TrueLife - Dr. Luigi Espasiano - A High Dose of Neuroscience

Episode Date: June 19, 2024

One on One Video Call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_US🚨🚨Curious about the future of psychedelics? Imagine if Alan Watts started a secret society with Ram Dass and Hunter S. Thompson… now open the door. Use Promocode TRUELIFE for Get 25% off monthly or 30% off the annual plan For the first yearhttps://www.district216.com/Dr. Luigi EspasianoWelcome to our event, where we delve into the profound intersections of science, technology, and the human experience. Today, we are honored to have Luigi Espasiano, a physician driven by an insatiable curiosity and a deep desire to enhance the human condition. Luigi’s journey traverses diverse realms: from the cutting-edge neuroscience of psychedelics and meditation to the promising fields of longevity medicine, Python, and machine learning.With a career spanning four different healthcare systems—Italy, the UK, Switzerland, and Portugal—and personal experience as a patient in Spain and Portugal, Luigi offers a unique perspective on the challenges faced by both doctors and patients. His dual perspective, coupled with a passion for technology, fuels his mission to improve well-being for healthcare providers and outcomes for patients.Outside his professional endeavors, Luigi finds solace in trail running, archery, and exploring obscure books. He often contemplates the future, projecting himself 50 years ahead to ponder the essential question: what truly matters? Guided by the wisdom of Yoda’s words, “Do. Or do not. There is no try,” Luigi embodies a commitment to action and impact. Today, he joins us to share his insights and vision for a better tomorrow.http://linkedin.com/in/luigiespasiano One on One Video call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_USCheck out our YouTube:https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPzfOaFtA1hF8UhnuvOQnTgKcIYPI9Ni9&si=Jgg9ATGwzhzdmjkg

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The one and only Dr. Luigi Espaciano. And I want to welcome everybody here because we are about to delve into the profound intersections of science, technology, and the human experience. Today we are honored to have Dr. Luigi Espaciano, a physician driven by an insatiable curiosity and a deep desire to enhance the human condition. Dr. Luigi's journey traverses diverse realms from the cutting-edge neuroscience of psychedelics and meditation to the promising fields of longevity medicine, python, and machine learning. With a career spanning four different health care systems, Italy, the UK, Switzerland, and Portugal, and personal experience as a patient in Spain in Portugal, Dr. Luigi offers a unique perspective on the challenges faced by both doctors and patients, his dual process.

perspective coupled with a passion for technology fuels his mission to improve well-being for health care providers and outcomes for patients. Outside his professional endeavors, he finds solace in trail running, archery, and exploring obscure books. He often contemplates the future, projecting himself 50 years ahead to ponder the essential question, what truly matters? Guided by the wisdom of Yoda's words, do or do not, there is no try. Dr. Luigi embodies a commitment to action and impact. Today he joins us to share his insights and vision for a better tomorrow. Dr. Espaciano, thank you for being here today. How are you? It's a pleasure, man. Thank you for the introduction. I'm excited.

Yeah, me too. It's such a fascinating time to be alive. And I often want to remind people that there's so much happening right now on this cutting edge of healthcare, medicine, longevity, AI, psychedelics, so much going on, man. I'm not. I'm not. even sure where to start. Maybe you can give us a little bit of background or where do you want to start at. Yeah, sure. Yeah, it's definitely exciting times. I totally agree. And yeah, I feel like, you know, there has been in my journey as a physician, I've been very, you know, I feel very fortunate, very lucky that, you know, I feel very curious. And I'm constantly studying. And many people, you know, I'd say medicine is a long path, right?

It takes over 10 years to become, you know, to become, you know, fully functioning doctors, so to speak. But for me, since graduation is where university actually began. And that's quite interesting because, you know, after medicine, then I started to get interested in neuroscience of psychedelics. I started studying meditation. And I started studying Python. and I was interested in machine learning.

And I just thought of curiosity really, right? So there was in many ways, yeah, I guess curiosity was the biggest drive, just a desire to understand and a desire to help as well, right? So, you know, medicine has become in many ways very mechanistic. And has become very specialized, which has trade-offs, right, for in a way it's really good you want to you want to have the best of the best in certain when you have certain disease you want to have the best of the best somebody who understands that specific thing better than everybody else but it has you know the trade-off is that sometimes

you know certain problems you kind of lose you know you lose the forest for the trees a little bit so since you know my desire was to keep keep an eye on the forest always basically not to forget that. So yeah. Yeah. It's, let me ask you this question. I see sometimes this thing that comes up in the world of psychedelics and you see it now and you saw it in the last sort of turning and I'm curious if you've seen it on your journey. But there seems to be an issue when the person providing the medicine thinks they are the medicine. Like at least in psychedelics, you see people to kind to kind of get this complex or something like that. Is that like, first off, why do you think that

is and second off is that something that happens in the world of modern medicine as well that's a great question actually um i haven't seen i haven't seen that um it's it's very it's very um particular to psychedelics i think or at least as far as my as far as my um you know experience goes it's it's very particular to psychedelics that people that people um design themselves as medicine men, medicine woman. Some people call themselves shamans. And I haven't seen this in medicine, like traditional kind of, I would say, Western medicine, so to speak. Although there are some, you know, now that you ask me this question, there are some

similarities, right? So some doctors say, I have been healing you, right? Some Western doctors. Yeah. I healed these patients from these. and from that. So I think it's a matter of layers, I would say, like, if you go deeper into the understanding, at least this is my, this is personal, you know, right, but in my understanding of how psychedelics work, or at least the way I approach them, right? The layer one is I bring

the medicine. A layer two is that I'm a vessel for the medicine. Layer three, this person was ready for the medicine, so the medicine gets in touch with her or him, and the healing somehow happens. And there are probably many more layers to this, but you get the idea, right? So I don't feel in my approach, I never saw myself as a, I also felt a little bit, it's a little bit challenging for me when people define themselves in that way, medicine man or medicine woman, because I feel like there is a kind of a bold. borrowing from traditional and ancestral practices.

And these people are, I think, you know, I was very fortunate to have met some healers who I have massive respect for. But these are people that were born in these traditions and had been doing this work for, you know, for decades and decades. And they have done a very, very special training. I don't want to say that a Westerner can't achieve

that level of insight into those, you know, into those medicines. But it's way beyond what most people think. Yeah. It's not a few years or it's not taking mushrooms 10 times. It's not attending a couple of retreat. It's so much more, right? So there is definitely, I feel very skeptical when I hear people defining themselves in that way.

but because I have very, I would say, have a very rational mind. And while I'm super open-minded, and that is the trade of, you know, when you start, when you start experimenting with psychedelics, the mind definitely, you know, kind of expands and opens up. But I feel it's also very important to keep an incredibly, even more so analytical and rational approach because these tools are powerful. Yeah. And so even more so you want to keep your eyes open because fooling oneself is easy.

And so I like this sentence. I read it from Richard Feynman. He's quote like fooling yourself is the easiest thing that can happen. It's so easy to fool oneself. So you have to be always extra cautious. And that goes with psychedelics. It actually goes with any spiritual practice. it goes with meditation too.

Psychedelics is probably more dangerous in that regard because it's just a faster way to access certain states. And so I feel that the risk of getting kind of being misled and thinking, oh, I am the shaman, or I am the medicine, or I am the healer, or I am, you know, the visionary here. The risk there is definitely. higher probably than with meditation just because of the nature of the practice meditation in many ways it's a slower it's kind of a slower more consistent path

which along the way the practitioner has probably more time to contemplate and to witness the changes that happen within the mind so yeah probably I would say that doesn't make sense to you these two

yeah I would say there are there are more risks with psychedelics I hope I gave you a very long perspective on your question. Yeah, I love it. That's my feeling with that, you know, people defining themselves like healers somehow. Yeah, although I wouldn't want to, you know, just to be clear, as I said, I don't want to, I don't want to rule out that some people have there is enormous healing potential to them, especially if they embody presence. Yeah. but that is rare, at least in my experience so far, you know,

these people are still rare, but they are there and they are medicine. You know, when you sit around them, you can feel the power of their presence. You can feel their, you know, their kind of their well-being radiates around them. And so not even psychedelics are needed, you know, just sitting around them and having a chat. And it happens to us as well when we are in a very good space, we radiate healing in a way. so yeah it's that's a fascinating concept to think of well-being being contagious hmm why not it is very yeah very both sides you know well-being and you know ill-being in a way right yeah I'm sure everybody notices how other people's moods can be

contagious in good for the good and the bad For sure. Yeah. Now, it's interesting, too, when we start talking about the way in which we, we as a society and different traditions perform the act of trying to help someone, you know, it seems in Western medicine, we, because we value the rational, because we value the ideas that, yes, you can fool yourself and you must be careful, sometimes I feel like we go overboard and like, okay, if we can't measure it, let's just throw it out. But there are a lot of subjective things out there that do probably add value to monitor someone's health. I know that like in the 50s and 60s, they had questionnaires for people that were in trying psychedelics for the first time. And they would ask the family, like, is your husband less of an asshole? You know, and like these sort of subjective questions that like, okay, we don't need that.

