TrueLife - Henrietta Szutorisz - For The Ones Who Never Came Back

Episode Date: May 26, 2025

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/Imagine if your nervous system were a cathedral—not a machine, not a malfunctioning circuit—but a living temple sculpted by experience, memory, mystery, and motion.Today’s guest, Dr. Henrietta Szutorisz, doesn’t just study the brain—she listens to its prayers, decodes its confessions, and challenges its illusions.She’s a neuroscientist by training, a revolutionary by nature,the founder of Objective Recovery,where data meets soul, and the tired scripts of addiction and mental health get rewritten in real time.But she’s not here to give you answers.She’s here to help us ask better questions.What if the root of addiction isn’t a disease, but a forgotten ritual?What if trauma isn’t something to erase, but to reweave?What if the brain isn’t a hard drive, but a symphony—and psychedelics are simply tuning forks for forgotten frequencies?Henrietta sits at the crossroads:between serotonin and soul, dopamine and destiny,neuroplasticity and the myth of the fixed self.She dares to say that maybe—just maybe—the mechanism of action is a mirage,and we are the experiment we’ve been waiting for.So today, we’re not talking about “fixing” people.We’re talking about remembering.We’re talking about sacred biology.We’re talking about the fire of consciousness waking up in the folds of the cortex.This is Alan Watts in a lab coat.Whitehead whispering through neurotransmitters.Burning Man in a Petri dish.And this conversation—this unfolding, this inquiry—is for those who still believe the map is not the territory,and that healing is not a protocol,but a pilgrimage.Welcome to the place where science stops performing,and starts dancing.Let’s begin.https://www.objectiverecovery.com/ 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. Fearers 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 Kodex Seraphini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life podcast. I hope everybody's having a beautiful day. I hope the sun is shining. I hope the birds are singing. wind is at your back. Imagine if your nervous system or a cathedral. Not a machine, not a

malfunctioning circuit, but a living temple sculpted by experience, memory, mystery, and motion. Today's guest, Dr. Henry Vietta Soutoris, doesn't just study the brain. She listens to its prayers, decodes its confessions, and challenges its illusions. She's a neuroscientist by training, a revolutionary by nature, the founder of objective recovery. where data meets soul and the tired scripts of addiction and mental health get rewritten in real time. But she's not here to give you answers. She's here to help us ask better questions. What if the root of addiction isn't a disease, but a forgotten ritual?

What if trauma isn't something to erase but to reweave? What if the brain isn't a hard drive, but a symphony? And psychedelics are simply tuning for forgotten frequencies. Henrietta sits at the crossroads between serotonin and soul, dopamine and destiny, neuroplasticity in the myth of the fixed self. She dares to say that maybe, just maybe. The mechanisms of action is a mirage, and we are the experiment we've been waiting for. So today we're not talking about fixing people. We're talking about remembering. We're talking about sacred biology. We're talking about the fire of consciousness waking up in the folds of the cortex.

This is Alan Watts in a lab coat, whitehead whispering through neurotransmitters, burning man in a petri dish. and this conversation, this unfolding, this inquiry is for those who still believe the map is not the territory, and that healing is not a protocol, but a pilgrimage. Welcome to the place where science stops performing and starts dancing. Let us begin with Henrietta today. How are you? Hi, George and everyone. Thank you very much. Very good. Thank you very much for having me. I'm very excited to be here. I think we did one of these about two years ago, so it's nice to do it. again. Yeah, it's an absolute pleasure. I love talking to you. And we've had some really

beautiful conversations and I love your perspective. And, you know, for someone who's like a layman over here, I don't thoroughly understand the ideas of neuroscience. I've never studied it like you. So I always am excited to speak with you and I'm excited that you're here today. Should we just, should we jump into some ideas and just begin this conversation? Yeah, but before that, I just want to comment on your introduction because I was really impressed. It's very poetic. It would never occur to me to introduce myself in that way. I kind of like it, but it was really, it's really weird to see, you know, me being introduced in that way in that context.

So thank you for that. It's very, it's very different. Definitely not something that I'm used to. Oh, I had our settings kind of jump out at us for a minute. Let me go ahead and change one thing right here. Okay, that'll be better. Okay. Well, I appreciate it. I always want people that I introduce to get to, I want them to see themselves the way I see them. And I see it in a poetic sort of nature. And it's definitely different than the way I see the world. So thank you for being here. And you know, I think from a neural, I'm always curious about the neuroscientist perspective. And it makes me, the first question that kind of comes to mind for me is, what do you think that we misunderstand most about how psychedelics work? Not. biologically, not biologically, but experientially.

I think it's, so there are many, many things and both like positives and negatives that can be misunderstood. I think one of the most general notions to me is that many, some people say that psychedelics can show us truth or reality. Like, you know, it gives us access to ultimate reality and things like that. And so you are asking my opinion, right? Yes. So that's exactly the point. So I don't think that there is any, we know from any sources that we have access to any, any sort of ultimate truth or psyched, psychedelics do that. In fact, from neuroscience research, it's, but it's clear is that they don't show us, you know, external truth, but we don't know they basically disrupt or interfere with that perception of

reality. So these are two different things. There are other notions that's well in the therapeutic context. I work on addiction, for example, and psychedelics are usually in a substance, a drug, chemical. And some people say that even professionals these days who are not really supportive of psychedelics, that it's not a good idea to use drugs. We don't need drugs. We can have, we can basically access the same experiences and the same thoughts and, you know, emotions and everything

in natural basis well and especially in the context of addiction. So it's treating addiction with another. substance is not a good idea and I think this is a bit narrow-minded this day so you can get into it in more detail if you want later and then finally is sometimes people who are really enthusiastic and big fan of psychedelic psychedelic use go a bit overboard and tend to think that psychedatics can be a holy grail to healing and to changing transformation almost like a fast track and even retreats, some retreats these days, advertise themselves in a way that, you know,

with this kind of ideas that you just go there to spend a few days there and come back, completely changed person. And I think that's definitely not true because it's all just a mental experience and then we still, if we want transformation as a consequence, we still need to do the hard work in our everyday life. with ordinary consciousness.

So we can't stay on psychedelics forever. These are some the Thai counter usually. It's a beautiful answer. Thank you for that. I often wonder, I see so much happening right now in the world of addiction and psychedelics, and I'm curious from your perspective. It seems to me, and this is just my opinion,

but the people that are best able to help people with addiction are people that themselves have gone through addiction. and it almost seems sort of antiquated or it almost seems odd to me that we could train people to help people in addiction that have never been addicted. Is that sort of like a problem on some level? Like, shouldn't the people that have been addicted be the best people suited to help other people with addiction? That's a very good question.

And it's definitely true that many people, including myself, gravitate to this profession is that they failed because, yes. experience addiction firsthand. So I'm one of those. It's just normal. But I don't personally think that we need to experience everything firsthand in order to be able to help others. There are many, you know, just that's just one example is a health, you know, anything about health. If we see if we have some health issue and go to see a doctor, that doctor will not have experienced all the different diseases and, you know, problems. for mental health, even if, even if addiction and addiction professional, treatment professional

counselor or anyone who deals with that, I'm pretty sure that nobody experienced every kind of addiction. So, you know, we are familiar with some, not with others. So I think it helps. It definitely can help, but it's not a necessity, in my opinion. Yeah. When I was talking to my wife about it, And she goes, George, that's ridiculous. My oncologist doesn't need to have cancer in order to help me with cancer. Like, she's so brilliant. But I think addiction's kind of a different animal. On some level, like, it's very difficult.

You can read all the books you want about addiction. But unless you've thoroughly understood what it's like to be thinking about a substance when you should be thinking about your family, you'll never really be able to connect with that person that's going through that thing on some level. And I realize it's sort of, you know, perhaps it's not logical or perhaps it's not something that people can do. But I think, I don't know, I just, I really feel, and you as an example of this, like it, maybe you can explain how your relationship with substances has allowed you to become better helping people with substance abuse problems. Yeah, so addiction is actually, it's one of those that I definitely feel that it helps to have firsthand experience. perhaps a bit more than something like cancer that is because the internal the internal drive of an addiction can be very difficult for to even to explain to someone else who has never experienced or who has never seen addiction even though it's very rare that someone goes through life they never see addiction at least in their environment because it's so common but the internal drives it's just for example you know

the very definition of addiction is that its behaviors that have negative consequences and we continue engaging in the behavior in spite of the negative consequences. So it can be very hard to explain to someone and even understand someone who has never been there that why we make those choices? Because you know addiction does not discriminate many people, very high intelligence, otherwise very successful lives experience it and so it can be that's why people come up with ideas that it's the old concept or idea is that it's a moral failure when you know I did just judgment before we started studying actually how it works

the neuroscience the biology and so on so it's definitely very hard one of one very specific example I always stayed because that was that was probably the most intense from my personal experience is that cravings or a desire or urges to engage in an addictive behavior, whether it's a drug or, you know, anything else. And it's so weird. Even for me, I had that, you know, when I was in that state, I had that on a daily basis. It's so weird how it can, the whole almost like a reality shift when it happens that, you know, we, we, we, we, we, we. We see that this is not good for us, and then we make a decision that we want to stop, we want to get better, we want to resolve.

This is a problem, a problem that we need to resolve because it gets in the way of our goals, our life, you know, enjoyment, everything. And still in the next moment, something happens or, you know, without apparent reason, we just go out and, you know, seek the drug or, you know, whatever is our addiction or, you know, behavior of choice. And it's very, it can be very hard to understand for someone who has never been there. But I still think that it can be, now there is, we know, we know more about it in general from science and, you know, this is also from psychology and treatment and decades of experience and even professionals who have never been there, at least in a severe form.

They can utilize their just intellectual understanding and knowledge, at least. to a certain extent. But I definitely find that in my own, in my own professional life, I definitely connect easily, but much more easily. And people actually find it very comforting and very, very, very nice that, you know, it's someone, they seek help and the helper is someone who actually understands, even without words. So. Yeah. There's something to be said about the language of experience. And you know when you're talking to someone who's been through something similar as you. And it is. Like on some level, in my opinion, it takes away the shame and the guilt because you're talking to someone that has been through it. And sometimes if we're in a

clinical setting, it's like, oh, this person is an authority figure. They got a lab coat on. They got a clipboard. You know, and when you come in, you're coming in as a patient. Like, oh, man, there must be something wrong with me. And it changes the dynamic of it. So it's so refreshing to get to see people that have had not only the experience and understand the language of addiction, but are willing to help people move through it on some level. I guess, You know, there's something interesting. Like when it comes to humankind, like we are an addictive species. Like it's not just drugs.

It's social media. Like everyone's addicted to money. Like we're all addicted to it. Like we have to have it. Like we can't survive without it. So when you pull back the curtain, it seems like we are just swimming in addiction, whether it's, you know, social media, money, porn for some people, drugs for some people. What do you think about the human being as an addictive species?

I definitely agree with that. I mean, that's describing, you know, human species as addictive. Maybe that's taking it a little too far. But addiction exists because we are definitely biologically wired for it. And examples that, so basically it's the mechanisms, even in the brain and behavior, all those things. They don't exist. We don't have them in the first place to serve addiction.

We have them because they have other functions. And that other function is basic service. survival. And for example, just even very simply eating, you know, the experience of eating and food that we find food pleasurable and eating pleasurable. Other relationships, that, you know, relationships, the good relationship. It's usually enjoyable. And we like, you know, the attachment, the connection and so on sex. It's very obvious. It theft serves reproduction, evolution. So all these. And so the pleasure component, it's just something that in biology usually we see it as something that evolution created for the species in order for us to survive. And what happens is that there are so many other options in reality in our lives that we can interact with and including drugs, including experience, is that not even every.

they ordinary experience. Some of those can be very, very stimulating, or, you know, we can feel that they solve a problem or anything. And it's very easy to experience that as, you know, it's a positive, pleasurable, at least in the beginning. And that's how slowly we usually fall in this, you know, addiction develops. And eventually, most of the time, it's not.

no longer just seeking pleasure. It's usually always so just kind of numbing and escaping the reality of the consequences of that behavior that the addiction goes in the first place. So that's how it becomes a vicious cycle. So yeah, so it's definitely there. All the mechanisms and everything are there because in the first days, they serve survival.

Wow. It's a brilliant breakdown. I appreciate that. What's going on that, I'm hopeful that you can describe. Some people may not understand what mechanism of action is. And I was hoping maybe you could define that and then tell people in your experience, what's going on with mechanism of action and addiction? But it's very complex.

And so there is a, your first question was about misunderstanding. And maybe I can open with that. Yeah, please. There are, so these days people understand. more about addiction even without, you know, any really deep scientific knowledge. And, you know, we speak about dopamine and, you know, a pleasure speaking. We just discuss that. I know, but it's, it's, it's, it's also, so, so, you know, based on what we know

apparently about how it works, it's a, it's very, it's a simplification. So there are, it's basically, you know, we talked about that, that system. So there we have this system that, that's, there's survival. So these are different external drugs or, you know, anything, experiences can basically interfere with those mechanisms. And those mechanisms are, there are many different, they operate on many different levels. So there are the emotions. Addiction usually have some kind of emotional drive. Many people even like to split, like when we talk about the brain and different brain areas,

that there are the emotional, the emotional brain or the brain area is that regulate emotions where it's the cognitive and, you know, control. And so what happens is that one of the primary features of addiction is that these emotional drive and the cognitive control, that, you know, decision making, what is beneficial for me, you know, risk benefits. It gets disconnected this two. So you know what you feel in the moment can take over. And so this operates on many different levels neurobiologically. I studied this for more than 15 years now. So on the level of molecules.

So I'm not talking just about dopamine or neurotransmitters. But, you know, many even have genes work, many things about physiology and neurodevelopment, while people develop addiction, some people. Others don't. So there are development of components. So it's very, very complex. And you know, what causes it from, you know,

basically from nature is it can be different things, such as there is some level of genetic predispositions. And there is also the effect of the environment that can affect how genes function and change all these developmental processes. and our cognitive functions, how we deal with emotions and all this. So it's very hard to actually summarize it. It's actually a good experience by me trying to share a very, very concise version of how addiction works and the mechanisms.

I love it. I think you did a fantastic job at it. I've been talking to quite a few people in the world of psychedelics. And again, I don't thoroughly understand mechanism of action. or exactly what's happening in the brain. But it seems to me, from a lot of the feedback I'm getting, at least in some psychedelics, they're resetting the receptors back to a more normal state. Like, I know I was talking to someone with Iboga,

and they were talking about how it goes in, and it changes the receptors for upregulation and down regulation. Is that different than a lot of the drugs we have now, or is that even accurate? So it's, so I would say that what is known about it now, that is still relatively new, these research is that so it goes back to what we discussed in the beginning about reality and our perception of reality and how that works. So one thing that psychedelics do is they interfere with basically control and have the brain, how we construct reality

based on, you know, what goes on inside and the external, the external, like sensory input and everything that we have interacted with the environment and it's just very briefly it disrupts some of the processes some of the you know the non-sia the classic psychedelics at least some of the some of these mechanisms I'm sure you heard about the default mode network and other things that you know control and basically that once that is removing it removes also So these older experience-based perceptions and reality models, and you know, what we think about truth and, you know, how we see others, how we see ourselves, identity, and all that.

And so because the way they interfered with the mechanisms through that, they basically remove this relatively rigid control, and then we can have access to a more like flexible state. So that's one of the main areas of focus also in research. And so how that works? So why that becomes more flexible? And you know all that, you know, hallucinations and you know, how that works.

That's also because the filters, reality, normal, reality perception filters and models, the way we see reality and ourselves are removed. You know, I'm sure you speak a lot about, about the, you know, what we go away, we usually describe it ego, ego dissolution or ego deaths, that's just a form of it. You know, it's just that our own construct, construct of our stuff is also a bit loose and then it creates space for new versions, new associations, new connections, and so on.

Literally, when people study this, what they can see in a brain image, brain imaging studies is that there are many new connections formed in the brain and the world ones have changed. So and there are many levels that there are others that people are beginning to understand now, but there is also a lot of unknown about it. So we definitely don't understand everything about how psychedelics work. It's a great answer. I love the interjection of truth and identity and

there. It's such an interesting time because you have so many people working in psychedelics that may not have a background and mechanism of action, but they do understand the idea of, oh, I'm changing my identity or my truth has changed. And in some level, that's speaking to the mechanism of action. It's, I think it's a beautiful time for science and sort of the underground that are kind of, you know, at loggerheads at times, but, you know, they're working together to try to figure out a better definition of like what's happening on some level. Do you see as a neuroscientist, is it ever, is it ever, like, frustrating to hear people talk about, like, their ego death or, like, they saw this

hallucination or from like a, from a neuroscientific point of view, does that helpful or is it hurtful? Or what do you think about that sort of? You mean when people talk about their subjective experiences and have this? Yes. For me, that's never, it's definitely never frustrating. For me, that's interesting. It's very interesting.

It can be sometimes a bit frustrating. I work sometimes with professionals who actually work with psychedelics and provide psychedelic therapy and things like that. And, you know, when someone is not able to use that experience in a way that it's conductive to their, you know, their goals, whatever they set as goals, so that can be frustrating because people can still get,

you know, we just discussed the psychedelic, basically losing control and disrupt, these rot, are established sense of stuff and reality image and all that. But people can still get stuck in that, actually, the psychedelic state and unable to use it and so on. So that can be frustrating. For me, that's never, that's why I'm very interested in this. And I'm so excited to see these days all the research and, you know, all the public interest

going into it or the therapeutic potential that everyone speaks about these days. So for me it's not frustrating at all, it's just interesting. But I think we still need to, you know, people can still use it recreationally and without any goal, just to have fun and, you know, have interesting experiences. And then there is also the therapy when someone's a goal and wants to understand something. So even if someone doesn't want to do anything with experience for me that's fine it's just more that not to overdo it not to do it at the expense of other important you know elements of life and so on so everything just like we spoke about addiction if it's excessive then it's not good yeah it's such an interesting time especially here in

the states where we're beginning to see like the decriminalization versus the legalization and there's all this talk about people, especially veterans going out and getting help with like PTSD and all of these stuff. But there seems to be a really large medical container that's built up around it on some level. And sometimes that scares me, Henrietta, because I think, what about if people want to use it recreationally? Like, what if people can use this without it? I know that there's safety issues, and I realize that there's best practices. But it just, it's a very interesting time to think about laying down the law or the foundation about how these substances are going to be used, especially since they've been in the category of category one for so long.

What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, so it's definitely, we need to notice again, we just talk about extremes. So now there is all these interests and many people advocate for, you know, legalization, the completely, you know, just make it available for recreation, anything, just like, you know, some other things. things, like, you know, alcohol or other things. And I think we need to understand more. That's why the research is very good, that there is so much research

and there is so much support now for the research on psychedelics, because we need that. And so we spoke about, you know, there is, you know, what science can study. And there are all that in psychedelics, psychedelic experiences, the subjective experience is just a same point. I mean, it's just basically half of the story. And so that subjectivity creates basically endless individual variation.

And so we cannot, we obviously cannot understand the endless factor, you know, all the different individuals, but we still need to understand more in order to, you know, regulate the use and to basically create integrated psychology in in society in a way that it's a it's a it's a it's a positive in the long run and also think about long-term consequences in terms of research there is still not much research on you know long-term effects of psychedelics now it's it's very it's very you know it's understandable because it takes time to accumulate that but so we definitely in my opinion we need to understand and i think simply real

relying on the subjective experiences of individuals who use psychedelics without the scientific, you know, more, you know, database approaches. It's not the safest. I think we need both. So I think that's why it takes time. I definitely support, not completely. I'm actually not pro-legalization completely. Maybe that's another topic.

But I definitely think that they have a place in, you know, modern society and modern life, and it should be more accessible. And yeah, but we need to understand more. Yeah, it's a brilliant part. ORA says, hi, what's up, ORA? Thank you for being here today. Super stoked your chiming in.

Put some questions in the chat. We can answer them for you. Which brings up another question I got coming in. This one's coming from my friend Betsy, and she says, as someone who studies the brain, how do you reconcile the ineffable, experience with hard neuroscience.

Yeah, so it's actually so interesting because people ask me this question all the time. And my answer is always, even I think about this a lot because people ask this question so often. So I never feel that I need to reconcile, actually, because I never in the first place, but maybe this is me. You can tell me because I love to get feedback. So for me, it's not, there is no, I don't see any conflict or I don't even feel like, you know, emotionally any conflict between the, between the, you know, the subjective experiences and, you know, everything else that is, you know, database and, you know, there's therapies and even the regulations and all that. I think even when we talk about science versus very often as people associate psychedelics with spirituality, you know, that's one aspect. And many people say that science and spirituality are, you know, in conflict.

For me, it's absolutely not. It's I don't even understand. Maybe it's because just how I have this brain. I mean, I understand because I understand how, you know, others think about this intellectually. But for me, that's not a problem. It completely coexist. You know, science is all about the unknown, right? And, you know, in many ways also, we don't,

I don't think that any current state of science needs to explain, to be able to explain everything. And if there are forced in our others understanding, it's a problem. I don't think it's a problem. I think what we call, what we describe as spirituality, there are many different subjective definitions. that's always true. To me that fits in the context of even, you know,

I can explain it to myself very rationally. It's not even, I don't even feel it's irrational. I think it's probably what we need to do is to look below the surface a bit and to accept that it's almost encoded in human nature that we are usually uncomfortable or very often. we are uncomfortable with the unknown and with uncertainty. And that's one thing that psychiatrics can actually have, that if someone has that too much,

to be more comfortable with even, you know, a completely unpredictable chaos even. That's one of the things that is known now, but psychiatrics that they do to the brain is that probably you have heard that they increased entropy, which is basically they increase disorder, or they decrease the order, you know, the certain control controls in the brain. So we just need to become more comfortable with that.

But at the same time, still keep in mind not to, you know, get to the other pole of the extreme, that now if we are more comfortable with disorder and the unknown and uncertainty, then we don't care about anything else. you know, we just let life go, go, you know, just go with the flow without wanting to have goals and, you know, interfere and have other values and so on. So I think it's, you know, this whole concept of balance. I think that if we have that, for me, that's, this, the way I think about balance

and the way I deal with it internally, I think that's part of what creates this. Basically, there is no conflict for me, I love that. It's such a beautiful answer. I think it speaks to the heart of so many problems we have in society is this idea that we should be in control, that things should go a certain way. And psychedelics do that. They allow you to sit with uncomfortableness, whether it's a thought or whether it's a feeling or whether it's an emotion. You have to sit with this thing.

And if you're on a high enough dose of psychedelics, there's no escape. Like, there's nowhere to run. Like, you're going to have to sit with that. thought and it simulates on it simulates uncertainty at a cognitive level where you can begin to find that balance and like I think that's what we're talking about spirituality versus science it's sort of like this dance between two beautiful entities that are I'm in control no I'm in control I'm leading no you're leading and it's so interesting to be the human and in the middle of that dance right there but I love I love the way you described it and it brings up this next question that we have coming in

It says, you've seen both sides of the clipboard as a researcher and as a subject. How did being studied change your understanding of autonomy or objectivity? Yeah, so I think this is referred to when I was, so I had a one time as a subject in a scientific study on psychedelics. So I went there. I was in a lab and I received the psychedelics. That was a DMT study. So that was the specific substance. And so, yes, I think that refers to that.

To me, actually, I thought about this, that it was as myself, did it actually change my stance of what was its objectivity and said it again? What was the other one? Objectivity and autonomy. Autonomy, yeah. So definitely, so, so, you know, it was a scientific study. so they have a specific set goals what they wanted to achieve. And so a psychedelic experience can be very hard to fit into that framework. And so I very hardly struggled with.

I knew this already going into it because I had experimented with psychedelics before that. And I knew that it would be very challenging to basically, you know, to stick to those, you know, the same. their study questions. But so I find it definitely limiting. So I felt that I didn't feel that it limited my autonomy or, you know, it doesn't limit the autonomy of anyone who goes to be a subject in an experience. It was to, I don't think that the experience itself changed my,

change my you know how I how I how I how I see my autonomy and you know subjectivity objectivity and all that it's basically it was I just I just realized even more that you know from the experience it's so rich is so complex and we want to squeeze it into this small framework of an experiment it's very very limited and so it's very it's very challenging in many ways, have to design that the best. And so that was, you know, the challenge of the researchers.

And also mine, because I had to share all my, you know, my experience, and there were also objective measurements and so on. But I, coming out of it, I don't feel that in general,

my psychiatric experiences, I don't think that they changed very much my view of autonomy or, you know, subject, you know, subjective objective. And so, and I think I always thought that, you know, both this subjective experience and using more, you know, database approaches and reality checks with others and feedback,

external feedback. So all of this, I always thought that all of these were important. So I don't think that's like that would have changed that for me. But it's very challenging to design the experiment, and experiment and then to interpret it, you know, the data and to, you know, to get, but we get out of it. So that's very, I love it. It's such a rich topic for me because just the observer effect alone, just someone watching you fundamentally changes how you act, whether you really know it or not. Like if you have someone standing next to you, especially if you're coming in

with the title of a subject in an experiment, like just that framework alone is going to change the thought that you have on your psychedelic journey. Like if you're in a room by yourself and you, oh, you know what, I should work on my relationship, you know, or your mind floats freely. But I think, and I think that this sometimes is where science and spirituality can mix and they're dancing a little bit is just the framework of language. The language in science sometimes to me is, it's very caging. like here's an here's an example i would love to get your opinion on like right now it seems to me

like there's a lot of talk about post-traumatic stress stress disorder but what do we get out of studying a disorder like what if we change the name like post-traumatic growth opportunity then you're building up something around something that's like a right of passage versus a disorder because it's very hard to get out of a disorder and if you're coming in with a label like you're broken like it's really you might not ever get unbroken because those the The science right now says you have this disorder. What if you had an opportunity? What if it's a right of passage?

Do you ever think that the limiting language of science stops us from achieving that which we're trying to achieve? There's definitely the language of language. First of all, language, human language is already limited. That's why, you know, you felt it yourself. That's why we, you know, if we struggle to share the psychedelic experience with others, so language itself, even just without science. And then the science, you know,

It is another level because science is a kind of rigid, you know, there are frameworks, there are models and there are data we work with data that are rules. Yes. That makes everything more and more and more, you know, structured and more kind of limited. So it's definitely, it's definitely, and then if we approach the psychedelic experience, is just simply with the traditional scientific method, very in a very rigid manner, that basically excludes a lot of things. So I think your question referred to, you know,

when we speak about diseases or disorder, so I work in mental hearts and especially in mental health. These days, there is already a shift, a big shift, over seeing this mental health conditions, as a spectra, you know, spectra. So I manage some kind of condition that is a spectrum. It's not just one state. So it's more, you know, flexible.

It's broader. And also people just don't like, many people don't like labels. And I think it's actually, especially the diagnosis, especially in mental health, many people really, really dislike. Actually, people often reject treatment, even the possibility of the treatment because they know that they will go there and receive a diagnosis and they don't want. It's not even just because of the consequences that, you know, it gets on their medical record, but just because they will be called these or that or, you know, place in boxes.

So there is already a shift, like a paradigm shift in the mental house, regardless of psychedelics, to move away from the labels and to see this, you know, the human nature and human experience as the continuum. It's actually even in medicine, some areas of medicine. even follow the trend, disciplines such as lifestyle medicine or functional medicine. So there the question is the goal is not to identify. You know, the diagnosis and the disease. That's the traditional medicine idea and, you know, the differential diagnosis process that we, it's problem-thorving.

So we have to identify the problem. So there is a problem. So what you suggest is to remove the idea that there is a problem, just see it as a state, right? And that state, if someone is bothered by the idea that they have a problem, they are disordered or, you know, they have a disease, then I think it doesn't really matter what we call it. even if we call it, even if we keep it the diagnosis, if we call it, let's say, PTSD post-traumatic stress disorder, even that, I think these days we need to see us, you know, developmental process and focus on the process

and how we can get better and how we can learn from, you know, even the causes, how we can identify it from many different sources. Instead of just focusing on that, that very current state, that snapshot that, you know, we can share when we get the diagnosis. So I think it's the whole whole of mental health, really, when medicine is moving slowly in that direction. And psychedelics definitely can have even just we spoke about removing someone's rigidly set notion of reality. I think if someone has very difficult problems with that, maybe they can utilize psychedetics to develop a more flexible view. I think this is a great window into why so many people want to work with you and why you're so successful at helping people is the way in which you explain that with language, with the spirituality notion of it and how psychedelics can be a component of it.

It's a beautiful answer. I appreciate it. Do you believe that being inside – let me switch over here to this one. If the current mental health system is built on treating symptoms, how can psychedelic therapies shift the focus back to root causes or even something deeper? Yeah, I think that's usually the psychedelic therapy. If it's therapy these days, usually they start with setting a goal. And, you know, there is, again, there is still, you know, whatever we call it, usually there is still something that people want to change, you know, if someone goes to therapy.

Either they want to change, not only that, either they want to change something that is not working optimally, or they just want to, they don't even know, you know, anything wrong. They don't know, they just want to grow. And so they go into the therapy with those goals. And so usually the process of psychiatric therapy is very process-oriented. It's not oriented to that state when we, you know,

on the day when we receive the substance, and we have the experience and we have the trip. That's just the beginning. And usually the most important part is the understanding or maybe people call it this day, see integration. So that's always the process. The other side of it is the psychedelics. So you were asking what root causes.

That's why the research is so interesting because the research is also identifying. Basically, we are looking at how the psychedelics, substance, the chemical, affect the brain, you know, on the many different levels. And there is a lot known about it these days. And we know that some of those are actually those mechanistic steps that are affected by the psychedelic substance, chemically, biochemically, are part of the root cause. So it's not only the process of integration and, you know, growth, can solve that problem or allow us to grow from it,

but also they can directly interfere with those mechanisms, those functions that are not working optimally. Just in this sense, I would say it's very much like, almost like any other medicine, but you know, the psychedelics also have these huge, vast opportunities of their subjective experience and the integration of that. definitely don't have that with a pain killer. Yeah.

Yeah. Like the host objective aspect of it. Like I do see it sort of making its way back into some of the clinical trials or maybe not clinical trials, but I do see it working its way back into therapy on a lot of levels. You know, it seems to me that the tears of a loved one who sees their significant other out of the house or doing things or talking good about themselves, like those are real quantifiable things that we could incorporate into these different kind of studies. It's difficult to measure, but again, like the tears of someone who loves you seeing you do better is definitely

something that's worth noting down and understanding. Do you think it's possible that there could be a therapeutic model entirely around subjective experiences? That's a very interesting question. In my opinion, honestly, I think that would be a terrible idea, because very upfront with you because you know just imagine if we completely just went with the subjective experience what would that cause that would be the consequences so we definitely we had you know we spoke about these different versions of reality and what psychedelics can achieve or so they loosen up or you know rigid control of you know a perception of reality and and so on so if we only relied on what goes on

what went on inside our minds without any interaction with the external world. I think that you know where does it lead to? I mean if we already learn to function with that just simply we already have such a

you know a good amount of data and you know knowledge and experience that accumulate that we don't need we can we can function without interactions without feedback, without, you know, reality checks and so on. I think it can go on for a while, but I think very soon it would get it would get derailed.

And I think that's why, you know, it's probably, and especially if we speak about therapeutic implications, if someone who already has a mental health problem and it's maybe, you know, it's just a sense of self-issue or, you know, anything, functioning issue. And very often those people already have problems, let's put it that way, problems with seeing themselves correctly. And then, you know, just let's remove all the rest of, you know, external feedback and data and everything where that lead to. I think we would go back to the old age. We could open up the insane asylums and, you know, put that people without any interference. I think that's how I see it. But of course, there are, there are, I think it's, again,

I think we need to do this in a balanced way. Only subjective experience, I don't think that's good. It's simply because we don't, at least again, this is my view because I don't think that any science, any discipline has ever shown very clearly what is the ultimate truth and reality, you know, what that is. So we can only access it through, our subjective lens.

Basically, I think in a way, everything that we do is subjective experience. We still have these interactions. You know, we speak with each other. We interact with the environment through our senses and all that. So I think that we still receive a lot of external input. But it always goes through everything, goes through, you know, perception. I don't think that we can interact with, the external world in any other way than, you know, through, even if it's mental,

just through, you know, intuition and mental perception, thoughts and feelings, those errors. So, you know, there is always a subjective field that. It's well said. It's well said. I, there's, there's, like, it's so hard to delineate between someone who has real problems or someone who may not. And that's not the right term. But, you know, to everyone, I think it was Bob Marley who said, every man thinks that his own problem is the heaviest. So like we all think we have these problems. But obviously there's people that need to see someone if they're contemplating suicide on a real level or if they have these real problems out there. But it seems there's like this giant gray area where people, maybe they need like a really close friend.

Maybe they're super lonely and they haven't talked to somebody for a long time and they just need someone to listen to them on some level. I think we get into real trouble when we are, again, giving diagnoses or allowing people to see, to see themselves as a victim in so many ways. Is that too much or what do you think? I think the victim, that's another very, these days I find it's being a very trendy, like, movement to, you know, kind of try to disrupt this victim mentality and, you know, to make people raise awareness for that, you know, and not to basically encourage, encourage people, not to see themselves and, you know, even like, you know,

populations or segments of, you know, problems, that you let's not see those problems, problems as, you know, a victim that just happens almost in a passive day. I think that's definitely, it's definitely a very, very beneficial. And I think psyched and except you can help with it. I've heard from many people. I did not have that experience personally, maybe because I never really had that kind of issues with the victim mentality very much,

but I heard it from many people. That's actually one of the main primary, very common issues, with addiction, you know, what goes on in the background, that people develop these, we call one word for it or one term for it, is learned helplessness. So it's just a synonym to a victim mentality. And very often it's related to every life experience is when people did not have support

and they were not as validated and so on. So they just lost that sense of power and influence and control. And then, you know, they turn to these other behavior, substances and everything else. So I think disrupting the, and, you know, teaching people not to think about ourselves in that way. I think it's, I don't see any negatives in that.

Some people actually, maybe not true because I'm questioning myself as well, because some people, I heard people that people can also benefit from seeing problems that they have as not their fault. And to me, that almost equals to, you know, being a victim. what's the different, right? So maybe it has some in some context. It can have some benefits. It depends on the context.

But too much passivity, passivity and victimhood is never very conductive of healing and growth. Yeah. There's a great quote that says growth and comfort can't coexist. And so that can be very helpful for people. For me, too, when I find myself in some challenging times, Okay, what can I learn right here? What is the message I should be doing? What can I learn about myself to make sure this doesn't happen anymore?

That's what to be. The comfort or discomfort. Let's see when we speak about psychedelics, that's one of the things that people must be. I think whoever wants to use, you know, psychedelics beyond just recreation, even recreation. I think it's good to go into that experience with prepared to be uncomfortable. because you know what might happen.

And I think that's always. We can't go wrong with that. We prepare ourselves, you know, being a feeling uncomfortable. It was a very big, a big part of, you know, we spoke about addiction, addiction. Many people, including myself early in my recovery, just almost every day there was something that I realized that I, you know, how much I use those behaviors to escape actually from those discomfort.

the word recovery is interesting to me is is is someone always in recovery or do they ever become recovered that's that's almost a great question it's almost like it's you know one of those things that you know do we need to sit in that way in the first place so that's for me that's why i i actually like to discuss this because in my opinion we don't even necessarily need to to sit to identify either with recovered or in recovery i can tell you you know what have have this different different models can have many people like the idea of purpose being in recovery you know it's lifelong because they equated with a with a self-improvement for me for me uh i i usually i don't usually when even you know in my thoughts i don't usually think about myself at this point uh the times

still recovering. I'm still trying to resolve my substance use because I don't have that problem anymore. I have problems that were still a consequence, that are the consequences of those behaviors in the past, you know, long term, that I'm still working on. So in that sense, I can say that I'm still in recovery years, but, you know, in other ways, I would always, we will always have problems, we will always have challenges in life. So, you know, we can also look at those. It's just like it's not recovery forever. But definitely many people. I think it's

the key part is to think about what helps you the most. If it helps you to feel that you are forever in recovery, just think about it in that way. If it helps you that it's you know, there is an end point to it and move on. Let's think about it in that

way. I think it's the important part is that if someone works with a helper, external helper, like a treatment provider. They have to reconcile this. If they are in conflict and have they stay these, they have to at least find a compromise because I think this can cause problems, even how they communicate in language and so on. So it's fascinating to me. Again, back, we always come back to language on some level. I can't help but think the psychedelics

help you change the language through which you see the world. Like they help you internally to understand, you know, big ideas like shame and guilt or whatever. But it's that internal dialogue. What is internal dialogue a form of mechanism of action? It seems like that is something that sets off the different neurotranspers. Are those two related? Yeah, so it's definitely always related.

So that's a big part of why I love neuroscience and behavioral science, because basically what we try to is to the questions. Exactly these are the questions that we are asking every day. You know, what's behind behavior? What's behind the thought? Where do those things come from? And the way we study it usually is that, you know, the mechanisms. And there is usually, you know, this is what we call a behavior

or, you know, when we do an action, behavior is an action usually. But even if we don't consider action, simply just a precursor of a behavior, which is very often a thought or a feeling. Those are also, they don't come just from, you know, nowhere. You know, that's why these are exactly some of the things, some of the reasons why people cannot reconcile, you know, science and experience and, you know, behavior and mental health and emotions, even emotions, many people feel that emotions,

and, you know, this rational, understanding and the mechanisms and everything is there is some kind of conflict. Basically, what we do in neuroscience is we study and we have understood a lot about what generates those emotions. What's behind that on a mechanistic level? What happens? You know, in the brain, in the whole body these days, most I think most scientists, even medical professionals try to look at it as a more like complex system, like holistically, not just the brain, but the whole body.

Not only that, but the life experience as well. And there is always some mechanism behind it. So for example, there is when we talk about, you know, what causes some type of mental health issue, and people are very often these days to speak about trauma. And trauma seems like, you know, it's an experience. But so that's one of the areas that I studied quite deeply for many years, and so how that works, and why we carry the trauma,

the memories, and, you know, the effect of that trauma for so long. And we do because they change development, different, different actually mechanisms, you know, things work, physiology. And on the molecular level, they change even how genes function. I studied epigenetics a lot. So those are just mechanisms, have genes function, you know, and they're expressed or silence and so on. And so basically all of this can be affected by, you know,

if you take a chemical, like a psyched, like any other drug, just interactions. And so usually there is always a mechanism like that behind, behavior or a decision or a feeling. So they are always linked. So behavior and emotions and thoughts are not mysterious these days. I think that's also one thing that that's one of the realizing these, accepting these.

I think that's basically the way to reconcile that there is no conflict between these things. I love that. It's such a fun conversation. Do you know of, like it makes me think about like the, language of trauma. Like, is there any correlation between a person's vocabulary and the relationship with poetry and trauma? You know what I mean? Like, it seems to me on some level, like, maybe even Broca's area. Maybe Broca's area may be the place where we find, like, where the trauma's held. Like, the speech centers of the brain may hold the key to solving trauma on some of it.

Are you aware of any experiments, or have you read a bit about the language centers in the brain and why that's relationship to trauma? That's actually a good question. Language. doesn't be an area that I'm very familiar with. I think language definitely, you know, the way we construct and learn language, that we learn language very early in life and you know, this experience, I think they get ingrained with the,

you know, simultaneously with the way, together with how we, you know, form basically we learn language and then we practice language. I'm not too familiar with that area. Another one that I'm very familiar with do is what I mentioned before is that, you know, what's behind trauma and why this question, why trauma is so persistent,

the effects of trauma. And that's in one way, it's not really related to, you know, this or that brain area, but more like the functioning, again, functioning of on a molecular level, like genes, gene regulation. That's one thing that I studied, that how experienced an environment can impact gene regulation, gene expression. And so that's what, you know, the discipline is this day is called epigenetics, so, you know, above the genome regulatory mechanisms.

And so it's very well known that's the main mechanism of action behind the trauma. And, you know, not just trauma, because trauma is negative, any positive life experiences as well. basically how the environment and experience can impact development and behavior and emotions and so on. So that's one level. And there's definitely, there is all this complexity in the brain that the different, when we study this, we look in different brain areas and we look at the more like systems and try to identify where the changes are. It's so huge, Henry.

Like, sometimes I wonder, like sometimes, and again, I'm just a layman, but I wonder, like, what are we doing with mechanism of action? Like, there's so many undefined variables. Like, will we ever be able to thoroughly understand mechanism of action? I think maybe on some parts we will, but when you start putting in epigenetics and you start factoring in all these different receptors and how much we really don't know, like I, I spoke with Brian Roth about his lab about, about, mechanism of action in LSD.

And like, you guys are genius, but they've been studying it for like 30 plus years with hundreds of millions of dollars and we got a safety protocol. You know, like, what are we doing? Like, why is mechanism of action? Like, is it worth studying on some level? Because it's so broad. Yeah, it's, I think it's, I definitely, you know, if you're asking a new rest scientist, I think they will tell you that it's worth.

because that's why we are interested in this. So I definitely think that's part of that question that you know when you asked before, is regard objective measures, objective, you know, quote and quote, like you know, at least, you know, based on what we can measure with different, different, you know, more like, you know,

what we call scientific methods and analyze and get feedback and, you know, reproduce and so on. Without that, I think we would go back to, you know, what we discussed before, to your question. Would it be a good idea? Just simply leave it to subjective experience and not to care. I think it's pretty much the same question. You know, imagine something much more than to us, that is medicine.

Do we want to completely abandon modern medicine? Some people do. Some people do. I know that they, you know, some people, it's for me, it's hard to understand. But I spoke with people like that, and they don't, they really try to live in that way. They never see a doctor. They never, you know, they don't, they never get those, those health checks. Usually they do when they end up in the hospital.

So I think in mental health, it's very much the same. And I think just like in medicine, if you don't, if you don't, you know, we can't prescribe a medication if we don't know how, at least on some level, how it works. It's very, very much the same in mental. house and even personal growth and being familiar and knowing how these things work can open up you know infinite you know it's just avenues to basically solutions and that are otherwise not available and if someone especially if someone is a professional and trying to help others in the mental health and without that knowledge it's very limited. That's why, for example, I do consulting. I work with many, many, for example,

psychotherapists who don't usually have a very deep neuroscience training. And, you know, we speak about cases and basically they get some level of education that they didn't, they never got in school at least in that, you know, depth. And it really helps and they always say it helps. So I think nobody, I've never heard from anyone that, you know, it would be a good idea to remove this, this knowledge and this, you know, this, this type of modern scientific understanding. Some people do, but those are usually, those are the people more like unique cases, people who just decide that they don't want to be part of society and they don't want to use the resources of modern society. And I think that life, it can work to a certain point,

once they start having problems and they cannot resolve their problems which are themselves is relying on their own, you know, subjective ideas or, you know, whatever is around them. If they don't utilize these other tools, they'd be very limited and maybe they will, you know, eventually be even, you know, won't survive because there are some problems cannot be solved without, without this. That's why, you know, we live longer. Humans live longer these days. It's all due to the understanding of, scientific understanding of, you know, how all this works. Yeah, it's a beautiful answer. It's just, it's so amazing to me. And I, I love modern medicine in a lot of ways. Like, I know people, if you need surgery, you better be thankful to have a doctor, you know, or I know

people that have tried to commit suicide and like you need someone to help you through some of the darkest nights and like we need we need all of it it's just it's such an awesome conversation to have do you believe psychedelics unlock neuroplastic neuroplastic potential that traditional treatments can't touch or is that just good marketing yeah that's a really great it's a very provocative question i love but i definitely support this i definitely have a very very very you know focused on the simple answer, definitely yes. And this is one of the main, you know, if you look at the research that has been done

in ongoing research and psychiatrists, this is actually, I'm sure you are asking this question because you already know the answer from the literature, but has been uncovered. So that's one of the main things that, you know, in different ways, you know, when they look at the connectivity, how psychedelics change their connectivity

and the interaction between different, brain areas, those are part of neuroplasticity. So the neuroplasticity is basically the ability of the brain to change, change function, structure and connections. And so we studied in different levels. So connections change. There is also that now evidence that psychedelics can increase neurogenesis, which means that you know, all times, even like 20, 30 years ago,

or thought that we don't be a one, so we just lose brain cells during our lifetime. We don't produce new ones and we don't, you know, that's just, that's why we need to make their force to conserve them. So it's actually not true. And even naturally, there is, there is new growth. But psychedelics can actually influence that to the typical neurogenesis, the formation of, you know, new connections, synapses and structures in the brain. brain and there is also these, what we discussed, disrupted control, that's a form of neuroplasticity that actually directly. There are others. I mentioned the epigenetics that I did a lot of research on that.

There is not too much evidence yet on how psychedelics change the epigenetic states, but there are definitely publication studies. Actually, I was involved in one of those that we are just putting the data together. for the publication that's showing that psychedelics effect, you know, gene regulation on that level. So that's very much like, you know, how we spoke about the effect of the environment and the psychedelics can kind of not mimic, but you know, it basically, basically interfere with the same mechanisms on the same level.

So there is a lot of the users. So it's definitely, we cannot disregard this, we cannot, you know, you know, just say that it's marketing, it's not marketing. That's why we have the data, you know, if you want to remind of this subjective experience and what we think one could say that that's not true, but it's true. It's sad that. I love the question. I'm grateful for the answer.

Can you see a future where gene expression is not only modified by medicine, but by meaning? That's actually something that, in my opinion, we do that all the time. every day we are just not aware of it and I explain what I mean by this so what I mean by this is so it's we spoke about how experience affects gene expression

right so I mentioned epigenetics so that's how you know environment experience whatever happens to us can impact the genes how those are regulated and very often we construct basically

life experience is based on values, based on meaning, based on goals. So we construct already everyday life experiences based on meaning, what is most meaningful for us in that moment. And then we go through those experiences, and those then, you know, that's just that, in that phase, at that stage, when the experience happens,

then, you know, those feedback is already ongoing, that they impact gene expression. So it just happens all the time. Another one very common in very well known is, is the effects of beliefs, you know, meaning placebo effects. So if a few effect is also not completely mysterious these days. So it's just a form of, you know, belief that if we believe that someone will help, it's usually we can experience positive, you know,

improvements. It's just a form of it. And that's also all these, it's again, the way these things work, beliefs and experience, it's an environment, they constantly, constantly interact with our physiology, with our, you know, not only in the brain, the whole body, you know, this system. And then one of that level, one of the levels of this is the gene expression. So it happens every day. Just I think I'm pretty sure that something, something is changing based on, you know, what we are. this conversation that we are having just right now. Maybe it's not long term, but, you know, it just happens all the time.

It's just a bit challenging to use this constructively, let's say, meaning if you want to, if your goal is to modify gene expression, to be specific with that, because you know, have to target, let's say you want to change an expression, you identify from some measurements, some, you know, a medical test let's say that something is some some gene is not functioning optimally you want to impact that and your idea is that I can I can cure that with a bit of changing my beliefs that's hard because you know there are a lot of steps in between and we don't usually know how to get there so but medications

can achieve usually it's more like a shortcut that many of them if we uncover how they work we know what they target and with beliefs and meaning is it's not that straightforward vibe. Yeah. Here we go. We got the one and only Robert Sean Davis. And for all my listening audience out there, if you don't know Robert Sean Dave, you should look them up.

The guy's a genius. Got so much energy and has all these incredible thoughts. And here's one of them right here. He says, I love epigenetics for exploring how DNA may hold ancestral impressions. I've seen many cases where trauma and addiction, although sometimes brutal in form, often serve as almost sacred disruptions, forcing refinement and growth not possible without adversity. Psychedelics can facilitate incredible perspectives for addiction treatment by framing it on a multi-generational basis, or as a tool for eternal character creation or even viewing impossible timing on a spiritual basis.

Yeah, that's excellent. That's beautiful. Thank you, Robert, for this. I completely agree with this. So I can reflect on, do you want me to reflect on this? Yes, please. Yeah, so first of all, it's definitely true that, you know, we just spoke about, you know, the early life and, you know, that's the intergenerational effects.

That's another area that was one of my main areas of research interests, that I did research on those intergenerational effects for many years. and how, so we were asking exactly these types of questions that how the effects of, you know, trauma, or if it's not trauma, just experienced can be, you know, passed down through generations. And so we were looking at these epigenetic mechanisms and then also the behavioral consequences.

And definitely psychedelics. And also to that point that it's not all wrong, it's not all bad that the negative life experience is that we call trauma trauma is just one word for it it's not well bad you know stress is not or bad it's a there is also you know there is we is we are we are actually evolution conditioned that conditioned us for stress we are designed to deal with stress we are designed to deal with trauma and we can definitely like he said Robert definitely we can learn not only learn from it but actually those those even on the on the on the

organic level, the biochemical level, the changes that they generate. It's not all of that is negative, even if we experience trauma. We just don't understand at the moment, you know, all the details, that you know, how we can, let's say, utilize a trauma experience and its physiological biochemical consequences in a positive, constructive way. But you know, we know it every day from life experience. That's how we learn. We learn much more from negative experiences than from positives. That's why there is also this bias and there is also many people in evolutionary biology think and has been shown that, you know,

that we have a bias toward focusing on negative and stress and stress and solving problems. That's also because, you know, we have set up for all this. So we don't need to think about those things as bad, even trauma. It's just more like what we do with those experiences. Yeah, it's, I love the way that he framed it too by, he said that sacred disruptions. Like we bring into this idea that these tragedies, like maybe they are sacred. And I know that that's not scientific talk, but on some level it is these tragedies. When we talk about people that come through addiction, often it gives them the catalyst.

to become the very best versions of themselves, whether they had to confront something or whether now they can help other people. But it's sort of refreshing to me to get to hear the word sacred disruptions or even the word sacred in science on some level. What do you think? Yeah, it's definitely,

let's, you know, it's just one way to put a, you know, poised, twist on it. I can tell you, I can share it from my own life because I have, I'm a very good example of this, for example, you know, I experience addiction a very serious one, actually not only one. And, you know, we could look at this, that, you know, definitely there are many negative consequences

in my life during that time. And I mentioned earlier that I'm still dealing with some of the long-term negative consequences. So that's a given. But at the same time, you know, what am I doing now? So, you know, I got into neuroscience, in part due to that. I get into this whole field, first just, you know, curiosity,

wanting to understand how, where this works and then the next phase once my problem was resolved and I got into this this field of you know recovery and helping others achieve the same and you know many people even even without me staying it when I shared these you know with my my life experience with them they see it's almost like almost like it's so you know it's just the fact that I had this experience and you know who I became from it and I'm doing you know what I'm doing in my professional life and why we are doing this conversation today without that experience it would not have happened and you know we can see this for those people who who like spirituality and

you know things that you know there is some kind of you know higher meaning behind all these you know my life is a good example I think I'm not a super spiritual person but I am very open to this and you know, it's, I definitely don't deny. It's like it's, it's, it's so, it's so, I wouldn't say perfect, but you know, the things, you know, how these things can come together. And what we can do once we, you know, we, we resolve to certain extent the problem. And what we can do with that and what we can do beyond ourselves, beyond this. To me, that's one of the most, first off, thanks for sharing that story.

To me, it's one of the most beautiful aspects of the relationship between spirituality and science is that maybe what people are going through when they find trauma is a right of passage. Maybe your brain has to link up differently in order for you to navigate the new world that's emerging. Like, you're emerging as something new. And why would it be easy? Like, it should be hard. Like, you should bump up against things that, like, you need help with. Otherwise, like, there's no way to really become the very best. version of you. If you're not tackling the biggest things out there that you need help with,

and sometimes that results in a substance abuse problem or negative behavior or consequences, but I'm hopeful, and I know that you're doing this with your work, but it's taking that stigma away from someone being broken and wrecked. Like, no, this is a right of passage. Congratulations. I know it's hard, but you made it. Maybe you crawled up here bleeding and your shirt torn, but you're here now. Congratulations. Like, you got it. Like, that to me is a big problem with the modern medicine idea of these labels that we talk about about being broken or wrecked. Like, no, you're not. You made it.

Like, you made it here. This is congratulations. Like, that's the right of passage that people are starving for, I think, on so many levels. And I know what you're doing. Like, that's a big part of recovery, right? It's understanding you're becoming this thing. You're not dying. You're becoming.

Yeah, definitely. You know, it's just goes back to that, you know, the victim mentality that we discussed before and it removes that and then you know it's or this even addiction or you know any any kind of really really difficult experience it's it's it's it's you know it's it's it's not it's not just it's not go it doesn't go to waste it doesn't have to go to waste and you know we can draw from it and whether or not there is some kind of you know spiritual higher meaning behind it I think it's up to in my opinion that's up to the interpretation of the person who is going through that. Some people believe that it's more like universal.

I think that's perfectly fine as well, unless they don't force it onto others too aggressively. But it's definitely, it's just like any stress. I think it's just, again, there is no way in life to escape and avoid trauma and stress negative experiences. It's not, I would probably, you know, some people believe even, many people actually believe that everything, when they say everything happens for a reason. I don't know if that, I don't like to use this expression for it

because that kind of implies that, you know, there is some predestined, you know, some kind of, you know, it just, it was already set up before for some kind of YouTube. I don't believe in those things very much, you know, to say that everything happens for a reason. But definitely everything happens for a reason in a stance that caused an effect. And, you know, this chain of, you know, that's why, you know, that's why you know, psychedelic, can help us actually see the interconnectedness and to see the cause and effect.

That's why people use it for healing because they can get in touch with those suppressed. and, you know, dissociated, you know, avoided, you know, problems or anything that cause problems in their life, traumas or whatever, and integrate that. And then during that integration, transformed the problem into something that is no longer a problem. But, you know, it's a product for growth, I would say. It sounds like alchemy on so many levels. So interesting because, you know, that's why it's, to me, that's why it's, you know, science and rationality and other things that we are speaking about today, spirituality. I don't see any conflict because, yeah, because even addiction, many people, many people, especially when they experience addiction firsthand, they feel it's so, it doesn't make sense that we make these decisions. No, it makes perfect sense.

if you think, if you view it in the proper context and you know why addiction develops and you know why you identify the root causes and all that. It also makes perfect sense when we studied, when we studied scientifically, the mechanisms of the brain dimension, that you know those things that get hijacked, they are there for a reason because they serve survival and, you know, it's just drugs can also interfere with that. So there is no conflict in that. I think it's one of the, maybe one of the best, if someone wants to find like a reframing,

like a mindset change is to focus on, on this idea that we don't need to see conflicts between things or at a time. I think that's actually one thing that it's good at the time, because I wanted to share this with you before even. Yeah, please. that this is one of the main things that I learned from studying biology. And you know, why this, why do we think, you know, humans, why do we see conflicts between, you know, everywhere, you know, politics and, you know, these topics that we are discussing today. And, you know, people cannot make up their mind and decide.

And, you know, we have to join either this camp or that camp or, you know, with the conflicts, conflict, anywhere, internally or all that. And I think it's simply because the biology works in that way. You know, it's very much like a computer. Many people are familiar a bit more with the computer, you know, decision trees. And you know, when we have to make decisions, we usually, you know, it's either it's simplified. We have to make a choice either or, you know, even if it's more options, but there are options. And we work with those options. And that's why we see those as those options become the

conflict. And I think if we look a bit more deeply, we can, we can recognize that very often there is no conflict between these options and these different possibilities. We can integrate them, even without psychedelics. For me, it's easy. I don't know why. But this is one thing that I know that psychotics can help to remove those conflicts. Yeah, absolutely. Henry, we're coming up on, oh, no, we got some. Are you okay on time? Yeah. Okay, good. I just want to double check. Sometimes I was like, you know, first off, Deanna, thank you so much for being here. It is a great conversation. And I'm, I, it's, it's been more than I thought it would be. You know, if we go back for a moment about addiction, sometimes addiction, uncovers a root problem in a family or a system or an environment,

like for someone that maybe got molested or something, maybe they turned to addiction because the weight of their family putting on them not to say anything. You know, but a lot of the times that stigma probably comes from uncovering a truth that's a much bigger truth that that person's been carrying with them for like a long time. Have you noticed that in a lot of the people that you, in a lot of your experience? Of course. We just talked about the trauma and all that. Right.

And there's just examples for that. Yes, definitely, definitely. I wouldn't say, you know, this is the part of that, you know, nature and nurture concept. And this is the nurture part, you see, but not, nothing. So it's, yeah, so it's definitely a part of it. It's, I would say it's almost part of it, at least some part of it. And then I wrote through the other components that that's why, you know, it's so good to study this. with a scientific method because we also know that it's not only the life experience.

In some cases, there can be genetic predispositions. That's also, it's not addiction, mental health, usually most mental health conditions. There is not very, very clear, very strong, like genetic, underlying genetic predisposition once you have this gene, you know, this mutation, you will develop the disorder. And usually it's a complex interaction between the biological, you know, the biological, you know, the DNA and then the experience and what the experience is caused. It's brilliant. Glenda, thank you so much for being here.

I appreciate it. Thank you for being part of the conversation. She says, great discussion. You should check. Everyone should be checking out Henrietta's work outside of this pocket. It does some amazing work. And if you go and you look at her, just her LinkedIn page, you'll see some incredible articles about a lot of the different things that she's working on.

right there. Robert, Sean Davis, one and only. I just would like, I'm just reading the comments and just, you know, catching up. Thank you very much. I didn't think even expect people being here and commenting. I'm very glad that you enjoyed this again. So yeah, so if you want to hear more, I don't know, I post, I post every week, usually every week more than once, something on LinkedIn. It's very often some about some provocative, some science or, you know, some, you're, objective views and things like that. Thank you very much for the feedback.

Of course. Of course. Robert Sean Davis, he's back. He says, thanks again, Robert, for everything. You're an amazing human being. He says, thankful for your dedication and professionalism

towards your crack, Enrietta. It is great to see how open and vibrant your mind is and how you joyfully avoid entanglements that may reduce your observational field. Great maturity as well as well in reducing language conflicts by embracing the widest possible lexicon without restriction. Thank you. Yeah.

What do you think is among the most controversial subjects in psychedelics right now? Oh, that's a bit. Is it similar to the very first question that you asked? The misunderstanding most controversial. I don't know if, I think I would go back to maybe do this thing. that I don't think it's a part because because in the past few years there is so much there is always interest in psychics both from you know you know people who want to experiment and from the science scientific fields and studies and medicine

or the therapeutic implications I think it removed it's removing a lot of the controversies there is all there is still always this open question there is the risk potential risks and benefits I think we still need to learn a lot about that I think there are still many misbeliefs about that we discussed that it's why you know going back to that very first question that the misunderstanding that you know psychedelics definitely it's not like the solution to everything a steeple of solution to everything some people it's a very extreme view I don't know if there is any, I think also that in terms of the regulations

and we spoke very briefly about, you know, where that is going. And I think also the extreme use of that. That's again, that's another topic. Why do we have to deal with this topic in a way that, you know, if we want to make the StarCadics legal or not? Right. Many people believe that, you know, all substance is not only,

only psychedics, even, but you know, psychoactive drugs, even the addictive ones, should be legalized, should be decriminalized because that would decrease, you know, the potential for addictions and so on. I think that's also in, for me,

that's a controversial, for example, a controversial view, because that's kind of, this regards all the nuances. I think we always need to, you know, before we jump to to these extreme conclusions, I think it's very important to realize the question of how much,

how much do we really know about this? And do we know enough to make that decision? For example, to change the legal status of this substance or the substance is a good time, what else is necessary to, if not, if it's not a good time, then what do we need for that? And then in terms of the science, then the research, of course, that's, you know, by definition,

there are always, you know, different models, different, different views, different interests in that. One area that I like very much is this, we touched upon this, you know, how psychedelics works in terms of deconstructing our perception of reality, and, you know, how we see reality, how we interact with reality, and, you know, how that works on a neurobiological level,

and this is what we call this a predictive error coding or processing. I think that's and then and that in the context, in some contexts there are debates over that, but we don't need to get into the details of that. That's actually there is a relevance of that to addiction. That's part of the reason why I'm so interested in that. But so, yeah, so I think we can clear up many of these. controversies. But I think we need to keep our, keep our, you know, minds and how we are dealing with these things open and question ourselves. Also, how we think, question ourselves.

It's not only what's just question what's going on out there, question ourselves. Do you think it opens the door? Like, when you look back at the history of psychedelics, like there were some really dark times with like MK Ultra or like, Jones Town, you know, and it's it's not uncommon for people to take psychedelics and then feel as if they have this sort of ability to heal people or they have this new found ability where like they're the medicine. And, you know, I can see it. In some ways I see it with some of the psychedelic gurus out there, some of these CEOs

that are pushing psychedelics. Like, it seems to me they're getting really close to like the Holy Man syndrome. You know, they start people talking about it. I'm like, vision. This guy's a visionary. Whoa. wait a minute. I don't know if he's a visionary and they use language. Like he reminds me of a spiritual leader in a tent. You know, I'm like, that kind of language begins to scare me a little bit,

especially when someone in that authority position is starting to gain lots of money and they're doing these things and they're pumping out these people. Like, is there a danger for sort of like a replay of what happened in the 60s to sort of have like a cult-like mentality be brought up with these substances? That's again. I would put that in the context of what you asked before about, you know, removing the feedback and the objective, you know, aspects of the reality. I know, I think I know what you are referring to. You know, it's, you know, everything can be,

not only that, you know, extremes, everything can, you know, we can get into extremes with everything, but not only that. People, people now use, people can use even a psychedelics, you know, as a power tool and, you know, position in the position of power. people like that you know and then not only it's it's even for you know she when they share that personal experience and everything and just because they are in that position of authority and power and all

that and you know they have a huge following and everything it doesn't mean that that what they what they say is true and i think we can see extant also that i don't want to i really don't want to mention names here but but i think everyone can come up with a one of two that that, you know, they, I don't, I never know if they do this intentionally, that they do this as a, you know, manipulation or it's just, you know, develops in that way because they get carried away, because they can do everything, they are in that position, they can say everything, they can do everything, and they will always have attention and what, but that definitely can cause a lot of damage

because, you know, these influences, you know, it's just a, social influence and people in those positions. And if they, you know, happen to use psychedelics, they become an advocate. And then, you know, they develop these extreme views. And they don't see the limitations of the psychedelic, the psychedelic drug or psychedelic experience. And especially they don't see their own limitations, their own shortcomings. They are not able to assess that. that's not a good

you know that's not a good way to progress but but you know it's kind of I understand it intellectually because like human nature just like addiction we can see

even as a form of almost like a form of addiction people that carry the way with power with everything and then you know psychedelics will be part of it that's why it's the politicized you know it becomes you know It's just a subject of whether or not we, that's why, you know, we approach it in all these debates over legalization or, you know,

scheduling and all that. Always becomes a really big topic for politics. And we don't, people don't think about it in terms of, you know, risks and benefits and, you know, look at, you know, really what happens, but they get associated. with political force and all that and they just look at that. It's so interesting to me because sometimes this case is when people use psychedelics a lot and they don't see the limitations and they don't do that, you know, probably they have, you know, they don't,

they do half of the job with it, I would say. And this definitely, so those are good examples that psychiatrics are not doing good to everyone. And they can do this significant damage if, you know, they become, you know, they, they, they initiate cults and they initiate all these movements and people follow them blindly. They generate this blind, blind movements. And drugs definitely will always be very, very powerful in that way because that's what drugs do. They, you know, psychoactive drugs, they change, obviously. reality, how we still ourselves.

And it's not only in the good direction. That's what we need to keep in mind. It's not only in the good direction. It's so depends on many other things. Yeah, I use the analysis sometimes. Like, you know, when you look back at Huxley's Brave New World, you can see how something can be used as a disassociative. And I think on some level, psychedelics have that ability to help you disassociate,

you know, whether it's through shrews. shame or guilt or maybe even stop you from confronting a problem. Like if you just take like a small dose maybe every now and then like maybe you're okay to go back and live a life that's not really fulfilling on some level, which seems to be antithetical to what the real psychedelic experience should be. Any thoughts on that? Yeah, that's for example. That's why, you know, that's why we need to investigate.

That's why it's true to actually understand how they work, even on the mechanistic level. Yeah. So I can bring up examples. For example, people, I know a person, I spoke to people personally who use ketamine, and, you know, ketamine has received so much attention

in therapeutic potential and all that. But it's also, you know, it has that kind of effect. Even, some of these substances, actually, they affect the brain in a way that they can actually impact those mechanisms that can lead to

addiction and, you know, the dopamine system and all this. you know the reward system not all of them so and then you know if that develops this pre-occupation with the psychedelic substance develops then it's just another drug addiction right it doesn't matter that you know that substance happens to be a psychedelic i think that's why you know we need to understand we know definitely that some of them some of the some of the psychedelics have that potential more than others. And so that's why it's important.

I think we should not definitely skip those investigations. It's such an incredible time. Lighterhorn, the incredible lighter horn. Thank you so much for being here later. I always appreciate reading thoughtful comments, and I'm really thankful that you're here with us. He says, I've pivoted to just working for understanding of psychedelics rather than forcing the political issue.

I think that's a brilliant pivot. And, you know, it is. It's a personal journey on so many levels. And it's interesting to see it play out on. a political level, on a cultural level, but also, you know, really you can only understand your own relationship with them. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, it's actually, I haven't experienced with this because I started out in that way when I was only a scientist and, you know, studying, studying, you know, drugs in a laboratory setting.

But now it's, you know, once you become, that's actually, it comes from, you know, it's once, if you only do that if we decide or you want to dedicate your, you know, at course to research and understanding and don't do anything else. I think that's very good already. It's very, very happy to just stop that. That's good enough. The problem starts when someone becomes more like a public figure that you know what we are doing now, you know,

it's just how they see these and then they challenge it. And you know, there will be dialogues developing from this. And at that point, I'm dealing with this. At this point, I still want to try, I try not to get into those areas to get involved in the political implications and all that. But I find that very often people tell me, people question me, so at least I have to be able to formulate a response, you know, how I see how I see, you know, these issues about legalization and the politics and so on. So you know, once you get in that position of, you know, just public,

public you are out there and speaking about this i think it's very it's very hard not to get get involved you can still choose not to get involved i i personally don't mind to a certain extent now definitely i think it's a it's important to bring up issues that are controversial and that are at the edge because that's where the the contention point is where the conversation needs to be had. And it doesn't need to be super contentious or, or, you know, angry or violent or anything. But I think that this is something that's sort of showing its face and culture. And it's, we're learning how to work with it. We're learning how to decipher it and build a relationship around it. So any questions that aren't asked, like it's the old, it's the old adage of there's

no such thing as a dumb question. Like, we've got to ask the questions, you know, who knows? Like, maybe I don't know. Maybe this person knows. Maybe they don't know. Maybe we come to an agreement on something but yeah it's interesting it's it's cool to see that take the place there is even you know the world is so the the legalization question if scientists never get involved in politics and you know that there's level those and they don't interact with the decision makers level then if nobody nobody takes that throw that position then they will be even more blinded at least you know that's for example that's my motif when I get involved in you know yeah it's like that and

you know, as a consultant or in any way, like advocacy or lobbying or anything. It's just to be able to, again, it's true to, you know, those comments that we discussed before is to broaden up their perspectives and to give actually people a reality check because I think that's again, they get, they get trapped in their subject. You know, if their politicians are interested on that level, they don't, they won't even, and they will never look at, you know, the scientific literature and, you know, all those studies. They don't know actually what they are dealing with on a more like, you know, mechanistic level or objective level. And I think it's useful for them to have that feedback.

And, you know, someone has to take that role. But, of course, nobody should be forced to take that role. Yeah. I think it speaks to the idea of, you know, in a lot with the pharmaceutical, industry being so big and so much attention on helping people and getting better, you know, there's, there's, there has seems to be on some level, like a shift from actual science to like company science, you know, and it's, it's sort of been captured in a way. I see so many brilliant young students that are, are being pushed into writing theoretical footnotes for big pharma, you know,

because there's no, there's really no money in some of these really interesting studies that I think are interesting that could, that would be helpful to people. Like, how do you patent it? How do we take the site? How do we take the mystical part out and just turn it into like this other side? And then that can help people with strokes or something like that. So there is real contention. But there's real conversation right there. Speaking of that, like what are your thoughts on taking the sort of mystical or the trip part out of the psychedelics and just allowing for the mechanism of action? Is that something that's possible?

Or what are your thoughts on that? I got to plug in my computer. So excuse me, well, what you take? Go ahead and take that question. Yeah. So I think that's possible because it's a, so we discussed, you. you asked about the mechanism of action. Is it just a marketing tactic?

And so I shared that there is actually quite a significant amount of scientific evidence now that it's not, it's not, it's so they do affect, they do have those mechanistic impacts. And so now I forget my stay answer. Can you, but what was the question? So the question is there seems to be some studies going around right now where it's, they're trying to take the sort of dimensional spiritual the hallucinations out of the actual yeah take the spirituality i think that i think it's possible even you know if they affect those you know in the mechanistic level the physiology we can have benefits simply from that i think even if someone you know there's

when people micro dose type at that example all that so usually that does not trigger those you know mystical experience, at least not consciously. They just simply impact the mechanisms on a biochemical level. It's pretty much like a medication. I think that can also have benefits. So we don't necessarily, I think it's not really a necessity to have to add the spiritual and mystical part and all these, you know, what we don't know, the unknown. We can just simply work with them.

as medicines and you know it's just just another type of you know medication and they can become part of you know a traditional medicine even i don't know if that ever happens i don't know i don't even have a good prediction for that at the moment but that could have you know ketamine again it's already being used in medicine by by medical medical doctors many many of them you know provided in their clinic ketamine therapy. And so that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's usually still some kind of, you know, psychedelic therapy that they discuss. There is some integration and all that.

But I think that's, you know, we can, we can, we can still have benefits without that part. So that's really even the, that's in my opinion, the beauty of it that it, it can, we can benefit on so many different levels and we don't need to, we don't need to turn someone who is like a who doesn't believe, it doesn't care about any of these spiritual things and you know there's a mystical thing and you know there's someone a really kind of hardcore atheist and we don't need to turn them into like you know a believer in anything in order to benefit in some ways so yeah many possibilities yeah i often wonder and i'm curious to get your perspective as a

neuroscientist, it seems to me like in the throes of like a really deep psychedelic trip, like someone that takes like 10 grams or maybe they do like five hits or something like that. But in these big, you know, life changing or these big psychedelic doses, a lot of the times you're confronted with like open eye visuals, like these geometrical images or maybe you hear a voice, like you have these audio hallucinations or maybe you see like your grandmother or you have a conversation with someone like in real time and it seems so real to you. Do you think that that is the manifestation of neuroplasticity happening in real time? Most a million-dollar question.

I don't think that we know anyone knows the answer to that, for sure. That's again, it's one of those things that I wouldn't dare to say, you know, but, you know, for sure. I think, you know, I can speculate about it. So, for example, we can even simply, again, if we just simply take what is already known by neuroscience, about how what we discussed before, that they kind of loosen up, these control, there's, you know, perception,

they change perception, and they allow more disorder, and that's why, you know, hallucinations, and, you know, we can just say, we can just think that those are just part of that. It's like, you know, random things happening. Or we can, we can speculate that in that state,

we are more receptive to other, more like if someone is interested in a more spiritual reality and there is some energies and you know interacting with the brain and the body and you know that we can actually more consciously maybe it's always there that interaction but that normally consciousness generates and you know like reality construction puts barriers to that we don't usually go there and then it's it's a disrupted and then and then we are suddenly we are able to actually see more of that, perceive more like more or not really, you know, with our senses, like, you know, five senses, but more like mental, mental sensors. And so it's actually a genuine, some other, you know, realities that we don't understand. I'm completely open to all of this. That's why I'm so interested in this topic because it's so intriguing.

where it's possibilities. And I don't think that there is, that we know at the moment, that there is anything out there or even, you know, out there, definitely that says definitely that we know the answer to this question. It is just hallucination.

So, you know, making up random, you know, chaos generated by the brain or we, you know, we actually interact with something else. And the subjective experience, that can be anything, that you know, many people, I'm sure you had experiences when you, those can be so intense sometimes that when you really feel that, that literally we feel that, you know, under the influence, that this is actually the reality, you know, that what we see those visions and all that, and now we have access to it.

I don't think that, again, it's, we can, we can say, we can say that for sure. But I think we can say that when I, again, subject level on an individual level, but believe about those, but there is no real evidence. What is the real about that? I got some friends of mine. I got a lot of friends that I want to introduce you to, but the ones I'm thinking about right now are the fishlies. And they do a lot of work with Iboga.

They've gone back to Africa and worked with the Boitie tribe, and they have noticed this pattern that's happening. And for those that don't know, Iboga is it's sort of, It's a psychedelic, but it's not a slow-acting psychedelic. It's not five or seven or ten hours. It's more like 48 or 72 hours. And what they have noticed with a lot of the people they're working with is that they have real-time hallucinations of the problems in their life,

like real-time where they're talking to them. And the pattern they see is also the trauma that seems to be going on in their mind. Like if they had a problem with their mom that abused them, they will sit down and have a conversation with their mom in real time, and they'll come to the conclusion of, oh, while my mom didn't do well, she did much better than her mother did. And it seems to me my mother did the best that she could. And that will help them to relieve the trauma right there.

Is there a possible way where you could set up a study that maybe it only showed correlation, but maybe you could show more? Like, could you study the visions of people and the neuroplasticity that's happening and their trauma and come to a conclusion? Like, these are all connected. Yeah, this is exactly what some of the studies. doing so it's not always that's usually there is some kind of some kind of you know scientific measurement like a brain imaging but was on in the brain and then people

are asked about and you know they even have to have to interact during the experience I did this myself the form of this myself and that's exactly and I think it's also you know the you know the the earlier experience is a trauma or anything but a lot of it is you know the baby state is based on memories and actually So definitely we already know that the psychedelics, a lot of what the psychedelics do, you know, this disruption of all these processes. In part, they disrupt also the memories and, you know, how we interact with memories. And, you know, that's how those things come up that previously dissociated or, you know, not remembered.

Or, you know, things get processed or constructed piece together, you know, from the different memory fragments in a different. way and suddenly that's the insight that we suddenly understand something in a new way. Those definitely, definitely, that's basically, that's definitely what happens in psychedelic therapy, exactly. So that's the beauty of it. It's so exciting to think that it's almost like an evolution of therapy on some level. Or maybe it's, maybe it's the indigenous people already knew this and we're just catching up on some level, you know, but it's fascinating to think that you can, you can remember a situation

and fundamentally change the outcome of that situation. Like, it's the wrong term. It's kind of like time traveling or, but it just seems like such a brilliant way for people to actually self-heal or find a way to move forward in life. It's so beautiful on so many levels. Yeah. It's also, I find it is so, so, so, first thing, I think that, you know, the whole consciousness that, you know, when everyone is more or less, the fact that most of the mental processes and decisions that we make are unconscious, like 90% or more. And then, you know, when we use this substances, then, you know, we can remember or, you know, we can, we can put to piece together more of it or we can access more of it.

So in that way that, you know, 90% unconscious, you know, it becomes a bit, you know, more conscious. so you know it's enters consciousness or you know we can we can request them in different ways and yeah so definitely that's

that's that's that's what it's I think it's but it's really fascinating is you know what you mentioned that people have done this it's not it's not the invention of you know the 21st century or 20th century or anything

that you know the shamans and you know people in the during the trial ages discovered very early in nature that you know many of these plants go grow in nature and they ingested them and realized that so it's definitely using psychedelics is not new I think what is new is that now we are adding this more like you know modern type of understanding so we are making it a kind of clarifications and shamans usually we're not interested in you know what neurobiology. Lighter Horn, thanks again for being here, my friend.

He says, we should have access to real healing tools. Yes, I love that. Yeah, so definitely. I mean, yeah, so it goes back, I guess, access to, you know, accessing psychedelic therapy, psychedelics, you know. Should they be accessible freely to everyone or not? It's a whole, I think there could be a whole discussion. Yeah, it's a beautiful discussion.

Henry Da, are we just blew through like two hours like it was five minutes. It's such, I always love talking to you. It's so much fun and I feel like I get to walk away with different insights and I appreciate your opinion on all of them. Where can people find you? What are you coming up and what are you excited about? