fast forward then he got shot in the head in a road rage accident uh with a 38 special lights out in the middle of the road still has shrapnel in his brain and so um i'm really good friends with him he was a he was a former green beret worked with him at the agency and and when he got shot in the head i i had gone down to help him help him and his wife um and he's just been struggling ever since. Well, his wife called, uh, called me and my wife one day and she was saying that he is bedridden five to six days a week. Can't get out of bed when he can get out of bed.

Starting point is 01:37:16 His vertigo is so bad. He has to walk around with a cane. He can't go outside without sunglasses on, even on a cloudy day. Cause his light sensitivity is so bad. We haven't had sex in over two years. And I'm thinking, holy fuck, man. And I had told him about this therapy several times. Called him up, connected him with some people, got him down there super fast.

Starting point is 01:37:48 And he fucking walked out of that exact same experience that i did left his cane there as a souvenir for these people he's like i don't need this shit anymore went home fucked his wife doesn't need the sunglasses anymore isn't bedridden this was probably about six months ago still doing great today wow that is incredible yeah yeah that is incredible i mean this is so far outside of the ultimate human um that is that is just incredible though man and you know and i think my intellectual curiosity really wants to dig in i'm gonna go down the rabbit hole on this because, you know, RFK, he posted a statement. I thought it was pretty badass. And he mentioned psychedelics, and I don't know if you saw this, but he has said the FDA's war on public health is about to end.

Starting point is 01:38:37 This includes the aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, i ivermectin hydroxychloroquine vitamins clean food sunshine exercise nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can't be patented by big pharma if you work for the fda and you're part of this corrupt system i have two messages for you number one preserve your records and number two pack your bags damn i love that guy i love that guy too like uh you know because when you have people in in your condition in your friend's condition when we have tens of thousands of you know our our military men and women that are permanently on the chemical hamster wheel,

Starting point is 01:39:26 which is further destroying their life. And there's something that an adult can do to make a sound decision for their own body with a full understanding of the consequences. You know, why are we preventing people from accessing these kinds of therapies when all they have is a persistent vegetative state like what your friend basically found himself in yeah that's not living i mean you're alive but you're not living yeah and um and i'm you know i'm a big fan i remember i remember during covid there was the right to try and um you know this was only for

Starting point is 01:40:04 the people that were in the darkest parts of their life they were in the icu pulmonary fibrosis they didn't have modern medicine had nothing left to offer and things started parachuting in like stem cells and exosomes and um nebulized exosomes and people were coming off of ventilators and respirators and and um and fibrotic tissue in their in their lungs was actually becoming healthy tissue. Things like medicine would have told you could have never happened, you know, nerves remyelinating and, and things like that. And, and I, and, you know, to me, the pace of medicine is, is slow because we have to move at the pace of the regulatory environment, which I totally understand and

Starting point is 01:40:42 embrace because you can't have a, you know, a bunch of charlatans just putting random stuff into human beings. But, um, but it's really, you know, it's really profound to know that it can have that, that big of an effect on somebody's life. Um, I want to sort of pull us out of the hole for a second. Um, I, I know that you've, you know, you gotta be really happy with what, what happened in this,'ve, you know, you got to be really happy with what happened in this last election. But for you and military men and women that are in your group, I mean, what is, what does the future look like for you? What does it mean to you? What is, what does this election mean to you?

Starting point is 01:41:23 As far as the direction of the country and oh but you i mean i could tell you you know when when when they pulled off the win trump and vance i gotta tell you man like i did not realize how much baggage i was running around with on a daily basis were you an angry little smurf oh yeah i mean i've been trying to i just couldn't i couldn't understand like what the fuck we were doing like like how are we going to send the taliban 80 million dollars a week did you know that we were doing that no we were sending the taliban 80 million dollars a week in cash in cash for what great question then we already gave them 83 billion dollars a week a week maybe they needed the fuel week we did wow and and so i started you know sending up flags through my podcast on that

Starting point is 01:42:22 got a lot of politicians involved to try to cut that funding but basically what it was is is we we were sending basically we were funding afghan ngos or uh or non-profits uh without looking into them at all and so the taliban i can't remember the exact number it was like 900 new ngos uh since the like within the first year of the afghan withdrawal and those were all set up by afghans and so i don't want to go too far into that it's it's unbelievable you can have sorry not set up by afghans so leakage like that nobody you know you always hear about the uh you know the five thousand dollar toilet seat that made it through the government but but to think that there's holes that big that could be filled it's crazy man yeah you know and and

