TrueLife - Dr. Rick Barnett - Mind Matters: Fragmentation & Integration

Episode Date: July 25, 2023

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/https://vermontpsychedelic.org/www.cartervermont.orghttp://linkedin.com/in/dr-rick-barnettClinical Psychologist, Addiction Psychologist, Geropsychology, Psychopharmacology, Healthcare Delivery and Workforce Systems, Psychedelics 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

Darkness struck, a gut-punched theft, Sun ripped away, her health bereft. I roar at the void. This ain't just fate, a cosmic scam I spit my hate. The games rigged tight, shadows deal, blood on their hands, I'll never kneel. Yet in the rage, a crack ignites, occulted sparks cut through the nights. The scars my key, hermetic and stark. To see, to rise, I hunt in the dark, fumbling, fear. Hears through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Codex Serafini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Hit that button, here we go. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope the birds are singing. I hope the sun is shining. I hope the wind is at your back. I've got a fantastic show for you today with an incredible guest.

I know I've been looking forward to this for quite some time, and anybody who has found themselves in the world of psychedelics, you'll know who my guest is, and I think you'll be just as thrilled as I am. Ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Rick Barnett, president, founder of Carter, Inc., Center for Addiction, for Addiction, Treatment, Education, and Recovery. He's also the co-founder at Psychedelic Society of Vermont,

the owner of Clinical BPS Health. He's a clinical psychologist, addiction psychologist. He knows almost all there is to know. about the world of geropsychology, psychopharmacology, healthcare delivery, and workforce systems. We're going to get into it today. You may have seen his previous podcast on psychedelics today or with the incredible Elizabeth McGahn.

Dr. Rick Burnett, thank you so much for being here today. How are you feeling? I feel great. I was lucky enough to spend time in the ocean just earlier today. So even though I'm in landlocked Stowe, Vermont right now, it's always good to connect to nature wherever you find yourself, whether you're in an urban area or a rural area. I love nature and being in the ocean is one of my favorites.

So that was something I don't get to do very often. So I'm feeling good. Yeah. I love the ocean so much I'm surrounded by it. And I have to agree there's something about being on it or in it or even next to it. It just calls to home. Yeah. You're out in Hawaii.

I've been to Hawaii several times and it's just stunning out there, stunning. Yeah, it's it's it's like being home in some weird way. It's you know Joseph Campbell, Terrence McKenna like there's just calls to you out here. It's psychedelic in nature in some ways. And I think the land is alive over here. I guess it is everywhere. And Wayne Dyer, Wayne Dyer lived on Maui for years. Wayne Dyer.

The list goes on and on. We could keep talking about people out here. It's, it's beautiful. And I hope everyone gets an opportunity to at some point in time visit it because it is one of the most beautiful spots on Earth. But as we talk about Vermont, you and it appears to me that you guys have a the psychedelic society of Vermont have a big show coming up in September. Maybe we could talk about that a little bit. Yeah, that's great.

We call it Sol Quinox because it's taking place on the fall equinox, but we're trying to have it be soulful. It's the psychedelic science and spirituality summit. It's in September on the fall equinox. Our second time doing this last year we did it on the summer solstice. There's something about the seasons changing that here in Vermont is, very significant and around the world. And we like to gather people together around these times. And why not do a psychedelic conference on the same occasion, bringing together some really wonderful, wonderful speakers, leaders in the field of research and advocacy and even an

underground practitioner coming to share with us. So we have a diverse group of people coming together. I think we even have some legislators coming to listen in on some of the talks. So it's going to be really fantastic. I mean, I don't want to list all the. names right off the bat, but, you know, names that we all know and love in the psychedelic space coming to Vermont to share their experience with us, build community, talk about the science, but also really talk about the spiritual side of things and the community side of things. It's so important to have community, whether it's in the psychedelic space or in the social space or in the, you know, internet world space or whatever, whatever field or whatever, you know,

wherever you find yourself, having community is so important. important. So it's really, it's really an honor to be able to bring these people together and bring us all together in September to, uh, to connect. Yeah. And what a beautiful place. In some ways, when I close my eyes and I was reading about this particular event that you guys are having, it kind of seems like a lusus a little bit. Like this, like you just return to the Elucinian mysteries happening over there. Could be. It's a nice, it's a nice vibe. Well, you know, the fall, you know, the fall in Vermont is very beautiful and bringing people together. during a time when we're moving in from from summer into the harvest season and then into the

winter. So really reaping the fruits of our labor, you know, about, it's about abundance. It's about transitioning into sort of a quieter time. I mean, I don't know if you were out in Denver for psychedelic science, 2023, 12,000 people. That was a major, major event, which was full of connections and community, but it was, frankly, it was a bit overwhelming. 500-some-on-present. presentations. So, you know, here in Vermont, 300 people quietly gathering, connecting with one another. It has a, it definitely has a special vibe for sure. Yeah, it sounds amazing. Everyone, everyone from Rick Doblin to Zeus to Pado coming all the way back home from the Netherlands. You got some just incredible guests. You got Ben Sasse over there. So many awesome people

that appear to already be lined up. And, you know, kind of begs the question as we begin talking about, you know, cycles, be it the equinox or, you know, full moons. It kind of seems like we are going through another wave of like a psychedelic tide. But I have, I'm curious, is it, you think it's a high tide? Sometimes the psychedelic movement, like with mushrooms, it seems to me that it comes in waves. So my question is, do you think that this particular moment in psychedelics is like a high tide or is it more like a tsunami? You know, it's hard to gauge because I started to really dive back into the world of psychedelics in 2019. That was when I really started to dip my toes and then dive a little bit

deeper and deeper and deeper into it. And even at that time, I could sense this, you know, major wave coming. So I was very lucky because I had a history with psychedelics when I was younger. So I knew there was something to it. So when it came back around in the way that it did, especially in my field of mental health, addiction, you know, recovery, spirituality, it's, it was like, I need to get involved with this because this is near and dear to my heart from personal experience and also from my, you know, my professional development. So, you know, it's hard to tell over the last five years, four or five years, there's been a series of waves and, you know, expansions and contractions in this space. And I think right now I feel like there

was, you know, leading up to Denver, 20 June, you know, there was this huge, you know, building towards that. And now I'm thinking there's a little bit of a way. The wave is starting to crest. And at least for now, because we're waiting for this MDMA FDA approval process. We have ketamine that's legal and people are practicing with ketamine, myself included. And we're waiting for MDMA, 3-4 methylene, dioxin, dioxin, methamphetamine, ecstasy, bringing it into clinical practice to treat trauma and perhaps off-label to treat alcohol use disorder,

anxiety, depression. But we're waiting for that now. And so, you know, I think there is a little bit of a, not holding our breath, but really, really kind of, you know, just continue to do the research, continue to gather experiences together and figuring out how, continuing to figure out how we can bring this psychedelic renaissance into a more consistent, stable, accessible system of care or cultural practices because I'm somebody who believes that as we do await FDA approval, food and drug administration approval for MDMA, you know, there are people practicing with these medicines out there in the community and they do tremendous work. And so working on decriminalizing, potentially legalizing some of these things as we continue to work on the medical model,

all these different models, all these different ways. of bringing these medicines, these experiences to people in healthy, safe, and effective ways, whether they have a mental health condition or they're just doing it for their own personal curiosity, spiritual growth. We're at a time where all these things are developing all simultaneously. And so it feels right now we're kind of in a, not a lull, but we're kind of in a space where kind of waiting to see what's going to happen next. Yeah.

Yeah, it's almost like we're in between sets. Someone who goes out and surfs all the time. It's like, okay, we had a big club. cleanup set come. Now we're all sitting out on the lineup like, all right, who's next over here? Yeah, exactly. It's, it's, let me ask this one. How do you perceive the intersection of science, spirituality, and mysticism within the context of psychedelic use? You know, it's, those things do go together, right? They go together. But it's hard to have those conversations when people may seem like they're locked into one camp or another camp. And,

you know, the truth, truth be told is that we know that psychedelics are great disruptors, right? They get in there and they change the way we think about things. They alter our perceptions of reality. They modify our beliefs, our values, our understanding of ourselves, the world, other people. So, you know, in some sense, psychedelics do have the potential to be the ideal bringing together of these different camps. It doesn't always happen, though. There's also this polarization that happens. So I think anybody who wants to be super useful and understanding and wants to be engaged in helping

see this through to a healthy outcome needs to have an appreciation for all paths. and finding those inroads where people can communicate and connect. We don't have to agree on everything. But the fact is that there's so much harmony between science and spirituality and mysticism, metaphysics, you know, someone who you may have on the show at some point, but Peter Soschen Hughes, he's from the University of Exeter, philosophy professor, written books on metaphysics and psychedelics. And he really does bring a quality.

of talking about those things in a really, really useful way, leaning hard on the philosophy side of things. His whole take is that, you know, philosophy is actually the ticket to bringing together science and spirituality and mysticism. It's through philosophy. So, you know, it is possible, George. And I think we all, I think, could carry some responsibility in saying how can we appreciate all these different camps

and not have to agree with one another all the time, but really bring our best foot forward and recognize that we're in this together. That is a great answer, and it's really well said. Sometimes I think that the conflict between science and spirituality is the same conflict that most people have in themselves, that creates PTSD or creates mental blocks. It's this thing that we can't measure this thing, so we don't know how to manage it. And that seems to be the problem with science and spirituality. It's like, yeah, we love the subjective stuff, but we can't measure it,

so we're just going to leave it over here for now. But that's the same thing with kind of blocking emotions. Like, yeah, I feel like this person did this to me, but I can't really deal with it right now. I don't know how to measure it. And it just, it blows my mind to think that in a heightened state of awareness, those two things kind of come together, you know, and it's almost like, oh, they're the same thing. If I can make sense of this, then I can measure it that way. And I really believe moving forward.

And I love the idea. of philosophy being the sort of bar between, in the double helix, it's kind of bringing spirituality and science together. You know, it's so beautiful in so many ways, and I really think that this wave or this tsunami moving forward is going to bring us into a whole different idea and realm of possibilities,

which brings me to this next idea of sense ratios. I had this long talk with our good friend chat GPT, and I asked our friend chat GPT, what would the world look like if humankind changed their sense ratios? And what chat GPD said back to me sounded so psychedelic in nature. It had mentioned things like it would fundamentally change our ideas of time. It may change our communication. And it gave me this long list of these different attributes that I think most people,

not only do most people experience on a psychedelic trip, but it seems to bring together the work of so many of the spiritual leaders, that have written stuff before us. Have you thought about this idea of sense ratios and what do you make of sense ratios? Well, it took me a second to, I haven't heard that term before, but I knew quickly what you meant is that,

so basically we are five sensory human beings and we see things and hear things and taste things and touch things and smell things through a limited band of what can be through our human senses experience. So dogs and different animals, and different living beings all have sensory awarenesses, and we only have a certain amount. So if you shift that, then all of a sudden, yeah,

all of a sudden it becomes a totally different world. You know, it's interesting, George, because one of the things that came to mind as you were talking, as you were describing that, you know, what would happen if we change our sense ratios. And it is something that's talked about in all religious traditions and spiritual practices. And that is, so same thing with psychedelics, you know, psychedelics, and I say this in a lot of settings,

psychedelics are just tools. They're not, you know, we can't just trip all the time. We can't just be dosing ourselves with LSD or having MDMA journeys every week or, you know, all the time, like as if we're going to develop our sensory experiences so that we shift our sense. We can't, that's not how it works. But, you know, these experiences can tune us into different sense ratios. And then in our daily lives, can we pay attention? differently to how we see things, how we touch things, how we hear things, how we smell things,

how we take, can we pay attention differently and develop that without needing to, you know, use psychedelics to do that. We can do that through meditation, through deep interpersonal experiences together. So there's different ways to cultivate that sort of shifting that sense ratio. But that if we, if somebody continued to unlock that, that would be pretty significant. I think we're, first of all, it's a great answer. I love the way you put it. I think that's what's happening on a grand scale.