But maybe we do need to figure out a way to merge this idea of subjectivity and objectivity together to have a more holistic. healing process. Yeah, that's a good point. I think that the challenge with, I would say the challenge with Western medicine and in general, Western science is that there is an obsession with measuring. If you can't measure it, then for most scientists, that wouldn't be probably worth investigating. And I think there is a purpose in that, there is a meaning in that because there are so many charlatans out there as well. And so unless you, you know, the thing, again, it's a matter of trade-offs. Like, how much do you lose versus how much do you gain when you cut out certain things, you know? Like, in a way, you're cutting out a lot of charlatans and a lot of, you know, things that are just just woo, right?

On the other hand, you're also cutting out a lot of very interesting phenomena. And there is actually a branch of philosophy called phenomenology, right? And this is a very interesting branch of philosophy, whereby it's actually being applied in psychedelics research. I know for sure that a friend Christopher Timmerman, who is the head of DMT research at Imperial. I remember when I was working there, he was using this technique called microphenomenology to gain a better, as objective as possible understanding of what happens when people are in the DMT experience. And this is a very, very special and interesting technique for interviewing, like an interviewing method, basically, which is, you know, which, which, which,

is very helpful in elucidating the structure of the experience with as little kind of, as little objectivity, as little subjectivity as possible. Now, how far? Can you go with that? I don't know, but definitely quite far. And I was very intrigued. I was familiar with this current with phenomenology, but I had never seen it applied. in, you know, interviewing somebody who was in an altered state. So I was incredibly intrigued. I actually suggest if you haven't already speaking with Chris about this technique and with actually the author of this methodology,

I can't remember her names, a French woman, very interesting, that came up with this technique from studying the Chilean scientists, Maturana and Varela from amazing scientists from the 20th century, amazing neuroscientists from Chile, who were some pioneers in bringing Western science and Eastern science together into a dialogue. And there's actually an amazing book now that comes to mind about dreaming. It's called Dreaming, Sleeping, Dreaming and Dying from Varela, amazing book, Dialogues with Dalai Lama in a kind of a,

five, six-day seminar. It's a meeting of these two cultures. It's an amazing book. And phenomenology is one way to address that problem of subjective, objective, you know, how do you, you know, because to be regarded as a scientist, you know, and for psychedelics, this is important. And Imperial has done it amazing, an amazing job, John Hopkins, you know, these are incredible universities, amazing researchers.

They had to figure out a way to kind of address this challenge, right? And I think phenomenology is one way to gain a better understanding without being overly subjective, right? Having a high-quality view of what happens within those experiences. But overall, yeah, the tension is there. You know, if you can't measure it, then, you know, you can't compute it, you can't prove it. and then you can't do science with it, you know? The challenge is definitely there, and, you know, so it's an interesting problem. It is an interesting problem, especially when you start looking at something like the placebo.

Like, you know, if a charlatan, you know, it's such an interesting question, and I can understand the power and the gravity behind it. On some level, that particular issue excites me because I feel like we are moving into a world where we are finally beginning to communicate meaning to each other. And these sort of issues are at the root of it. Like, how can we really have a meaningful dialogue if we don't thoroughly understand what each one of us is talking about? And I think science and, like you said, the meaning of these two minds, this science and spirituality on some level are coming together in this double helix type shape of relationship to show us this is the way. Like it's exciting.

It's exciting to be alive and seeing this stuff happen. right? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the meeting of science and spirituality has definitely begun to unfold early in last century. I remember one of the first books I've read, and I was in my like, I was 19 years old. It's like very, very naive, but this book had an impact on me by Frithio Kappa. It was called the Tao, the Tao physics or the Tao physics. Or the Tao physics. or something like that. I think that was the name. And this guy who had interviewed people like Stan Groff

and Ilya Prigogin and amazing scientists of the time came up with this book trying to kind of make sense of, you know, kind of build a bridge. It's a very narrative style type of book. But the idea is that there is pretty much, there are many intersections between, the discoveries in hard science is like physics from past century and many, many insights from Eastern traditions like Buddhism, for example. That's a pretty big one.

And there's a whole line that I was fascinated. There is this psychologist, Anil Seth, Anil Seth, and Thomas Metzinger, philosopher from Germany, who have been writing about the absence of self and, there is actually a book which is not by those two authors. It's called No Self, No Problem. This whole currents of Western science and Western neuroscience that kind of coming to very similar conclusions to the one to which the Buddha reached some years ago.

And I feel that this bridge has begun to be built since, you know, early last, in last century with the latest quantum physics understanding and discoveries, right? So I feel the bridge is there. For me, you know, without getting overly philosophical, I would say for me it's been somehow very intuitive understanding that there is something ungraspable in the nature of reality, in the nature of the mind. There is something, I want to be careful with the words because it's easy to be misled,

but there is something mysterious that one perceives if you sit in silence or there are some moments where things can get a little messy in life and there are these moments where you're like, oh, there is a moment of presence, right, which is magical and that takes you beyond. And at the same time, the understandings of physics, and I'm an amateur student, but my understanding of physics is how, you know, as a segue to what we said before, like the indetermination principle and how measuring reality affects reality. Yes. This was very interesting. You know, when I read the book from, that was, I think, was from high. Eisenberg that he wrote my vision, my vision of the world.

I think it's from Heisenberg or Schrodinger, I can't, probably Schrodinger, but one of those two authors describing exactly, you know, this kind of question, like philosophy goes back into the equation and spirituality in that it's more akin to spirituality than philosophy goes back into the equation. But with a much more, with a much more scientific approach, which I love, You know, I love the, I love a scientific approach to spirituality. And that's why probably my, the most interesting philosophy for me is Buddhism, right? Very experimental approach to the mind and to healing, I would say.

That's an awesome answer. I, it brings up so many thoughts in my mind. The first is this idea of when I, when I, I'm a big fan of Merseille-Iliad, the terror before the sacred. And, you know, that feeling of just like being in awe of something so beautiful, you want to pee your pants on some level. You know what I mean? Like, you're frightened, but it's so beautiful. And that leads me to the bridge of observation, which is what seems to happen in a high dose or an alter state of awareness or a psychedelic experience is that you are observing yourself in a way you haven't before. And that seems to be what allows you to change those

behaviors, whether it's abuse or, you know, destructive behavior. But doesn't it seem like that? Those particular states allow you to observe yourself the same way Schrodinger would observe the cat or the same way that model is, right? Like that's a fascinating concept to think about. Observing yourself changes your behavior. Yeah. That's like, let me think about that because somehow, somehow there is a tension.

between observing oneself, let's say in a psychedelic experience where you take a moderate, you know, a dose that is high enough for you. Right. Well said. Yeah, a dose that is high enough for you, right? Yes, it's well said. For some people, the heroic dose wouldn't be enough. I've seen people of five, six grams of mushrooms like not moving, you know, not being affected. I was quite curious.

but I'd say that self-observation is definitely an important aspect, but probably somehow comes more into integration phase. You know, during those peak experience, it's sometimes just massive chaos. It's very, very difficult to make sense of stuff, and that's why some people have a challenging time, because there is this desire to grasp, this desire to understand, the desire to make sense, which are useful functions, but they're functions of the minds, which within those states, you know, either with the mushrooms or with any other plants, ayahuasca,

the mind is somehow, I wouldn't say disintegrated, but something very similar. It works in a very, very non-linear way. And so, Dris, I'll be honest with you, I have no clue what happens. Like, I can give you some, you know, there are some really amazing theories about, or, you know, hypotheses about what happens, like the most, the most interesting one in my, in my opinion. And one of the most fascinating is the anthropic brain theory by Robin Carteris and Carl Friston, mostly Robin, I think, this idea that on a high dose of a psychedelic, you know, basically the amount of entropy in the brain, so to speak, and you can measure that in certain ways, it's so high that the brain gets somehow destructured.

And so there is a possibility for revisiting patterns of thoughts, patterns of thinking. There is an opening up of opportunity, so to speak. And this is what seems to, this is one possible kind of hypothesis for what happens at the brain level. but there is something magical about people ingesting a plant and there is an opportunity to change 10, 15, 20 years old belief systems. Now, there is a challenge there and that many people go into these journeys with very, very high expectations. and this can be a problem because, you know, if you think, if you're expecting a magic pill, then

for some people, it happens and that's the thing, you know, for some people, you know, looking at, you know, even if you look in Jones Hopkins studies, they're saying, oh, these were rated amongst the top five most meaningful experiences of some of our participant's life. And that's a very, that's a very big statement. And it has been very, you know, in the media has gone all over the place. So people go into those experiences and they're like, oh, this is going to change my life forever. And that is the approach that people have with, oh, look, you have eye cholesterol or high triglycerides. Or there you go, take a statin or, you know, just take this peel or that pill and that will do it for you.

That's not the case. You know, that's not the case. Those pills can help you out for sure, and they do. But you have to do the work, you know, and there is no way out. Nothing is going to change your brain for you, not even the most potent molecule like 5MEODMT or DMT or or mescaline. None of those things is going to change the brain for you. They are going to open up a window of opportunity.

As far as I understand it, and the window of opportunity could be very big so that it's very hard not to walk through it. but you still have to do the work, right? So it doesn't happen automatically. You know, that's in my experience, it's been a pretty common misunderstanding. All right, let's just go to the retreat five days. And then, you know, I have entertained depressive thoughts.

I had a depressive attitude. I had a, I've been complaining on my life. I've been blaming others all my life. And then all of a sudden in five days, I experienced this insight and understanding. and I think everything, you know, it's done, it's gone. I don't have to do any more work. How can you change 30, 40, 50 years of patterns within a few days?

It's very rare. The probabilities are low. Yeah. Yeah. So that was, that's a common, common issue with psychedelics. And, you know, that's a very long answer to your, you know, like looking at yourself, looking at yourself from a perspective. But I think it's very important because it hurts people

when they go in with expectations and the expectations are not met for change. Yeah. I heard a great quote that says high expectations make poor travel companions. Yeah. Yeah. They make poor life overall. Totally. Very poor.

life, yeah, yeah. I was talking with Dr. Alexander. He's going to kill me. I forgot his last name, but he just recently. Oh, you spoke with Alexander Lebedev. Yes, thank you very much. He's a friend of mine. I love that guy.

Him and I had a really cool discussion, and we were talking about just different theories, and we were balancing this idea back and forth about, and I'd love to get your opinion on this. And we're just pure speculation on my part, but the idea that, the difficult trip is neuroplasticity happening in real time. Like rewiring that negative experience is what manifests the difficult part of the trip are people freaking out. Like changing that pattern rapidly.

You know what I mean? Like what do you think about that? Is that possible? Is that possible? Yeah, that's a good way to. That's definitely a good perspective on that. Your plasticity happening real time. I like that.

I just bow. I think it's really. Yeah, I think it's realistic. It does happen real time, right? Right. It's about that neuroplasticity is, it happens real time, but then you have, you want to consolidate it. But definitely the bad, you know, the so-called bad trip is this massive, massive restructuring of the brain happening. And you're like, imagine you have workers trying to, you know, trying to make this change.

And there's a part of you that is like, oh, no, no, no. get away, you know, just get off, leave it like that. You know, there is kind of a battle. The terrace coming there. Remember, right. Yeah, you're like, man, I don't want this to happen. And then when you're two hours in and we realize that, oh, fuck, this is, I need to, I need to release these stuff.

And people coming in and, you know, and it happened to me like so many times. And I'm like, I'm going into something and I, let's speak about myself. I'm going into something. and with this desire to release certain things, with the desire to let go of certain habits, certain addictive tendencies, certain traits. I go into the experience and I'm like, oh, fuck, I did it again. Now I have to deal with this, you know, and it's painful.

It's painful, man, it's so painful. And that's for everyone like that. That's why, like, one of the best ways, to prepare, I would say, is to put yourself in those situations in advance, in situations of distress. And I was thinking about this just the, you know, just a few, I think a few weeks back. I was thinking, I was doing this, I was doing this kind of training called sprintite training. Now, now this seems unrelated, but I'm going to, I'm going to, you know, let's hear it. But the sprintight training is basically, has been shown, is, you know, this training where you have this,

you have this interval training where you do like 30 seconds, high intensity like zone four, zone five training super hard. You go super hard, harder you can. It's like a sprint, right? Yeah. And then you stop for 90 seconds.

And then you do that for eight times. So eight sprints super hard. And you go into the high, you know, on the first two, three, if you're relatively fit, it's all right. Then the fourth sprint starts to get serious. The seventh eighth sprint is going to be like, you're going to be breathless.

and it's going to feel like you're dying. And I thought to myself, wow, this is, this feels a little bit like a big psychedelic experience where shit hits the fun. Excuse me for the word. Yeah, yeah, I love it. And, you know, I'm like, wow, this is interesting. I could really, you know, because I'm always looking for ways to kind of, how can I help people prepare for those kind of experiences and, you know, how can I help them have the

right set of tools to embark on those journeys? and have the most productive experience that they can. And I was so fascinated by this. I'm like, how about putting yourself in a situation where you're training your physical body to the extent that it feels, of course, within the limits of safety, right? Of course. Without being stupid.

Of course. But, you know, training zone four, zone five, like going into the darkness alone sometimes in the night and meditating, one can kind of witness what happens to the mind and the body, and you can get some training for when, you know, if you do psychedelics once or twice, it may never happen. For some people, they do it, you know, even a dozen times,

and it never happens. But for many people, the challenging moments does come, you know, a moment where you have to really kind of have faith that things are going to work out. You know, you have people around assisting you, but then you have to do it yourself and you have to like, okay, that's it, right? And how do you come to these moments in the most, in the best possible way? And, you know, meditation is incredibly helpful, but even more helpful. And here's the nuance.

Meditating in situations where you feel scared. Like there is a practice that Buddhist monks do, which is meditating in monastery, in cemeteries. So it's like a dead body meditation. You can do it actually in a cemetery or you could actually do it in your mind where you envision the body. Could be your body,

could be anybody's body in the faces of decomposition. For some people, that can be very scary. For other people, the way to train the minds for these moments could be doing zone four, zone five training consistently. in this place where you feel breathless and you learn to tune down your nervous system in these moments of stress.

That is very, very helpful in my experience to kind of because many people say you go into the experience and you just have to let go. All right, I know. How do I do it? This is the problem. Nobody tells you how to do it. You know, it's like you have to let go. Okay. What does that mean, right? Yeah, like, chis and you're like, ah, I have to let go. How do I do it? The only thing we know how to do is to cling. Yeah.

The thing we know how to do the best. So, yeah, I'd say there's two very useful tips to integrate into the preparation kind of journey. And, yeah, learning to let go in practice, not just in theory. And learning to manage a little bit also the stress when it comes in those experiences. Yeah, it's really well said. And I like the reference to the Buddhist monk in that mindset. And it brings up some of the questions that we've got a few people in the chat that have a few questions for us here. First off, Clint Kyle's incredible individual, the psychedelic Christian podcast.

He says, I have often seen people tremble, cry, hyperventilate, et cetera, when they convert to Christianity. Is that experience a bad trip? Any thoughts on that one, doctor? That's an interesting one. You know, I'm very cautious when, you know, as I said before, I'm very cautious with using the term bad trip. Right. Because for me, a bad trip is a badly managed trip, both from the side of whoever is facilitating or assisting or holding space. and also badly managed from the perspective of who is doing the work.

That could be a bad trip. And for bad trip, I mean, you don't understand dosing rights. You're not in the right context. I see Clint saying, I don't believe so. So, yeah, just let me finish the concept. But the idea is that when you manage your expectation incorrectly, when you're not in a safe place, where you're not surrounded by people who understand what you're going through,

that can end up in a bad trip. That for me is a bad trip. Things like crying, hyperventilating. I've seen it happening in many people going through very strong processes or just going through their own processes. And not necessarily, I would say that's a bad trip, actually. No, actually not. It really depends.

but there is no generality, but yeah, I wouldn't say so. Yeah. It's, it's, do you, what do you think about the, the term or the, the idea that people throw around that there's no such thing as a bad trip? Yeah, as I said, I think, I think there, I think there is, there is a way to make it, to make it, like, you know, there is a way to do it wrong. Right. So to speak, although, right, I mean, again, here just layers, right?

There are layers. Yeah, of course. For some people doing it wrong in the first place leads to understanding, which then in turn leads to doing it right in the next phase, right? So in a way, I don't want to go as far as saying there's no right or wrong because I think there is a line and I think people should be, you know, mindful of their sensitivity to plants. They should be mindful of their own psychological condition.

That should be mindful of, you know, their diets. their medication use, their past psychological history. So there are many things that people should be paying attention to. You know, this is no joke. These are very, these are very powerful tools. Like, would you ever give somebody who just got his driving license a Ferrari? And they're like, okay, just go around and have fun. First time you drive, I put your Ferrari in your hand.

Right. Maybe nothing happens. But the likelihood that things go wrong is quite high. This is what I'm saying. It's all about probabilities, basically. I know this is not, like, many people want to have clear-cut answers. Right. But oftentimes, you know, if I have to be like honest, it's mostly probabilities, right,

in terms of what is dangerous. But if you take all the precautions and you do the preparation rights, and you get assistance from people who have done the work and who have experience, I think it's very safe, you know, for most people can be, it's a very safe, it's a very safe journey for most people. There are exceptions, but mushrooms are very safe, for example. Now, there are nuances with other substances, but mushrooms are safe. Yeah, I think the LD50 is like your body weight.

Yeah. Way too much of those. Of course, this is like the physiological risks for, from my life. of course the the psychological risks are true and they you know they they come with a much lower dose yeah if if people is um you know i'm for i'm for being cautious for the first time getting to know getting to know the plants right it's like you know i always see uh i i always like to see those plants as elders some people see the mushrooms as ninos they call it you know youngsters, for me, they're mostly elders, people that you want to have respect for.

This is a metaphoric way of describing an attitude, right? But the attitude is the one of respect. Would you, would you hug the Imlai as, you know, barefoot? Yeah, we moved it, but there are many, many years of preparation. You know, this guy didn't just go up there all of a sudden. He went to a process. For most of us, we need to prepare and we need to prepare properly. Yeah, it's like a dojo

Like you wouldn't walk in Until the sense I think I could take you out Let me show you doing this thing wrong This is the wrong way Exactly yeah He would get you in the head Like if you like it Go out man

You know If we move back Just for a moment To this idea of interval training And we think about the way In which you can train your body With this type of training or exercise And you can get into a state

Of physical fitness Where you can really do incredible things with your body. It sounds to me it's similar in the psychedelic state. Once you become familiar with the environment, once you begin understanding that not to, you know, once you get past the death by astonishment stage, you can start looking around a little bit and saying,

whoa, you know what? There was this period in this deep psychedelic trip where I relived four lifetimes and I saw all the bad decisions, but I saw how they played out. I wonder if I could do that without that. You know, maybe you can't get to that exact same deeply imaginative visual place, but maybe you can get close. Maybe you can start walking down that path.

Do you think there's something to be said about the same way we train our bodies through exercise that prolonged use of perhaps psychedelic substances allow us to train our brain in new ways and see the world differently? Yeah, yeah, I totally think so. I was, you know, I'm a big fan of David Goggins, which probably many, you know, like half of the US, probably at this point. But I was listening to one of his podcasts and he was talking about this idea of mental zones as a kind of the counterpart of cardiac zones. and I really, really like that, I really like that concept. I really, really like it.

And I think psychedelics are in a way what sprint training is to the body. Psychedics are to the mental zones. In certain instances within certain moments, those plants take you to mental zone five. Yeah. the toughest, most challenging time. And there is a learning there is something to be learned. Like how do you handle those tough mental zones? You know, this is actually a great question.

This is a segue to what we were saying before about spring training. How do you handle when your body goes into kind of these really, really vital flight mode where you have zone 5, zone 4, 180 bits per minute, your heart is pumping, your system is all about telling you, like, you need to stop whatever you're doing. We need to stop right now because I'm freaking out. And the mind starts telling you those kind of things. And just so as the body is into these cardiac zones,

the mind starts going to these mental zones. And so the training is, how do you tune down the volume? You know, how do you reduce, you know, you go down the zones, basically while you're in that state. That's a trick, you know? Like that's a trick. You know, learning about dealing with this very, very tough physical or mental moments. I think psychedelics are amazing teachers for this kind of work.

Because life, you know, life is filled with moments of challenges, you know. Losing somebody you love, not getting something you want. so many challenges all over the place and that can be opportunities and I feel the way I approach it and I like to suggest it to people who ask

is like see it as a training see it as an opportunity for understanding how to deal with your minds when things get when things get messy in life right so whatever you learn

within the ceremonies within the retreats about your mind and body, you can apply it in life. That is the deal. Unless you do that, it's like, you know,

I had this experience with meditation retreats. I've been doing, I've been doing retreats for many years. And I was very excited when I found out about the PASana from Goenka, right? I went to one of those retreats 10 years ago, and they're very intensive and, you know,

very discipline oriented. So you sit for 10 hours. a day for many for 10 days in a row silence and stuff and it was amazing the mind gets into very interesting states but the point after after a couple of those retreats i was like i can't bring this to my life you know i can't bring this to my day to day like how come you know what's what's the issue there is am i doing something wrong here like am i practicing incorrectly and so that also started to let me to the question of how do i bring the insights from

de-meditation practice, these psychedelic, you know, journeys into my life. Because otherwise there is no purpose. Why would you go through such hardship? Because psychedelics are, can be very hard to deal with ayahuasca, you know, masculine, mushrooms.

You know, most often, they lead you to uncomfortable places. just so with meditation. It's just a little less, it's just a bit more gradual with meditation, but eventually it leads you to the same place. So for me, the question has always been, how can I use those things into my life

to become a better human being, really? That's one of the biggest teachings of plants that I'm getting so far, right? So it's like getting into mental zones and dealing with them. Yeah, I love it. I see this, I believe we're on this precipice of a next step of moving out of the medical container. And I can hear it in this conversation where we're thinking, how do we use these particular substances or entheogens or psychedelics for enhancement instead of healing?

Maybe the first stage is healing. But when we start layering them, hey, let's use it on a low dose with, you know, the Goggin style. Or let's stack it with something like HGH. You know, like let's start figuring out ways to improve the human condition instead of keeping it contained in this medical container. And I almost feel like there's a barrier around it. Like there's a certain force that's like, hey, this isn't for human enhancement. only for healing. Like, do you ever get that vibe?

Maybe it's just the people I'm talking to or maybe it's the state that I'm in. But I feel like we're pushing up against this boundary. Like, let's get this thing out and enhance people. Like instead of just using it for healing, can it be a bigger tool for enhancement? Yeah, that's a great leads. I feel like that's a natural consequence. Yeah. For me, that's kind of the natural consequence of using.

using techniques you know the same can be said you know there is a lot of stigma around psychedelics still despite you know and the decision from the committee like recent committee on MDMA it's still kind of resonates a little bit on that you know the criticism was

yeah I'm not sure but you know not going into that but there is still stigma around it and even if you talk about yoga or about you know meditation you know why do why do we want to practice why do we want to meditate why do people get interested in yoga or meditation in the first place suffering everybody gets into that most people i haven't meant anyone who has got into meditation or yoga or psychedelics just for fun most people there is something deeper to it. They're looking for healing.

They're looking for a release of suffering from their life, from their mind. They can take it anymore and they don't know what else to do. Alcohol doesn't do it. Drugs don't do it. So what do you do? And so the first stage is definitely healing.

And probably healing never ends. I don't know. I haven't gotten there. Maybe. But yeah, for me, one challenge that I had with many retreats I've attended, for meditation as well, I want to be, you know, I want to be as general as I can because I want to, I want to convey this idea that psychedelics or intergens are just tools like meditation and yoga. There's a lot of hype around those things, but these are tools.

Not everybody needs them. and actually there is a really cool way in which Don Juan in Journey to Xlan or one of the Castaneda's books, which I'm sure many of your listeners are familiar with. There is a point where Don Juan says to Castaneda, man, I just had to give you masculine because you're so dumb. You just don't get it. You don't understand, so I have to give you mesquine, but you don't need it. You know, some students I have, some disciples I have, apprentice I have, they don't need masculine.

They get it. So they use dreams. They use, you know, hunting power as he calls it. You know, some people don't need, don't need psychedelics. So to understand and to achieve, you know, to get into presence and to get free from the burden of, you know, thought patterns, right? So, yeah, I feel, I feel, yeah, I feel those tools, those tools all point to the same place somehow. You know, so a place beyond suffering.

But then the immediate next step is how do I, you know, once you're in a pretty good place, right? there is no major issues, no major traumas. Then you start exploring because you're curious. Like, what's going on with the mind in those instances? You know, exploring existential questions becomes more of the driver. At least that was for me, and I've seen many people. Like, for me, it was absolutely incredible to witness this trend. transformation and interest and curiosity in all domains of science, all domains of philosophy, all domains.

You know, I'm like, you know, I've seen it happening in so many people that get interested in physics, in philosophy, in mathematics, in computer science, in neuroscience, just out of the desire to understand and to inquire about the mind and about reality. So that is, yeah, for me, that is the logical, you know, next step. And if I am to say, what is the next step after that? That is the interesting question because it is so easy to kind of get a little bit trapped into those kind of wanderings of the minds. And in the curiosity is an amazing, you know, is an amazing force. but can lead you astray, I think. It definitely has done for me. Like exploring, exploring, exploring,

and then you have this seeker, seeker, I don't want to say complex, but, you know, people seeking and seeking and seeking and seeking. I've definitely been there. I'm definitely there many times, like seeking, but what? You know, just exploring, exploring to avoid stillness, to avoid just being present. So this is definitely a challenge I find myself confronted with at the place where I met.

Yeah. It blows like it almost sounds. That's the first time I've ever heard curiosity sort of in conjunction with adrenaline. You know, people that have like adrenaline junkies. Like once they get that adrenaline rush, they want it again. Same is true with curiosity. I never thought about it like that. But that's so true.

Like you can't get so curious that you're just, I'm over here. Now I'm over here. What is this thing? What is this thing? You know. Yeah, it's a massive. The thing with curiosity is that it's a virtuous, you know, attitude to have. Yeah.

I think, right? I love it. I feel genuinely curious about many areas of science and life. And it's a virtuous thing. It's acclaimed by society. and but it's also feeding into reward system. You're learning new things. You're discovering new things.

And in a way, this is natural. We expand. This is natural. But I feel at least, yeah, I felt the, I felt the risks of getting lost in curiosity. You know, especially listen. I listen a lot to Eckhart. one of my favorite teachers. I really, really love him.

And he's, you know, he's in one of his retreats. He does points. He actually made me think about this when he talked about these aspects of, I think I heard him talking about this aspect of curiosity and how one, you know, curiosity is one virtuous way of not being still somewhere and just being content with whatever you have. So that was very very. It was interesting for me to contemplates for sure.

Yeah, that is. Clint Carl's comes in with a pretty, this is pretty funny. Maybe we need special clinics that offer meditation and yoga by prescription only. Love it, so thank you. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, maybe, maybe yes, maybe yes. There's definitely special clinics that offer, I thought about it often, you know, how to combine that in a, you know,

in a kind of a new, new type of clinic, right? New type of clinic that offers those kind of techniques for mental health. And for sure, many people are really doing this. Yeah. The wellness center, I could see taking place, taking the place at the gym,

or maybe a wellness center inside a gym. You know, like those two things do go hand in hand together. you could probably get a lot done if you were able to prepare yourself in the proper state of mind with a light. I bet you a microdosing regimen and a workout regimen stacked with like HGH or some sort of something like that. I bet you would crush it. You'd crush it. You know, obviously, this is all hypothetical. But, you know, like those two things together, I bet you could start producing some.

I've seen it happening. I've seen it. It's now happening in the U.S. where they're combining clinics. like I would say is more kind of this longevity type of with functional gyms. You know, you have this field of medicine super interesting, which have been studying this functional approach to medicine, functional medicine. You have many, you know, I think it was, there are many exponents in the U.S., many U.S.

physicians, you know, Peter Atia, amazing, absolute inspiration, Mark Hyman. You know, there are many of those into functional medicine. And I've read this idea, this concept, which is popping up quite, I think it's popping up quite a bit in the US with this clinics where you can get your blood work, you know, your lab work done. And you can tailor your, you know, exercise regime to your own, to your own metabolism and lab work. So pretty interesting, right? It's happening. And probably a similar trends with mental health, you know, functional mental health where you can kind of tailor, tailor your, you know, tailor your, you know, tailor your, you know, your exercise to your own personality traits, psychology traits,

to your own lab work as well. There is a relationship there too. And I'm not sure how I see like microdosing and workout, that's super personal. That would be interesting to invest in. I think microdosing, for many people I, you know, many of the people I know and I've been working with, it gets them into more contemplative state. So I would be curious, I have never tried microdosing while going to gym, actually. It could be interesting.

Yeah. Microusing an exercise. I think that, you know, if, and you might as well throw some lions main in there too, but for me, and this is all speculative, I don't have any research, but when I, when I take, my, my dosing proxie, program will be like maybe five or seven grams once a month, and then I follow that up every three days with a microdose. But I'm constantly taking Lionsman, like three grams of Lionsman every other day.

But I can really feel the difference when I don't take Lionsman in a microdose versus taking lionsman in microdosing. And I think that there's some sort of, it's like a vasodilator on some level, because I can really feel the tingling in my hands. I can really feel the blood flowing on that level. And I think that there's something to be said about microdosing and then understanding your motivation of why you want to go to the gym. Like all those things on a psychological and philosophical level, they fully align. That's going to keep you going to the gym on the days that you don't want to go to the gym.

This is all just speculation. I'm just telling you like what I'm thinking about. And I don't know if it works, but it seems to work for me on some level. So why not? Like I think it's a great way for people to explore. their conscious mind while also exploring what's possible for their body at the same time. And then exploring why those two things are connected, right? Like that should be the next step is the body-mind connection and working these two things out

simultaneously. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, but that is happening. Yeah. It's happening. You know, like, Deweis is an incredible amount of people talking about mind and body now, spirituality and science, this is happening already. This is happening.

And that's why things like yoga and meditation and psychedelics or intergens, they are also picking up. It's kind of a simultaneous kind of resurgence of those ideas, of those concepts. And for me, you know, to give you my perspective on microdosing is amazing. I know the science, you know, the science of microdosing is somewhat, I feel like inconclusive in a way. I couldn't really understand it works. It doesn't work according to science, right?

According to science. It seems like it doesn't. But on the other hands, I feel like the way, everything depends on how you set up a study, how you set up the investigation. For me, and the way I've been suggesting it, is using microdosing as a contemplation. tool, just like you said, you know, like diving deeper into your motivations, diving deeper into, you know, understanding your minds. And it's a kind of a self-inquiry approach. Now, how do you, you know, again, how do you measure that? You know, how do you, how do you set up a clinical trial or an investigation or you figure out whether microdozing is beneficial for self-inquiry or not?

could be some maybe some smart researcher will come up with something like that. In my, and here I can only speak for, you know, personal experience. Yeah. For me, it's an amazing tool for self-inquiry because somehow it connects the mind with this dimension where, you know, this is actually where I see more self-observation. where I see that there is you know there is that that inch between the happenings in the minds

and the watcher so it facilitates self-inquiry microdosing so that I find it's so fascinating and I actually I have a list of questions that I like to revisit on microdosing or one of the exercise I really like

is that you know projecting yourself projecting myself ahead of time. Like many people, I'm also very, you know, very ambitious, very busy learning, very busy building stuff, doing things. And so there are many times in which I lose connection with, I really lose connection with the present moment. Yeah. And microdosing in this kind of sometimes can be this, this helps, helps with this building this bridge. and like, okay, what does truly matter? And doing this exercise, projecting myself 50 years ahead,

like, you know, I'm 32 years old now, like all of the things that I'm doing today or everything that exists today in my life will be absolutely gone in 50 years, maybe even I am gone. And so doing these mental exercises on microdosing, I find it so extremely like, even if you do it without microdosing is so powerful. But for some people, the microdosing introduces this boost where you go deeper into the emotions.

Because those thoughts, like, if you really do it, like projecting yourself 30 years ahead, 40 years ahead, can be just a mental exercise, but it's actually a feeling exercise. It's an emotional exercise. Because you want to feel what it feels to be. 85 years old, 95 years old, how does life look like at this point? What matters? And sometimes the mind blocks the feeling because it can be intense. Yeah. And I feel like the microdosing is an amazing tool to open up that bridge and to feeling

what it feels and kind of putting things into perspective a little bit and getting rid of that formal feeling, I'm not doing enough. for you know, many of us have this kind of feelings. I certainly do like, I'm not doing enough. I should be doing more or this is not good enough or blah, blah, blah. And so many, so many, like so many mental kind of masturbations. Yeah, totally. And microdosing is so amazing to getting in tune with that frequency, I think.

At least I find it amazing. I don't know. As I said, in terms of the science, I can't really say because the results, the studies are somehow not pointing to the to the same clarity like high dose of mushrooms. It works for depression. There is relatively little doubt around that anymore because the science is, you know, the facts are there. With macrodosing is not so clear as far as, you know, as far as my understanding goes now. Yeah, it's so, it takes us back to the idea of how can you,

how can you manage what you can't measure? You know, it gets us back to that idea on some level. But I, it blows my mind. Sometimes I wonder if, if we're ever going to be able to measure it. And the amount of money that goes into like, hey, this stimulates the 5H2A over here. And then what happens?

Hmm. Well, it's a little foggy. Like how much, we're spending so much money and trying to prove this thing happens, but you can just see the effects on some, level. Do you think, are we, are we going to get to a point where we really understand the mystery or is it just people desperately trying to find a way to patent it? Yeah, well, for now, patenting seems to be, seems to be the way to go. And I understand that,

right? There is, there is a, there is a place for that too. Agreed. Understanding the mystery? Well, depends on what do you mean for understanding, right? Well, understanding, I don't know. It's a really big word, but I would say, I would say I feel very lucky.

I feel very blessed, actually. Right. When I witness, that's a good word. When I witness the mystery, I feel blessed. When that happens, understanding at this point of my life is beyond, like, I can't contemplate that so much. Also, because I tell you what, I've been in, I've been in, I've been in ayahuasca ceremonies,

where I want in with a desire to understand. And now, you know, I desire to understand. Understand what? Understand everything. just connect with reality, right? This can be very vague, but in certain instances, it's actually very practical. It feels very concrete and real,

but as I put it into words, then it loses a little bit of power. But I went with this desire into certain ceremonies, into certain retreats, and then at points in which it gets really, really deep and intense, then I'm like, oh, Maybe understanding not now. Maybe next time.

You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I know exactly. Sometimes you can get in some moments like, yeah, there is a time for everything and why, you know, and I'm totally feeling, you know, I totally have this, this, this strong desire for understanding, but at the same time, things have their own, you know,

they have their own working. they have their own yes timings and so that also was a was a realization that I had like like being being being yeah this this is a trivial thing but being patient with even with working with with especially working with psychedelics or with plants or intergeons being patient like with this with this seeking to understand it can be very intense sometimes so for I'm for now I'm very happy with witnessing I feel very blessed with It's absolutely amazing.

Understanding for now, for me, is, yeah, maybe I'll get there. I don't know. Yeah. That makes me feel like it's a, on some level, if we look at, you know, McKenna's Stone Ape Theory or we just look at our own personal experiences and being in these altered states and bumping up against the ineffable, you know, witnessing versus understanding versus the unexplainable. There is a definite connection between these plans.

medicines and in theogens and psychedelics and language, at least the people that I've spoken to, is it, is it fair to say that it forces us, or maybe not forces, is it fair to say that it has a deep impact on the way we communicate? I would say so, right? The way we communicate or the way we use and manipulate language is a direct, I think it's a direct consequence of the way we think. Yeah. Right, isn't it?

Yeah. Yeah. You would say that the way you speak and the way you communicate is kind of the next, is the next line after just, you know, if you see that as a chain, you have thoughts, where thoughts come out of somewhere, you have space and silence, that you have thoughts come out of somewhere, programming, conditioning, people's thought, other people's thoughts and feelings somehow emerging to our consciousness. and somehow we filter some of those and they become words which then become actions.

And so if that is the case, and I think so, that in theologians or meditation for that matter, restructured the brain as a consequence of that, I'm making some assumptions here, but as a consequence of that, you would have a restructuring of your thought processes. Now, the assumption is that the brain is what causes the thought processes. Then I don't want to get into like theory of consciousness and stuff like that. I'm not even qualified to do that. I'm just giving you like my own like thought processes around those things. So I would assume that by is restructuring whatever gets, you know, you measure,

you definitely the brain changes after psychedelics. That for sure. And the brain changes actually every day, whatever we do, the brain changes. But the brain changes in a special way or in a more profound way after psychedelics, right? So for sure, the thoughts are going to change and the way we use language is going to change because the way we feel has changed, the way we think has changed. So I totally agree. I would definitely say that the way we communicate with others, the way we communicate with ourselves changes.

And again, this is. I feel like as a, you know, psychedelics can be very helpful in witnessing the quality and the quantity and the volume of the thought processes that we kind of carry on every day and how these get translated into words and actions which basically then shape our reality somehow. And that's the same with meditation. You know, they kind of help disentangle these links. And as we disentangle the links, we start to be more mindful of how we speak to ourselves and how we speak to others. And we start to be more mindful of how we think. This is for me like a very amazing possibility that things like meditation and psychedelics open up for us, you know. One of my first experiences was seeing how my mind was so chaotic.

So much thinking, so much thoughts. And I really like the way, I really like the way Echertolle says it. Like, we are our most powerful, resilient addiction is the addiction to thinking. I love that. First time I heard Echertoli saying that was kind of an enlightening moment for me. The addiction to thinking never even thought about that. Like, I'm thinking all the time. Now, a little bit less.

But in general, thinking is what, you know, thinking basically is happening all the time. And with psychedelics and meditation, there is this awareness that comes in, oh, like, wow, my mind. What's going on in here? Like, so much stuff all the time. No peace or mostly, right, many times. Yeah. It reminds me of, if you look at it. some of the earlier work in the last wave of this particular, you know, psychedelic

under experimentation, there's a lot of work that was done with doctors taking it and then understanding how patients that had certain illnesses acted. Like, they would take it so they could feel the state of madness that other people. I don't know madness is the wrong word, but yeah. You know what I mean? Like, there's real value in that, I think. Anybody who's found themselves at the end of their rope in the psychedelic experience understands a little bit about madness or that idea of finally letting go is like, okay, I guess I was going to sink into this, you know, but you could really understand like, I bet you that's what someone may feel like that can't communicate effectively because you're, sometimes you can't speak, you can't think,

and you're just, you're, you know, you're thinking blind or something like that. But what does your take on that particular type of experimentation? It's almost an experimentation and empathy, I guess. Yeah, yeah, I totally agree. I mean, the studies you're mentioning, you're referring to are some of the early studies that were on, I think LSD was one of the main molecules in early 60s and 50s, actually. There were studies where psychiatrists or even medical students were, you know, they were experimenting.

There was not so much burden from the bureaucratic end, so people could just experiment. so much more. And there was this idea like, how can I understand, you know, people going through psychotic events. And so there was this, you know, there was definitely this exercise in empathy and there were these theories like, you know, some of the first theories on psychedelics were actually initially they were called psychothomimetic. in this idea where it mimics a psychotic episode. This was the idea, like the initial understanding in the Western research establishments were like this is a mimic of psychosis. So by going through these experiences as a psychiatrist,

I will perhaps better understand what a psychotic patient goes through. Now that goes a long way, but there is definitely, there is definitely a level of wisdom there, right? This desire to, this desire to understand the condition of another human being, like sacred. I think this is, this is, this was an amazing, you know, an amazing endeavor, like figuring out. What is, what is people going? Because right now, the understanding of psychosis is much more, much more developed, but there is still so much,

receive so much that needs to be done in that regard. 60 years ago, it was even more a complete mystery. And so when somebody dropped LSD and they started to go into this really delirious, paranoid state, which can happen for some people, can be especially strong, and like, oh, this is perhaps this is the same state. So that somehow fell a little bit

when they figured out that you can block LSD receptors and stop the allusintory state, but by blocking those same receptors, you can't actually block the psychotic state. That wasn't so easy. So there were other levels of complexity. But the idea of empathy was really something profound in which you say, you know, like this understanding of,

is the same principle of phenomenology, I would say, as a current, what we were talking about before. the idea of not going into the dialogue, you know, the idea of not going into the room with your, with the other human being, thinking, I am the physician. Yeah. You are the sick patient and I am going to heal you.

This is a common approach still in many, you know, in many psychiatric schools. But phenomenology is not one of those. They were one of the pioneers, cardiasper. German psychiatrist and philosopher who introduced the idea, as far as my understanding goes, he was the first one to introduce the idea of phenomenology and philosophy into clinical practice. So, psychiatrist and philosopher, this amazing man, and introducing this idea that I'm getting into this room with you, you person that is having this different understanding and this different experience of reality,

different from mine. And I get in here in this room to establish a dialogue with you, to establish a common ground where you and I meet as human beings. And the idea is that I, physician, so-called healthy, in a way, right? That is the principle. I go in there and say, how can I meet you where you are and help you ground? without saying you're sick, you're schizophrenic, you're psychotic,

you're delusional, these are all labels. Yeah. What is going on with you actually? If I'm not going to say you're delusional, okay, when I said you're delusioned, whatever I actually said, yeah, I could give you a definition of that, but the understanding is totally different,

the actual experience. So this is what a phoom, you know, this is what a psychiatrist with a phenomenological approach would do when they get an interface with somebody who is so-called psychotic or somebody who is in a deep, altered state of consciousness.

Yeah. Man, it's the study of relationships. And we start talking about altered states. Someone in an altered state has like a different relationship. Sometimes when I see these studies that maybe go awry or there's some inappropriate action that happens, it makes me ask the question of how does an individual who takes an entheogen that changes their awareness

that has to have some effect on the other individual in the room that we probably can't measure. You know, like, it's interesting to think about that because when I see these things happen in there, like, you know, there's way more going on than we know. Like, this is, their relationship is affecting each other in a way we can't measure. Like, you know, and it kind of blurs the lines about,

appropriateness and in and and I realize there's best practices and I'm not I'm not saying this is it's okay or anything but I'm just saying there's a blurred line there because we don't thoroughly understand the way that that interaction happens right is that is that fair to say yeah yeah there is there is so much um there's so much to that I mean there's a whole there's a there's a whole conversation there um I think Jody Spencer has done some uh measurements around how certain people, so he does these retreats and he has done some measurements as to how certain people meditating affects the heart rate variability of certain other people in the room. I haven't gone through the papers, but I've listened to him say on a podcast about this phenomenon.

And there is some, I think there is a line of research which attempts within psychedelics or within intelligence, which attempts to see how do people within a ceremony, you know, influence each other. And one way to, you know, to do science, you have to measure stuff, right? So there's no, you know, to my, you know, there's no way around it. You have to have some variables that you control, some other that you don't control and that you want to figure out how they relate to each other. This is science. And so you have to measure something. And I think one way that people has been doing it is, you know, people in a circle, in a ceremony, right, typical how it happens, for example, for ayahuasca,

for mushrooms. And then you would measure their EEGs, you know, the brain eGs and heart rate and how it changes. And I'm not sure about this because, as I said, I haven't read the papers. But there has been some leads pointing to the fact that there is actually a change in the heart rate of other people in the circle. Especially, I'm sure that's what Jody Spencer said. Like in his retreats, there is actually a way to measure how people meditating are influencing other people in the room just through the process of meditation. And he measures that by measuring. how heart rate variability changes

before during and after the meditation exercise. So that is pretty, there's a pretty interesting way. I guess I'm not sure if this has been done and there are results within the entheogenic or psychedelic literature. But I know Alexander, since you mentioned

him before, Alexander wanted to do a study like that. He wanted to set up a study where where you could kind of try and measure this kind of subtle human-human influence within a psychedelic space because they're real. You know, I have witnessed those many times. Like there is somebody going through a strong process and all of a sudden other people start saying that they are going through the same process or they start saying that they're also being activated by them.

So the fact of seeing, the fact of feeling certain energy in the room. So how do you measure that? Yeah, one way heart rate variability, brain EEGs, that is definitely one way to do it, to see if there is, the thing is that with this kind of data, with EEGs specifically, it's, I think it's easy to lose the signal. With heart rate variability, it can be confounding as well, like people moving or getting stress, so you don't really know. it's much easier to do you with meditation because experienced meditators can go into a place where they are still while they're doing the work. And their physiological functions are very calm, are tuned down. So it's easier to, you know, there are less confounding factors.

So you could measure how people influence each other in a space when they're in an alter state. But meditation probably easier. but I would love to see if somebody has done that with psychedelics. Are you aware of any that has carried on something like that? I've been reading a bit about heart rate frequency and coherence, but I can't think of anything on top of my head that does that. But it wouldn't surprise me at all. You know, I mean, we see echoes of it in,

like you said when when look at women who be around sometimes women who are around each other they their cycle becomes similar you know like you know maybe there's some sort of maybe the brain activity is similar there too but you can see echoes of it in different behaviors and group dynamics so i i would imagine there's some there's possibilities for some real similarities there yeah for sure just some um don't don't take me uh don't take my work for this, I think for females, it's like for the cycle synchronization is quite real, right? It's probably like hormonal driven, which is kind of a, you know, a sink in the hormonal pattern somehow get transmitted.

There is a, yeah, there is a, there is a, there is a, there is a, there is a, there is a, research on this. I'm not, I'm not aware, I'm not familiar with it, but I know there is something that is more kind of concrete papers and more science stuff. Yeah, I think there's some women that are beginning to apply these ideas of psychedelics and cycles and stuff like that. That's a whole other branch of research that there's some incredible women working on. Another issue that I wanted to touch on briefly is the geometric imagery that sometimes people find I've heard some interesting theories about that being a language. You know, like the fundamental understanding of relationships through geometric images seen in psychedelic states.

Like if you just take some time to think about that as like, yeah, like some of those images that just come firing at you, if you just take time to think about them in an abstract way, it's like, wow, that was a really interesting relationship the way that image came to me and the way it was linked to this other image and the colors on there. It's almost like a language, right? And I guess maybe that's how people can get caught up and, hey, there's people talking. There's this language that's coming at me that I don't fully understand. But any thoughts on the geometrical imaging being a language? Yeah, I've contemplated on that. And this is a big, like, it comes up. It comes up quite quite a bit because these patterns are so common.

Yeah. with DMT specifically, and ayahuasca and with ayahuasca, the visions, I wouldn't say are not as common as people think, but they are, they are something that, you know, that happens. But the geometrical vision, I would say that I have no clue, but it would make sense if you were some sort of a language that, you know, some people see this as, you know, these vibratory frequencies, these vibratory patterns

that somehow, you know, and then there's a whole thing about aliens and entities, and, you know, this is like a whole thing in itself. But these patterns, these geometric patterns are somehow, a kind of a healing, healing frequencies for us and for the mind, for the body. This is an understanding that I have, that I have heard many times, that it kind of, you know, it kind of resonates somehow. You know, I have a feeling that those, this imagery has a certain effect on the

subconscious mind. Now, is it a like? language than a language by who? A language that, you know, like, like when you, you know, you can go deep into this rabbit hole, right? Like language presupposes somehow a mind, right? There has to be a mind. A language has a structure than presupposes like entities and beings.

And so it goes into a whole, you know, it goes into a whole rabbitel of its own. And without going there, I feel that those imagery, this imagery and those patterns do have a massive impact on the subconscious mind. And this would also make sense, given the, you know, I'm a huge fan and student of Jung. and massive inspiration for me from, you know, since my early days in med school. And

he has studied immensely like you know, many Eastern traditions, alchemy, you know, the relevance of mandala's and patterns. And so

it you know, the power of those structures does appear in other traditions. And so if we want to use, you know, because, you know, to speak about those things, for me, one of the most useful frames of reference is using anthropology and comparative religion. So this is the way where we can kind of, kind of get a picture of things. Because with science, you know, we can't speak about, we are beyond science now.

So we can't speak about data. We can speak about measuring. we can't speak about any of those. So we have other languages that we need to use, other frames of reference. And those patterns do appear in other religion and they seem to have a power of their own, like mantras. And they appear in yoga like each chakra has its own associated,

I think they're called yantras, their own associated set of symbols. That, you know, it's a special set of symbols that have power. They hold power. associated with the mantra, associated with an image, with a color, associated with a certain position

like they're doing in Korea yoga. So these things, these things do appear. And so I would be kind of, I regard the ones that appear within DMT as, you know, I don't fully ascribe to the perennial philosophy thing, but there is so much truth to that.

I think there are so many interwoven, connections between many, many traditions and things. So, you know, I do think that they exert some sort of power on our subconscious, long answer, which is short answer is yes. It is a kind of language that gets impressed into our mind and does something, performs something on us. You know, what does it do? Oftentimes, it is healing. Oftentimes, this is healing.

This is like, you know, you get a, how do you know? How do you know its ceiling? Well, how do you feel? It feels peaceful. It feels beautiful. It feels nourishing. It feels sacred. And so this is the way that I think one can kind of decode the impacts that patterns like

they appear in DMT can have on us. You know, this is my understanding at least. Now, language by whom, for whom? Like, why? That's a wonderful answer. It's beautiful, man. I'm sitting here like a kid in a candy store. It speaks volumes of hope and healing and spiritual and science coming together on so many levels.

It seems like this erudony thread that runs through the tapestry of understanding the environment around you after being having these sort of mystical experiences you know when you see a certain vine climb a tree and then it produces a flower at a 48 degree angle on july 4th at 444 p.m. Like that that's a language is a divine intelligence and after it seems to me some people with psychedelic some people without it can understand that oh that is the perfect angle at which to grow there's an innate intelligence and it happens the same way the things that happen in my life happen. Maybe I don't have that much control. Maybe I'm the vine that's producing a flower. Maybe I'm climbing up the tree right now. But there's a certain sort of elegance that comes from witnessing

the language of nature and applying it to your life. And I think that those patterns are, whether they're geometrical or whether they're a vine. I wish more people could get that feeling of watching that language unfold around you. There's a certain sense of wholeness that comes from that. Yeah. Yeah. It's beautiful, man. It's beautiful. Man. Well, Dr. I got a few questions that came from the chat that I want to throw your way. I know we're kind of, we're just jamming here. So these are some ones that people had thrown to me before we started in. Technology and human empathy. Can the integration of Python and machine learning into healthcare not only optimize clinical outcomes, but also enhance human empathy and connection between doctors and patients.

That's a great one. That's a great one. Well, I would hope so, right? I would really hope so. I think that the challenge for physicians and the reason why there is this, you know, oftentimes we visit the doctor and or have been there as well. We're so stressed out. We're so overworked.

And this is one of the reason I left clinical practice. I loved it, but I felt like I had to stop caring for myself in order to care for others. And that would eventually lead me to a place where I wouldn't be able to care for others anymore because I would feel I would no longer be healthy. And so you see many physicians who are unfortunately very unhealthy because the lives we lead are tough. They're stressful, you know, constantly working long. long shifts, night shifts. And now there is so much awareness around the impacts of sleep disruption into health and well-being and mood.

And doctors, we have constantly, you know, having to deal with night shifts and stuff. So I think, you know, if we manage, and this is one of my missions, if we manage to bring technology to a place where it can empower doctors to kind of take off the burden of things that, you know, can be done by machines. And so that I, I'm not so stressed out because I speak to a patient and I speak to 15 patients in an afternoon or 20 patients and 30 patients and then I have to fill hours and hours of forms. And then the next day I'm just burned out because I have so much backlog to deal with.

And so, you know, ideally, if you can, you know, by bringing technology, And this is what many, many startups, many companies are doing, you know, how do you help doctors, you know, do the things, you know, interface with the patients while a machine takes care of the documentation. So that would for sure, I'm sure of that, you know, if doctors were not burdened by, you know, having to deal with so much bureaucracy and, you know, you would probably, everyone would probably feel more relieved. we would be more joyous, we would have more time to dedicate to our patients.

And so I see, I mean, this is inevitable. This is going to become part of clinical practice. I'm glad this is happening. I want to be part of that transformation because we need it so badly. You know, like half of the, I think in the U.S., more than half of the medical workforce is burned out or something. I think this is the data. There is such a high, you know, there's such a high rate of burnout among clinicians. this is not just doctors, this is nurses, which, by the way, you know, we're talking the same.

You know, this is not just doctors, nurses is the same. Anybody who works with people in suffering have to carry a massive burden. And on top of that, also you have to deal with kind of the bureaucracy of doing the work, which is so tough. And this is what, this is my desire. This is my mission to how do you remove that as much as possible so that you bring joy back into the clinical practice? I think this is the, I think this is, this is the beauty of these technologies and what they can bring into us, you know, into clinical practice. This is definitely the beauty of it, for sure. And then, of course, you know, many other, you know, many other advantages like you have these algorithms who, you know, if you're missing something out, the algorithm feels, you know, flags it up for you.

You're missing something, you know, maybe after 10-hour shifts, you're looking at an EKG, you're not seeing something. and but you have it double-checked through an algorithm and it flags it up for you. You know, there are so many applications that are immensely useful and interesting and beneficial, both for the clinician's wellbeing and for to improving the outcomes for patients. So 100%. I'm totally sold on that. You know, I'm not fearing, I don't fear, you know, AI replacing people. I think, you know, I don't think that's going to be the case. perhaps, you know, I'm either dumb or overly optimistic, but my feeling is that for sure there is going to be a massive shift, you know, and people who, like, just like internet happens, you know,

people who are not interested in kind of upgrading their skills and understanding on how to use those tools, perhaps some of those people will be in a challenging situation because this will become inevitable, you know, like this is, this is what's happening and which, just have to deal with it in the best possible way, right? Yeah. Yeah, I, there's the old quote that says, we have nothing to fear but fear itself. And, you know, it's, I think it's true with AI. I think it's true with where we're going and embracing it on some level is the only way, the only way out is through, right?

Same way with psychedelics. You have to go through it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. What about cross-cultural medical insights? With experience in diverse healthcare systems across Europe, how can we harmonize the best practices of these systems to create a universally superior model of care that addresses both physical and spiritual well-being? Oh, wow, another awesome question.

Yeah, I mean, again, out of this desire for a complete or, well, holistic understanding, functional, integral understanding. You know, I was fortunate to have a scholarship to spend some time in China, in Beijing, in one of their major hospitals and seeing how they work there, you know, spending time in Portugal and Spain. And I don't have enough understanding of, you know, I have good understanding of traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, for example. But this is just the tipping points.

You know, this is just the point of the iceberg. where those traditions are so complex and are as complex as Western medicine for sure. Now, in terms of a total understanding, I feel like this is happening. Like, this is already happening in the US, for example. I haven't seen it as much. I haven't practiced in the US,

but I haven't seen it as much in the EU. Even in countries like Switzerland where, you know, they have a super, you know, this is probably amongst all of you European countries. Well, they're not even European, but you get the idea, right? They're the closest to the U.S. system. There is not as much that functional medicine preventive, you know, kind of functional medicine wave that is coming up. You know, of course the U.S., you know, the healthcare system in the U.S.,

we know, we know the challenges that you guys are facing there. We know the challenges of working in a high-cost private fee-based system where, you know, like, it's very good doctors make a lot of money, but many people, if you can't afford insurance, you know, you know, all these things. I'm not going to say it, but the idea is that there are several, you know, for sure, several challenges there. But the interesting thing is that exactly because there are those challenges that you're facing, something new is emerging, which is functional medicine, which is, you know, medicine 3.0, as Dr. Atia calls it. And these are, you know,

disease is emerging in the US precisely because people realized that, you know, either, you know, if you can't, you know, if you can't,

if you don't, if you can't afford healthcare, for example, well, one of the best ways not to end up there in the first place is to use this functional medicine, medicine 3.0 approach,

for sure. Sure. So there is a, this understanding is coming up. Now, this is probably still very elite, you know, not many people. This, you know, it's kind of the, hopefully the spillover effects. You know, it starts, you know, people from lower, you know, I don't want to say lower class, but people who are less, who have less of an exposure to health education can still benefit from this trend eventually. You know, I hope as soon as possible with the fact that, you know, Andrew Huberman, Dr. Etting, they're making all these health education available for free. You know, anybody can go out there on YouTube and get, you know, high quality health education completely for free, you know, and this is happening, and this is coming from the U.S. So I feel like the understanding is, you know, it's going in that direction, you know, integrating, you know, mind and body happening through psychedelics,

meditation, yoga, you know, preventive medicine. is happening through, you know, functional medicine, medicine 3.0, you know, working on prevention, working on exercise, understanding, you know, how your lab work and how your body works and how to adjust your training regime based on your physiologies. All of this is happening already. It's just that, you know, those kind of changes are, they take time, right? This is a paradigm shift that is happening. It's a complete, you know, it's a complete paradigm shift from give me the pill that I will solve my issue from, okay, I have to kind of handle myself because I am my own medicine. I am the one in charge of my health. Now, this is a massive shift that

that needs to happen and it's going to take still some time, but I feel like it's already pretty much there, luckily. Yeah. You know, as you're saying that, I can see it in other, it goes hand in hand with AI. The same way you used to work for this company, now you got to work for yourself. The same way you did this thing, now you got to do it for yourself. It just seems like there's this slow handing off of liberation on some level that's happening around. Some people say people are waking up, but on some level, it does seem like liberation.

Like this is what freedom looks like or this is what liberation looks like. You can make it out there on your own, but you have to be it. have to do the work, whether it's in a psychedelic experience or whether it's in a, you know, traditional working experience. It's just taking more responsibility for yourself leads to better outcomes, I think, on some level. It's just an interesting time. And you have all the boomers that are kind of passing on and this new group.

It's so fascinating to me. Yeah, you have to want it. Like taking responsibility. This is like the, this is the, yeah, this is the mantra, I think, that that is coming up. also from the, you know, from main thought leaders, also in the U.S., you know, many of them, you know, you have to own yourself to make, you know, exercise. He's like, nobody, you know, nobody was thinking about this 20, 30 years ago. Yeah.

Like this is such a, this is such somehow, somehow obvious, right, that moving your body is going to help your health. But this awareness was kind of obscured a little. bit. But now it's coming up, even stronger and stronger and stronger. And the science is clearly pointing to the best thing you can do for your physical and mental health is just move your body, exercise. The best thing. But you know, you have to own it. It's not a peel. Sometimes, some days, we are like, I don't want to, I don't want to do it. I don't feel like it. And so we know, we know all those tricks. We know that all too well. And so.

So this is where psychedelics and meditation come in, in my opinion, because they somehow, you know, allow us to learn, as we said, about mental zones, about dealing with moments where you don't want to do something, but you still have to do it. You know, how do you deal with? Because this is all about mental training. This is why, you know, David Goggins has become a, you know, massive, a massive thought leader, you know, massive inspiration. Because that's what society needs to hear. You need to hear that you have to deal with your own, you have to learn to deal with your own minds. And you can.

This is the biggest message. We can deal with the mind. We don't have to be slaves of this thought or that thoughts or this feeling or that feeling or whatever other people want us to be slave of because they're slave of that themselves. This is the massive message that is coming up. Otherwise, you wouldn't have people like Eckartolle, having such massive audiences and there's so many amazing spiritual teachers out there, so many functional physicians, functional doctors, functional psychiatrists,

you know, all these amazing things are happening. It's just a matter of the scale and magnitude of it becoming more and more and more and more as more people start to kind of get attuned with this. I love it, man. It's a language of science, right? Science is a massive, science is the gateway. for these things to get, you know, to get kind of into the main, kind of into the main, into the mainstream.

Science is the gateway. The language of science is the gateway. That's why people like, you know, Andrew Huberman are getting so much attention because he is doing exactly again. Society needs to hear certain things in the language of science, you know? So this is amazing, this magic is really happening in a way. I think that should be a t-shirt or a bumper sticker. We don't have to be slaves.

Yeah, yeah. We don't have to be. Yeah, it makes so much sense. I, um, Dr. Esposciano, like, this has been a fascinating conversation. I love it. This is so much fun. I think we've covered quite a bit here. And I still got other stuff that people probably want to want to hear.

You're going to have to come back. Maybe I can have you in, uh, Dr. Ledbadov come on together or we can do a panel. I think we can get 100 people in this hand. Alexander is a friend deep, you know, I really love him. We've done some good work together. He's a really, really good friend of mine. I love to, you know, I love to come back.

I hope that there was some interesting insights there for your audience. I absolutely love the conversation. Me too. It was so nice to talk to you. You have an amazing energy. So I'd be super happy to, yeah, to come back. Just let me know. And we arrange, for sure.

Yeah, absolutely. I got some, I got, the True Life podcast has been moving and growing in ways that are amazing. And I have some people that are putting together events that want me to come and do some panel work for them. So maybe I can get you on a panel list. We'll figure stuff out in the future. But before I let you go today, where can people find you? What do you have coming up and what are you excited about? So you can find, you know, perhaps you can leave my, you know, my LinkedIn or my Google. So I'm pretty much in monk modes these days for the next few months.

I signed up for an intensive machine learning course and pretty deep into studying the science behind that. So that's something I'm really excited about building within, you know, building within healthcare with those technologies and really diving deep there because they're fascinating links with neuroscience. And so diving deep in there. So what's coming up for me, I'm, I'm, I'm basically looking into building in healthcare. I don't really know what it is.

I'm exploring something with a co-founder that I have I'm working with right now, but it's still kind of still working progress. And yeah, so yeah, I would say that that's what excites me at the moment. Starting deep down in Monk mode right now. I love it. That's where we find the inspiration to build a better tomorrow. And I'm so thankful you came here today. Ladies and gentlemen, go down to the show notes,

check out the links, check out some of the work that he's doing. I hope everybody enjoyed the conversation. Clint Kyle's, Ernest Hong, everybody in the chat over here. Excellent conversation, gentlemen. Thanks for speaking. Everybody that joined us, whether you're listening today or tomorrow, I hope you have a beautiful day, and that's all we got. Hang on briefly afterwards, but to everybody else, have a beautiful day.

Aloha.