Starting point is 01:43:16 and then to see people not want to give it any light a day because it makes their it makes their guy look bad it's like do you have any fucking people are gonna die like 9-11 was a 500 000 budget we're sending them 80 million dollars a week how the fuck do you think this is gonna turn out yeah you know and it was that it was the border it was it's ukraine it's i don't even know why i'm saying was because all this is still going on but yeah it's it's our power grid it's the chinese state it's it's our our our um the hell am i trying to say our uh the supply chain you know do you know about the power grid, how vulnerable that is on water supply? It is unbelievable how, you know, I'm not a doomsdayer,

Starting point is 01:44:11 but I have an off-the-grid place in Colorado that's solar-fed electricity, glacier-fed spring water, well and septic, no bunker. But we've got our own little 50-acre slice paradise out there and I'll tell you what I'm happier out there than I am in this beautiful place in Miami yeah and it's super basic you know I got a freaking you know I've got a propane stove and little fox that comes on to the you know porch every night I get this free-loading deer they eat my flowers every day um and it's just it's amazing at the razors that you just rage around the mountain they got a shooting range on the back of the property and um it's at 10 500 feet when you spend the summer up there and you come back to

Starting point is 01:44:54 miami to sea level you feel like you know yeah you just got limitless pill you know yeah it's my workouts for like four or five weeks are incredible it's like simplicity sleep yeah but it's it's simplicity i was talking actually devin levesque about this and he's got this incredible micro farming concept that he's building these communities around um you know animals that are you know being raised and then um you know, turned into food and raising your own vegetables and, you know, growing your own food and building a community around it and having these membership clubs that are actually built around sort of getting people back in touch with nature and into a community where you're just doing the basics, sauna, cold plunge, you know know conversation um clean whole foods um and in and an environment where

Starting point is 01:45:48 you're back in touch with nature and um i so identify with that because nothing makes me feel better none none of all this fancy equipment i probably got a million and a half dollars worth equipment in this apartment but then put on a 20 pound rucksack and, and go in for literally a four mile walk in the woods. Um, not even kidding. Like I get back from that and I tune into myself and I'm like, holy shit, I feel amazing. I put on a heavy vest and a pair of boots and I grabbed the water bottle and just did this little four mile hike. And I wasn't even trying to like, you know, bust my own balls.

Starting point is 01:46:26 I wasn't trying to push myself so hard to, you know, to, you know, even improve my fitness. It's just walk in the woods with a 20 pound rucksack. And you know, you don't realize how simple that is. And, you know, there's a lot of evidence now that exercise is more impactful than SSRIs for treating, you know, depression. Like they say, you want to, you want to fix somebody's depression, push them in cold

Starting point is 01:46:49 water. Right. Push a sad person in cold water and see if they're still sad when they get out. You know, it's, it's, it's, you know, and it just reminds me so, so much how, you know, just getting back to the basics can be so profound. Can I just, can I say, as we were talking about, you know, what the election meant to me, and I just want to say, you know, that I think part of the reason we got to where we were is because people in this country are scared to tell the truth and to stand up to shit that they don't like i agree and here we are now right we got through that four years which was a fucking disaster and but you know what it was it was people

Starting point is 01:47:37 like you and people like me and rogan and lex friedman and all these podcasters yeah who what actually i can't even say we're able to get around the media a small handful of podcasters who who don't care what people think of them and aren't scared of what might happen for just asking at in Tucker, asking questions, just asking questions, the right questions and standing up against the shit, just, just from talking on a podcast, you know? And, and so, and I think it's podcasts that pulled us out of this because the mainstream media was putting out garbage was still is.

Starting point is 01:48:24 I just saw an announcement today of a reporter that just announced is going to out of this because the mainstream media was putting out garbage i mean was still is i just saw an announcement today of a reporter that just announced he's going to write a hit piece on me did one on rogan one on uh joe dispenza did one on uh like huberman and ag greens and now he's like you know just made the announcement that i'm his next congratulations yeah i know so i feel like i kind of won the lottery i'm like wow somebody actually wants to put my name on that list. Do a whole journalistic. Do it on both of us. But what I want to say is, I mean, we're all still here.

Starting point is 01:48:52 None of us are in prison. None of us are dead. Our businesses are all exploding because we did that. And so when it starts to get tough again, don't be a fucking pussy and speak up and say what's on your mind. And maybe we won't wind up here again because that's what happened. I think that's a very valuable lesson learned. Well, look, this has been amazing. I wanted to make sure that before we close things out that I talk about your, what's a day in the life of like your daily routine um

Starting point is 01:49:27 look like now i mean because the drugs and the alcohol are gone the benzos are gone the adderall's gone all of those things that sort of blurred the lines between daytime nighttime reality and fiction those are those have all moved out of your life you got two beautiful kids in an incredible marriage i hear you speak about your wife and you hear you the changes that you went through when your son was born um so what is it what is it what is a day in the life look like now i mean do you have a cold punch routine do you have a morning routine do you have a exercise routine i have a light exercise routine but uh i think a navy seal would have a pretty intense exercise routine i feel like you exercised enough back in the day that you're good pretty much you banked it but um you put some aid deposits no i do i do a light workout every morning um and then, to be honest with you, Gary, me and my wife are really trying to just figure out our big goal this year was health.

Starting point is 01:50:31 That's awesome. I'm glad to be a part of that journey, man. We have tried to, I mean, we don't know where to look, man. You know what I mean? So we've really, we've cleaned the diet up, started going to a natural, what are they called? Naturopath. Yeah, naturopath doctors. I don't know if you've, I'm not plugging them, but it's helped me a ton. The Yuka app, have you heard of the Yuka app?

Starting point is 01:51:01 It's like this app you put on your phone you can pretty much scan oh yeah i've seen that it tells you what the contents of the grocery are yep yeah i didn't know it was called yuca i have seen that before it's actually pretty good tells you the additives what the additives do to you yeah and so i mean we've just we we found that app we went through our entire kitchen in like one night so good scanning everything throw just about everything out all the shit we thought was healthy turns out as horrible oh it is yeah um so we started doing that um some we're really just trying to clean it up man and figure out i mean it's like every day now i feel like i hear somebody you know dying of cancer or high rates of childhood cancer you know history it's it's it's almost a one and two now so we're trying to clean it up you know and and i think we've done

Starting point is 01:51:51 i know we've done a really good job because i'll taste foods that i don't eat anymore after doing this for six to nine months and i'll taste the fucking chemicals on there yeah no devon and i were literally talking about how your palate changes and like when you eat whole foods you crave whole nutritious foods and um without going too deep down the rabbit hole of the science behind it but we have a hormone in our body released in our gut called glp1 and essentially it's the it's the satiation hormone it tells us that we're full and you know big pharma also makes it um some aglutide you know will go be ozempic but you you you can raise that in response to really whole nutritious foods like what we had in the kitchen before we came in here and highly processed foods you know unnatural flavorings

Starting point is 01:52:39 food additives colors dyes preservatives you chemicals, synthetics, artificial sweeteners, those don't satiate us or our body doesn't recognize them. So the brain doesn't think you've eaten. And so it needs you to eat more because it needs the nutrients. I mean, it's an infinitely complex, but very intelligent organ. And it knows we haven't gotten enough nutrients.

Starting point is 01:53:04 So I mean, you're gonna you're gonna eat again and if you keep eating the same processed shit i mean this is why the obesity pandemic is what it is we want to push down on the obesity with weight loss drugs instead of pushing up on obesity with whole foods um you know you look at videos from, we talked about this too, you know, from, um, you know, uh, JFK, you know, like you, you look at high schools in the, in the fifties and the, in the sixties play, find the fat person. Like they just weren't, they're all fit. They're doing muscle ups and climbing up the walls with their little hand dowels and, and running a mile and, you know, under seven minutes and everybody's

Starting point is 01:53:45 fit and lean. And, um, and you know, now we've just, you know, we're the sickest, fattest, uh, most disease ridden nation in the world of all the civilized nations. It's crazy. But, um, but this was, this is just been incredible, man. I'm, I'm, first of all, I'm very excited and, um, I, I, I take, uh, great pride in, in you trusting me to be a part of that health journey. I'm, I'm, first of all, I'm very excited and I'm, I, I, I take, uh, great pride in, in you trusting me to be a part of that health journey. I'm excited to talk about that on, on your podcast. Um, but before I wind down every podcast, I last, I ask all my guests the same question. Um, and there's no right or wrong answer to this question. And it's, what does it mean to you to be an ultimate human? What does it mean to you to be an ultimate human?

Starting point is 01:54:28 What does it mean to me to be an ultimate human? Because I think you're an ultimate human. I think to be an ultimate human, you have to constantly think about how you're going to leave this world a better place than when you entered it. Be a good husband, be a good father. If you're not either one of those, then find somebody to mentor and make them a better person. Wow. That's amazing, man.

Starting point is 01:54:50 Well, I mean, this has been incredible, Sean. I want to have you back sometime, man. Your journey is astounding. You made a huge impact. And my audience is going to absolutely love this. Thank you for coming on, man. I appreciate it. And as always, that's just science, guys.

The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 113. Shawn Ryan: Beating Addiction, Military Industrial Complex, Trump Presidency Outlook

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