You know, and maybe this is just my interpretation of waking up. But let me tell you what I base this on. There's a fantastic book called The Gutenberg Galaxy by Marshall McLuhan. And in that book, he talks about the phonetic alphabet and the printing press and how it gave us the idea of like exact repeatability. And how the printing press really made us focus in on the visual nature

and the way we consume information. And in doing so, it changed our sense ratios from the time of storytellers and being, you know, audio learners or, you know, the cold medium of audio or reading forces Dr. Barnett and George to take in the information and then create a mental picture of our own, creating our own reality, our own model of reality, where if you were to go watch Oppenheimer or the new Barbie movie, you would be handed a beautiful idea on a silver platter next to some popcorn and a Dr. Pellner. pepper and it would get in there real nice and easy and you would have a someone else's idea of it. And so it just blows my mind to think that we've already shifted ratios in this revolution of the printing press. And it seems to me when I look at all this work of people, especially in the psychedelic renaissance, or it doesn't need to necessarily be through psychedelics, it can be through breathwork or heightened states of awareness, meditation, isolation, but you are changing your sense ratio. And it seems to me that that's where these ideas are revealed to us, these, these ideas

about science, these ideas about nature, these ideas about three-dimensional objects that pop into your purview when you're tripping a little bit. These things are revealed to you when you change your sense ratio. And I think that that's like the aha moment. And that's why I bring it up, man. I'm fascinated to talk about it. And thanks for letting me throw that out there a little bit. Maybe Maybe you could rip a little bit more on that with me. Well, I think of sensory deprivation as, you know, something that is becoming back in, you know, into practice people, flotation tanks and sensory deprivation experiences. And what that does to sort of reacquaint ourselves with our senses and actually have a heightened level of sensitivity to that.

And, you know, I was wondering, as you were talking about it, I don't. know what role. So you were mentioning the printing press as being this technology shift so that that changed our way of interpreting our, you know, way our sensory experience can change. So I was thinking about the internet and I was thinking about intelligence and how those, the technologies of today and into the future are definitely, definitely shifting our sense range. Even if it's just simply like as a crude, maybe loose analogy, our intention span now has gone from whatever 12 seconds to like three seconds. And that's not quite a sensory thing.

But, you know, when you think about the visual cortex auditory processing, you know, shorter and shorter and shorter. And then, you know, are we going to get to a place with AI and holographic images? Instead of doing like a podcast right now where we're on a two-dimensional screen, I'm talking to you, Hawaii. If I was beamed into your office there or you were beamed into my office here, and we're sitting across with each other in three-dimensional space, you know, what that does to our sense ratio or our sensory experience is going to be, that's,

you know, that's not that far down the road. It's very, it's very weird how like, you know, 50 years from now, 100 years from now, people are going to be talking about when we went from,

you know, our cell phones and these Zoom calls and stuff into a world where we're actually transported into each other's lives, whether it's through meta, you know, web 3.0 or it's, you know, like virtual reality, or it's through like live holographic images beamed in. We don't know how that's going to look, but 50 years from now, this, what we're doing now is going to be so archaic.

It's almost schizophrenic in nature. Like if you think about, you know, I remember the first time I saw someone talking on a Bluetooth headset and like they were just talking to themselves. And I remember being like, what is that guy? What a weirdo? Look at that guy. What's talking to himself?

What wrong with that guy? And it doesn't look. that much different than, say, someone who is having a conversation with a dead loved one, but they're doing it out loud. You know what I mean? Like, it's, it's, I know that's not the right term to use, but it does seem as if we are, some of us are moving into this world where we can communicate over the airwaves, and it's, it's, it's mesmerizing. You're right. Like, it's, it's a mesmerizing to think that this particular form of communication will be archaic and not too long from now. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And what that does to our sensory experience is going to be significant.

Yeah. I often wonder if some of these mental illnesses that we have today are a direct reflection of the world we live in. I don't know this for sure, but if you go to a third world country on some level, do they have anorexic people? Do they have people? I'm sure they have people with PTSD. but some of the diseases we have here in the West have to be a direct connection to our technology. What did you think? Yeah, I think so. I think it probably goes beyond technology. So third world countries that have different cultures tend to have disproportionate number, you know, different kinds of conditions that they might struggle with. And there are there are situations, there are cultures or communities that don't have,

nearly the amount of depression. Don't even know what depression is, what anxiety is, what anorexia is. They just don't, they don't have that. So I don't know if it's a direct product of technology. I tend to sort of remain somewhat nuanced and neutral when it comes to the negative influences of technology on our mental health. You know, it's incontrovertible in some ways. You know, I just mentioned our attention span going now.

are more and more people being diagnosed with ADD, for example, does that even exist in other? There's, I mean, of course, of course there's something, there's something to it. But I also believe that there's something to it in a positive way, that it's not all negative. And I wonder if we're going to go through a period of transformation where, you know, it seems like all this technology is really negatively impacting our mental health and making us feel more alienated and disconnected. but eventually it's going to come around to feeling more connected and more finding ways to be healthy and integrating technology into our lives in a way that doesn't seem pathological.

I don't want to pathological. We don't need to pathologize all this stuff that we're doing. Like right now, someone could say, like, we're not really connecting, George, but it feels good. You know, it feels, you mentioned to me, you watched a couple of my podcasts and you said before the show that there's, you know, we convey something that's genuine and meaningful. full even through technology. So it's not all, it's not all bad. But I understand, I understand it's negative influences. So I'm not trying to dismiss that at all. I'm just trying to, I like to find

that nuance that both and rather than either or position. Yeah, that's really well said. I, I, I love the idea of the felt presence of the other. You know, when you're sitting next to somebody and you're, you're taking in there the whole, everything about it, not only the five senses, but I could hit you on the shoulder or we could laugh. I could slap my knee. You could hear the sound. And I love that. But the more podcasting I do, the more I'm beginning to feel as if there's something that reaches through.

Maybe it's my voice. Maybe it's the eye contact. But I'm beginning to notice the felt presence of the other, even through technology, which I didn't realize until I really started getting into this. And maybe it's adaptive. Maybe there's something else shining through. But I agree. I think there's a both end in the world of technology.

Yeah, and we went through that as therapists, you know, during COVID. We all, a lot of people were like, oh, it's never going to work. I can't believe we have to go online. It's not going to be the same. It's not going to be as effective. And, you know, some people I know still practice online only. They actually have found it so useful to be able to connect with people and the convenience of it all and they feel really good about it.

Whereas at first, they were like, it's never going to work. Now, I myself, I have a, again, I like. I'm really psyched about the gathering we're having in September. And I love it when my patients come into my office. I love seeing people in person. But doing it online, like I still see people for therapy. Maybe 30% of my sessions are online. And I still feel like those are super valuable.

So, you know, again, this sort of both and paradigm. And then again, also, as technology evolves, George, oh, my gosh. I mean, it's going to feel like we're going to be able to pipe in like three-dimensional sound. into the room and you know, when you slap your knee, you're actually going to feel the reverberations of the, you know, so there's going to be ways in which technology is going to try to mimic reality as closely as it can more and more over time. And that's, again, that sensory, sense ratio thing are questioning. I think that's interesting. It's why, maybe why psychedelics also fascinate us. It's as though we get a chance to dip our toes into another way of seeing,

and experiencing the world that even though the psychedelic experience wears off, once we have that experience, maybe it gives us a certain psychological flexibility or enhances our adaptability. So when it comes to the blurring of the lines of reality with all this technology that's coming down the pipe, those of us who have a little bit more familiarity with psychedelic experiences might be able to transition into that state more naturally because we've had experiences where reality, the lines of what's real and what's not real get blurred. And so it's kind of an interesting thought. The more you think about it, the more is going to unfold before you're going to be like,

that little white guy from Hawaii, man, how did he know that? It's going to blow up. It's such a great concept. And the few people that I've mentioned it to were like, yeah, here's another aspect of it where if you think about, at least for me, you know, we learn the phonetic alphabet. In this book, too, you should definitely check it out, look into it, the Gutenberg Galaxy by McClune. But if you think about the way in which language shapes, not only our model of reality,

but our words, our language fundamentally change the way we see the world. And so if we're conditioned in school our entire life to take labels and put them on a process, because instead of something being a noun, a person, place, or thing, it's really a process. I'm a process, your process, a table is a process. But we like to put this shiny label on stuff so we know what it is and we know where it is. And so what I think psychedelics do is they allow that conditioning that you've been conditioned to for the last 48 years for me to wipe that away and go, okay, well, what is it? And if you think about that process, it's a therapeutic process as well because so many of us have labels, hey, I'm depressed. Hey, I'm bipolar. Hey, I'm manic depressive.

You know, we have these labels that we put on us. Thanks, DSM. We've got these cool labels that we put on there. But once you strip away those labels, then you can begin to see the process that got you there. I think that's what psychedelics do. And I think that that is also a sense ratio because you're really investigating how you as an individual see your process, which is different than the English language labels that were given, you know, or the Swedish labels that you're given. And that would explain the difference in cultures is this melding of language and process and this unfolding nature of psychedelic. It's kind of out there, man.

I can't help it because it's really fun for me to talk about. But, yeah, I really see it continuing to unfold in that direction. Yeah, no, there's something also that's common with psychedelic experience, this idea that there are no words for it. It's very ineffable is the word, ineffable. And that's a word that's tossed around a lot. It's the ineffability. We can't, there are no words.

So as you're talking about that, there are some psychedelic experiences that putting words to it just sort of robs us of the experience itself somehow. So just sitting with our thoughts and our feelings and our awarenesses, our consciousness, being present oftentimes doesn't need words. You know, can we transition into needing less words and connecting in nonverbal ways for sure? And this brings us back to, there's another awesome book called Metaphor. figures of the mind.

And this book talks quite a bit about how we use metaphors. And they also talk about how metaphors and language is the bridge between science and spirituality. Because you can't have any new ideas or information without referencing old information, right? I'm sure you see that in your practice too, where you're able to bring about an analogy for someone or a metaphor and it helps them see the light or it helps them understand the ways that things happen. But it's that same fundamental pathway, be it in language or in discovery that we find out the ineffable, right? Like there is no words to describe something that doesn't exist. So we have to rely on old ideas. But those ideas are changing the same way our language is changing, which takes me all the way back to sense ratios.

I'm sorry. I'm definitely going to I'm going to study up on. sense ratio. There is a there is a type of psychotherapy called acceptance and commitment therapy, and it's sometimes used in in psychedelic work, psychedelic therapy. So Dr. Rosalind Watts, Roswatz is coming to Vermont. She was a lead researcher at Imperial College on some of the initial psilocybin studies there. And she's moved on to create an integration organization to help people integrate psychedelic experiences. And she's big on nature, nature connectedness, Dr. Roslyn Watts.

But she appreciates acceptance commitment therapy. And that's a type of therapy that's heavy on metaphors to help people. And yes, it does come in very useful in just general psychotherapy practice when either a patient or a practitioner can come up with a metaphor to help understand their situation in a way they didn't previously understand it. It's very, very powerful. So, yeah, acceptance and commitment therapy is like that. And then also, of course, psychedelic experiences.

People can come out of a psychedelic experience with an image or something that occurred to them during the psychedelic experience. And that becomes a metaphor, you know, for their very deeply impactful that carries forward with them for months, if not years, something like a, an image of a dragon that comes through and is smiling and, you know, it was once seen as scary, but then realize. And so now every time they think of dragons, you know, they realize that it's actually not scary.

And it's sort of like, it almost like like a catharsis in a way. It relieves their trauma or relieves some of their anxiety because they once saw a dragon as scary. But during the psychedelic experiences, it was smiling and it was happy. And so metaphors are very powerful tools for. human growth, human understanding, healing. And of course they use words, but it's, it's, they're words that help us capture concepts. Yeah.

Yeah. Images rather than just being relying on the words themselves. Yeah, that's really well said. I think it was Alfred North Whitehead who said mysticism, clarification, action. And that seems a lot like anybody who's gone through some therapy or has used metaphors or watch Game of Thrones or, you know, whatever it is. they have come to mysticism, which helped them understand clarification and that helped them move into action.

So three great steps people can take in order to make the most authentic version of themselves appear in their own life. You know, it's interesting to watch this new phase of, or at least for me, this phase of psychedelics move through the way in which it's moving. I'm curious to get your thoughts on. Do you think there's a difference in a practitioner who has had experience providing medicine versus a practitioner who's never had secular experiences providing medicine. It's a question that comes up a lot.

And a colleague of mine, Dr. Joseph DeLeo from the Toronto area of Canada, he's written a co-author to paper on that subject. And, you know, it's one that comes up a lot. And I think that, you know, it's both, it's a both end scenario again. And I don't, I don't mean to keep belaboring that. But, you know, there are, I think on the one. hand, most people would agree that it's important to have a psychedelic experience and to be trained in psychedelics, not only experientially, but didactically, to be able to be of service to

people, to be able to hold space and know what a person is going through if you're going to help them with a psychedelic experience. It seems like a vitally important component. On the other hand, you know, there are people that have vital spiritual experiences or, you know, trans traverse different landscapes of their minds, of realities, different dimensions through breathwork, through meditation, through maybe traumatic experiences. And they have deeply moving profound. And they learn how to work within these landscapes that are sort of outside the normal reality. yogis, you know, all kinds of different. So do those people need to have a psychedelic experience in order to sit with somebody who's ingested a certain amount of psychedelic and they're going through some stuff? I imagine that somebody who's experienced in those mystical states, it could, even without

having had a psychedelic experience, could be a very useful guide or sitter for a psychedelic experience. But, you know, and, you know, even back in the back in the, back in the, I think in, some of the indigenous cultures around ayahuasca, I believe it was the shaman who ingested ayahuasca and people didn't even use ayahuasca themselves. He went into, or he or she went into a psychedelic space. And the practitioners were deeply moved by whatever the shaman was going through under the influence of psychics. That's just sort of a reverse of what we're talking about in some ways. So, George, I really think it's a both and situation, although I think, again, on surface face value, I think it is important to have a number of psychedelic experiences in order to

really know the different things that could come up for people, to have had experiences with that, to help them through those experiences. The other thing that comes to mind when this question comes up, I've worked a long time in the addiction world. So addiction recovery, addiction treatment. And so the question has come up a lot in that space. Does a person need to have their own experience with addiction and recovery in order to be the best therapeutic, you know, provider, a therapeutic person for an individual who is still stuck in their addiction and trying to get into recovery?

Does that, do they need to work with people who have had experiences with addiction themselves and have been able to get into recovery. And my answer to that is the same thing. We all have had either personal experiences with addiction or we know somebody that has or we've been affected by it somehow. Do we need to have gone through it ourselves in order to be there for somebody who is struggling? Again, I think a lot of people will say that is a super important thing to have. I want my counselor. I want my therapist.

I want my sponsor. I want somebody who knows what I'm. going through. Most people will say that, but you will come across people who haven't, you know, shot 20 bags of heroin a day for 10 years or smoke crack houses and, and, you know, rank themselves to the point of liver failure in order to, in order to understand somebody else's plight. So, again, it's a both and scenario, but most people, I think, would, yes, want to have somebody working with them who's had psychedelic experiences or want to, in addiction, in the addiction world, want to have somebody work with them who's had experiences with addiction and recovery

themselves. So, but I'm trying to give, again, a nuanced answer there. That's a great one. Yeah, sometimes I think that you find the teacher that you need. Some people want to go to a setting where they, I want to see this person that graduated from Yale. That way I know they know what they're talking about. Some people are like, I want to talk to George's grandfather, you know, or I want to talk

to an indigenous shaman. people see maybe people are seeking out the treatment they need from the practitioner that will best help them and we somehow we instinctively know what it is the same way that a vine climbs up a tree and knows to unfold on August 8th at 422 p.m. So too do we maybe know where to go to find the help that will really speak to us, right? It seems like it's fractal in nature, right? Yeah, yeah. We get our guides show up in all kinds of shapes and forms and, and it doesn't have to be through either through a psychedelic experience or to have somebody who's who's had that experience.

The other thing it comes to mind, George, is you've heard stories about, I think it's Chogiam Rimpote. He was the guy, one of the Buddhist, Tibetan Buddhists that came over from Tibet and founded, I think, he was involved in founding the Naropa Institute. There's a documentary about him, I forgot. but he is somebody who he's got a storied a story passed and he passed away at a relatively young age. But he he's somebody who I don't think had a lot of experience with psychedelics, but a lot of experience with meditation. And he took an ungodly amount of LSD one time. It was just like, yeah, okay, whatever.

And I think even like Ram Dass's guru might have had the same kind of thing where, you know, did Ram Dass's guru need to do a, a lot of LSD one time or 10 times in order to be a guru, like absolutely not, in order to serve people and help people, absolutely not. So that's another example of why that question is such a, it's such an interesting one and not, it's not necessarily just a yes and no kind of answer. Yeah, it's beautiful. And sometimes I, it all seems so novel and new to me. Maybe it's because of my age, maybe because things are starting to come to light and

some of the stigma is being taken away from it. So some of these questions are probably have been answered in the past, but it's nice to get to, you know, pick them up and look at them again from fresh eyes and see it in that aspect of it. You know, one thing I'm really excited about is this idea that there could potentially be a Nobel Prize for psychedelics. And I want to put that out into the world. Like so, and I've been asking some guests this.

And I'm curious to get your opinion. I know that in a prior conference, with Dr. Brian Roth, I asked him who he thought if there was a, if there was going to be a Nobel Prize for Psychedelics, who would win and what would it be on? So I would like to pose the same question to you. If the people came and said, Dr. Rick Barnett, who would you recommend to win the Nobel Prize in Psychedelus? What would that research look like and who might it be? Would it be postmortem? Either or. I mean, it could be someone's work that it's postmortem. It could be someone that's

working in the field now. It could be research that someone's working on. I'm just trying get that idea in front as many people as I can. I mean, Amanda Fielding is somebody, I think, who would be at the top of the list, Albert Hoffman, Rick Doblin. You know, currently some of the work being done by Gouldolin and some of the folks over where Zeus is in Maastricht in the Netherlands. I mean, there's so many. But, you know, there's, yeah, that's why I asked you the question. like post-mortem. Roland Griffiths, obviously, I think I saw the thread when you were discussing that online

with some folks. Yeah, Roland Griffiths, for sure, is right up there. Bill Richards, amazing work in the field. Walter Pankey, I think somebody had mentioned on that. He passed away at a very young age, but it's really seminal in this space. And there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of notables that we as people who may be new to the scene,

and I consider myself one of them, you know, in the last four or five years, we don't really know the depths of some of the amazing work. I was actually listening to a symposium on pain, chronic pain and psychedelics, a couple of weekends ago, court wing. And he had somebody talk about a paper that was written in 1930, all in German.

And it was a case study of three people with phantom limb pain using mescaline to try to treat phantom limb pain in 1930 in Germany. You know, we're talking about there's so much work that's been done that we don't know. We, I mean, we, there's a lot of people that know about it. You and I may not know about that, you know, qualify some legends out there for the Nobel Prize. but you know, I did throw out some names there. Amanda Fielding, I think, I'm, she's somebody who I think, you know, needs, gets a lot of recognition and needs more recognition. I listened to her talk in, in Denver, in June. One of her talks was very significant. And she did a lot of work with LSD. And I think LSD is a, is a drug that still has so much stigma associated with it. And so for her to bring that up, as being like, this is a drug that was studied a lot in the 50s and 60s, a lot. It was the main psychedelic drug that was studied at the 50s and 60s. And yet nowadays, we don't hear that much about studies using LSD.

There's a study going on here in Vermont, LSD to treat social anxiety. But, you know, her work and Albert Hoffman's work and all the work that was done in the 50s and 60s, oh, Stan Groff was another name for sure that should be up there on the list. But, you know, she's a legend. And she brought that right back to the foreground, even at her, you know, where she is in her life at sort of the end of her career, still plugging away, trying to make sure that people realize that there's a rich history of research that has been done and still needs to be done with that particular molecule. So that's, that's significant. Yeah, that's huge. And that's, thank you for answering that question the way you did.

I think we're all standing on the shoulders of giants and we're really fortunate. to have the people that have paved the way before us. And in some ways, that that creates responsibility for all of us to try to move the ball forward as far as we can, which kind of leads me to a question that our friend Randall Hanson had posed to me. And that question is, what role do psychedelic societies have in bringing psychedelics to the mainstream? That's a great question.

What a great guy, too. Yeah, he's an amazing individual. Yeah, triumph over trauma. Yeah. And, yeah, that's a great question. That's a great question. I forgot to mention also Robin Carhart Harris is somebody whose research is really widely study.

He's very prolific in his writing and his ideas, very forward thinking. So Robin Carhart Harris is still very young and still producing a lot. But, you know, there is something called the Global Psychedelic Society. Mark Mogollies from, Marguer, sorry, Mogulies, Marguerlees from, he did something years ago called Sykes Seminars. And he's been involved in the psychedelic space for a long time. Mike Margulies and Jazz. I forgot Jazz's last name.

They put together the global psychedelic society. And the Psychedelic Society of Vermont was, you know, donated to sort of get the, and they've brought a lot of different psychedelic societies together from around the globe. And it's different types of psychedelic society. So the question that Randall Hansen asks here is, it's such an important one. It's one that I, you know, you and I were talking about at the beginning, which is that it's all about community. You know, the, the medical space is going to be the medical space. It's a broken healthcare system. I'm a Western practitioner. I work within the system.

I understand it's broken. And I'm not sitting here singing its praises. It has a place. But, you know, the, where the work is done, where the safety is created, where connection is, and where it thrives is in community. So psychedelic societies, whether it's gender-specific or sex-specific or discipline-specific psychedelic societies, location-specific, there's so many different types of communities that are emerging in the psychedelic space. And each of them appeals to different people. and they're all not going to be aligned.

I'm not going to want to be a part of the psychedelic society of such and such because it doesn't, it's not my, it's not my wheelhouse. But I want to be a part of this psychedelic society. So the fact that all of these psychedelic societies continue to emerge and the fact that Mike Margulies and Jazz have decided they really want to bring this global network together to help people start psychedelic societies, to help different psychedelic societies communicate with one another. What are you doing?

What's working in your society? What's not working in your society? Because we've seen it over the years. And sometimes there are bad actors. And there are some nasty things that take place in these spaces. And they have over the years, one of the things that comes to mind is that I wanted to ask Bill Richards about because he spoke about it.

But Milbrook. So there's that faith, Milbrook place in New York. New York with Timothy Leary and Ram Dass. And whatever happened that. That was like this quintessential, you know, upstate New York residents where people apparently just went, showed up, used a lot of psychedelics, and we're all doing all kinds of things. And the whole thing kind of fell apart. It didn't really have a structure to it.

It didn't have a cohesiveness to it. And so there's, again, psychedelics are great disruptors. it's really tricky to develop and maintain a certain cohesion when psychedelics are involved. So I think that on the one hand, psychedelic societies provide a tremendous resource. I would argue I'll be so bold to say that they are the psychedelic resource of the future, not the medical model, not the retreat center model, not, you know, it's really as it exists in community. but it has to be safe. You know, it really has to be safe.

I think you had Dr. Catherine McLean on your podcast. He's had a lot of experiences with different groups of people where psychedelics, you know, they didn't come in and save the day, that it really was, you know, created some real challenges for people to get along with one another, to keep community together. And so we all need to be mindful of that. We need to hold each other accountable. We need to be transparent. We need to show a very high degree of integrity when we are sort of wanting to participate in this space in healthy ways.

Yeah, it's really well said. And if past relevant behavior is the best predictor of future behavior, I think we are in the process of breaking down some big boundaries coming up. And what happens when you break down boundaries? You have chaos a little bit. But that's where the creativity is. That's where the opportunity is, is in the chaos. The opportunity is, yeah, breaking down the boundaries and then having a little bit of foresight to understand, hey, we need to, we went wrong here the first time.

How can we build this back in a way that's beneficial for everybody? But it comes from the breaking down of those boundaries. If you look around what's happening in society, we can see those boundaries breaking down. I don't know which one, if it's the chicken or the egg, if the psychedelic. if the psychedelics are making it happen or the psychedelics just emerge when it happens. But it's happening right now. It's pretty fascinating time to be alive. It is.

And, you know, COVID broke down those boundaries. And the psychedelic renaissance coincided with, you know, sort of co-occurring with the, with the, you know, pandemic and the systems that that disrupted. It's a very exciting time. Again, I think, you know, from chaos emerges creativity and also emerges order. So there's, you know, I think Jordan Peterson, like him or hate him, I think he wrote a book called Chaos in Order or something like that. And I haven't read it, but, you know, there is sort of that, we were talking earlier about the crests of the wave and the wave crashing down and in between sets. And then another wave comes and the tsunami.

And there's some destruction and chaos. And then order gets restored. We just went through some massive floods here in Vermont. It was all over the news in the New York Times and stuff. I mean, towns were destroyed because these floods went through. And, you know, that caused a lot of chaos, a lot of disorder, a lot of pain, a lot of suffering. Not a lot of lives lost, but a lot of livelihoods lost, a lot of homes lost. And, you know, what's going to emerge from that is not only a bunch of mushrooms, I'm sure, but also, also, you know, some amount of order will be restored.

And then, you know, and we keep going through those cycles, expansion, contraction, you know, growth. and destruction, chaos, and order. You know, that's the cycles that we, that you were talking about earlier, the cycles that we all go through. And this is, this is, this is an exciting time because it seems like we're right in the thick of a major shift happening. Yeah, it brings up, I was talking with a young lady named Tess Bersenski, and I think she's out of Michigan.

And her and I were speaking on, she's a mycologist and a real fascinating young lady. And we were talking about how mycology and mushrooms can be a sort of therapy. And what we were talking about is, isn't it interesting that psychedelic mushrooms provide you this unique insight when you take them? But I think they also provide you an incredible insight when you grow them. Because anybody who's ever tried to grow mushrooms realizes the contamination is a real risk. And if you're growing them, I think it's not too far ever bridge to them. look at that and be like, wow, these things are getting contaminated because of all the things around. And you're like, wait a minute, my life was a little contaminated because of all these

things around. You know, in some ways, you can learn so much just by trying to, by going out in your garden or growing mushrooms. But I think there's something to be said about that particular mode of education. And I'm wondering if that's, if that's something that you can see happening more of in the psychedelic therapy going forward. Like, I think it's a good process, right? Grow your own mushrooms, watch for contamination, but more than that, watch what the mushrooms are telling you. Hey, you could be contaminated the same way they are. Hey, you could get to this stage and then quit, just like they do. What do do you think about that process? Yeah, it's a great metaphor. It's another metaphor we were talking about metaphors before that growing, growing mushrooms and having

that real life experience can be a metaphor for one's own life. And certainly, when we ingest psychedelic mushrooms at high enough doses, we can have, we can have experiences that can be challenging where there's a lot of death and destruction that we're bearing witness to in our in our psyches that emerge that there's challenging you know seeing seeing ourselves or loved ones die and and seeing rebirth happen and stuff because you know psychedelic mushrooms can they're very earthy and they can they can sort of get us in touch with the life and death cycles that that people go through but yeah I think that's a great it's another metaphor I don't know how that would be incorporated into psychedelic therapy because, well, you know, I mean, just the obvious

mushrooms aren't legal. So we can't encourage people to, you know, grow their own and possess them, do something illegal. But certainly patients do. I mean, I've had patients come to tell, you know, come into my office and tell me they bought some spores because spores are legal and they started growing their own mushrooms and describing the process. And I have heard. stories about contamination. They've had to throw out their whole batch because they got contaminated. Didn't think about it at the time in terms of a metaphor for their lives. That would be an obvious thing to, I should have mentioned probably at the time. But yeah, I love that. That's a great concept.

Yeah, I love it. I'm curious, you know, and this is just speculation going forward. You know, when we, when we harken back to the ideas of Carlos Castaneda, and we read some of the people back in the days that talked about certain substances being allies. I'm curious. Like, do you think that in the future we may begin to see like DNA tests or some sort of genetic therapy? Like say, oh, this person is B positive and they have these genes. Thus, we're going to pair them with this particular psychedelic.

You think that there may be something in the future where certain psychedelics are partnered up with certain types of DNA or personality types or blood types? it's possible yeah anything's possible for sure you just throw something into some you know AI algorithm and encoding thing and they'll split out something with I have a book sitting on my my table over there called allies for awakening written by Ralph Metznor a great great book going through all the different psychedelics they're all they're all allies for our awakening you know they do have something called pharmacogenomics I don't know if you know that but they have something where they can, they can examine your enzyme profile. So we all have enzymes in our

system that break down certain medications that phosphorylate things and convert different, you know, substances that we ingest and turn them into other substances and how that, how that happens, there may be polymorphisms or certain things that are, sort of unique to each individual. So something called pharmacogenomic testing, where they look at your genetic encoding and and enzyme systems, and they try to match psychiatric medications to people's enzyme systems and specific genomic polymorphisms. And I think the data on that is still unclear if that's super accurate. But there are companies popping up all over the place trying to sell these types of testing processes

so people can be better matched with medication. So I think as that science, that technology advances, why not extrapolate and why not sort of try that with psychedelics as well? You know, what's also interesting is that we know, and you've probably had people talk about this, maybe Zeus talked about it. But, you know, all these psychedelic drugs, they, what's so funny is that you think they're all,

they're all psychedelic drugs, they all change your consciousness. so they must be doing the same thing in the brain. But they don't. They all act on different receptor systems. You have ketamine that works on the NMDA receptor system. It's an antagonist and works through glutamate. And then you've got all these serotonin 2A receptor type drugs that activate and bind to the serotonin 2A.

And then there's a serotonin 1A receptor. And then there's the Kappa opioid receptor. And there's the, and there's, you know, all these different receptor systems that arguably don't relate specifically. to one another in any kind of clear way, and yet they all produce massive psychedelic experiences, changes in consciousness. So again, that's a tricky thing when you think about pairing certain psychedelic drugs with certain personalities. But I think, you know, I do think that as we become more sophisticated with these medicines,

I think we're going to become increasingly sophisticated and skilled in being able to sort of work with people in such a way and understand that perhaps this person might benefit from five methoxy DMT, 5MEO DMT as a first-line treatment. That would be a knock-your-sox off kind of first-line treatment. But hypothetically, you know, we might be like get to know somebody, get to understand their issues and say, you know, I think MDMA might be the best choice for you. And how that would probably be more of an art than a science, but maybe there'll be scientific methods to help us refine that process and offer people. And then also, you know, people, if they, if they're fortunate and they have experiences with MDMA that are helpful,

but they want to go deeper and they want to try five MEO DMT, they can go ahead and if they have the resources and the ability to do that, they can try five MEODMT. They can have an ayahuasca experience. they can do a high-dose psilocybin experience. So there's different medicines, and they work differently, and they can affect the same person differently. And so it's really, that's the kind of, one of the neat things about this emerging field is that there are numerous tools that all act differently

and have tremendous benefit. And each one in their own right has a specific kind of benefit to different types of people. So it's great that it's not just, you know, it's not just one type of psychedelic drug that's coming into being used for personal growth or healing or treatment. It's a number of medicines. Of course, ketamine is legal. MDMA is next. Cilocybin is next from a legal medical standpoint. But out there in the world, we didn't even say Ibogaine. Ibegain. They don't even know the pharmacology of Ibegain. The way it works on the brain

is different than all the other ones. And it's a, it works particularly well with addiction, and opioid use disorder in particular. So, you know, all these tools, all these medicines are going to have their place based on an individual's situation. And, and again, I don't, I mean, it sounds like I'm maybe promoting or extolling the medicines themselves. And I really, I really want to make it clear to our audience that it's not, it's not the medicine itself.

It's what the, what impact it has on somebody's daily life after. after the experience because you can trip your face off and change nothing in your life because you just, oh, that was a really cool time and that you're not nothing changed. And that's fine. I support people who want to use it in celebratory ways, not clinically, not in any particularly meaningful way other than the meaningfulness of celebrating and recreating. But, you know, that's a very different model than using it to make. deep and healthy changes in our lives.

Yeah, I think that it speaks to our maturing relationship with substances. I recently had on a gentleman who came up with this. He's got a new application for medical cannabis. And in that particular application, you know, doesn't really, the way he was explaining to me is that when I was growing up, you know, medical cannabis had names like White Widow or Charlotte's, there's all these different cool, names, like Maui-wowi and stuff like that. And that was how you base the actual product.

But in today's world where you can send something to a lab, you can understand the THC content. You can understand the cannabinoid system, the tones of it, the turps on there. There's all these things that we can now look like at the back of a label and be like, oh, well, here's the content on there. And I think that that speaks on some level to not only the commodification of it and the acceptance of it, but sort of a maturing relationship with it. In some ways, it's taken the magic out of it because no longer has, even though it might have a majestic name, now we can peel back the label and see what's on there. And I think that that is sort of a maturing process with cannabis. And I, you know, you can see the same thing beginning to

happen with the different types of alkaloids or substances that are coming down the pipe. And I think I think it's a positive good thing. And I think it shows that we are maturing and becoming more accepting and understanding and how to use. these things in a beneficial way. What do you think? I think we have a long way to go with psychedelics, but yes, I can see that. I can see that path. Yeah. Do you think there's something to be said about, are you okay on time? I tend to continue to talk when I find people that are fascinating. So you do okay in time? Yeah, I'm good for probably another 15 minutes or so, just because I have a beautiful animal in his crate next to me and he would like to play outside before.

Sure. Yeah. Okay. So, I'm going to do. I'll give you this one. Maybe we can finish up right here. Do you think that, you know, sometimes when I talk about people and ceremonies and rituals, you can look at using a psychedelic in a ceremony and a ritual as a container. And it seems that maybe in the West we've taken the medicine out of the container.

Do you think there's a, there is, obviously there's a place and a time for ceremonies, but do you think that the lack of ceremony with the medicine in the West is a problem? It doesn't have to be a problem. I mean, it's definitely a strong argument that it is a problem. And I think that, again, bringing it back to this idea of community, why the sort of interconnectedness of all the different psychedelic communities, as well as the individual communities, the different communities popping up all over the place, are if they're healthy ones and aren't bad actors in there,

then I think that, you know, that is the modern-day, version of trying to recreate or reestablish the importance of community and that type of group container system. And arguably, there are people, and I'm one of them, I believe that, for example, ketamine is legal. Ketamine is illegal, psychedelic-ish drug, if you want to call it that. And what's not done yet so much, but will continue to evolve and be offered more frequently is group ketamine experiences. And I've done a few ketamine trainings with clinicians in a group. And those are very powerful experiences when you do ketamine with a group of people. And you prepare for the experience together. You have the experience together. You stay connected afterwards and

process the experience. And sometimes that can lead to further deepening of connections with one another, whether it's in that same community or other communities that spring up from there. So I think that that's an important evolution that will be, I think, coming along here in the Western world. But there's also a strong argument. I've seen it time and time again that, you know, you don't even need a guide. You don't even need a therapist in the room with you. There's, there are advocates out there for solo psychedelic experiences, solo MDMA. Solo MDMA. experiences solo psilocybin experiences now i don't recommend that per se for people especially not their first time or first few times but you know you can make a strong case is why you know keeping within

yourself and having a solo experience can be a very transformative thing so that's not in a group setting that's not in a ceremony it's a very personal experience it reminds me of i did outward bound when i was a kid i did it when i was 17 years old and i did it when i was 18 years old. The first time I did it was in the Pacific Northwest up in the Cascade Mountains. And the second time I did it was in the Sierra Nevadas. And both times I did outward bound. We had what was called a solo experience. And we were, we set up camp, we set up our tent in the woods with very little food and just water. And we were completely alone for three days. No human contact. It was just us. We could bring a journal. We weren't allowed to bring a book. We just sat in the

woods by ourselves for three days. And that was very profound. That was very significant for me. That reminds me that, you know, we can have solo experiences with these medicines. Again, I don't suggest that for people the first time, the second time. Having community around is very special and very important. Having a guide there with you in case you need support is very important. But so it's another example, George, of how there's no wrong door here. You know, We just need to be, we need to be honest with ourselves. We need to be transparent with others. We need to hold each other accountable.

And we need to be open about these experiences. And we're doing a lot of trial and error stuff. And there's going to be some disorder and chaos, like you said. But hopefully, you know, there are those of us out in this space who are wanting to sort of offer the most nuance and the most healthy, balanced approaches to whatever. happening in this space. And there isn't a wrong way or a right way necessarily. There's, there's just ways to go about it that can can be healthy and safe and ethical. And there are ways to go about it that are unethical. And we need to stay on the path together, helping each other usher this along in ways that are, it's sort of for the overall good of humanity.

That is beautiful and really well said. I'm so thankful to get to finally talk to you face to face and get to ask you some interesting questions and get to maybe get a better understanding of how you see the world and psychedelics and your relationship to them. Truly thankful for it. Before I let you go, where can people find you?

What do you have coming up and what are you excited about? So, George, you found me, I think, online on LinkedIn. So I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. I'm pretty active on Twitter. And we have this conference coming up that I'm super excited about. Again, we have Rick Doblin and we have Gouldolin from Johns Hopkins and UC Davis, I think, or UC San Francisco. We have Roz Watts coming over from England. We have Zeus coming back over from the Netherlands.

We've got Carolyn Dorson from Rutgers. We've got Julie Holland, who's coming up from New York City. We've got the Midhoeffers who are coming out here to do Grand Rounds at the University of Vermont. just so happens that our conference is that same grand round weekend. So they're going to come and present to us. I mean, really just so many wonderful people coming together and sharing their wisdom and their experience and hopefully sharing in community building that in a place like Vermont at that time of year is really something I'm so grateful for and so excited about.

And, you know, continuing to, you know, participate in these kinds of discussions. with people like you, George, because there's so much to talk about and there's so many different connections to be made. And it seems to be happening very organically. So I want to continue to do that work with you and with other folks. And I just, I'm really appreciative that you decided you wanted to reach out and have me on your podcast. Yeah, well, the pleasure's all mine. And thank you for doing what you do. It's a, it's really enjoyable. I think to myself and my audience, to get to learn new insights and meet new people. And I'm really thankful for the people that are willing to allow me to participate in their dream and truly grateful for those who participate in

mine. So thank you to everybody. That's what we got for today. Check out Dr. Rick Barnett in the show notes down there. It's also kind of interesting about how many Dr. Ricks there are. There's like Dr. Rick Straussman, Dr. Rick Doblin, now Dr. Rick Barnett. So there's all these ricks in the world of psychedelics. It's a beautiful thing. That's all we got for today. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for hanging out with us today. Dr. Barnett, hang on one second. I'm talking to you afterwards. I'm going to hang up with the people real briefly. Ladies and gentlemen, Aloha.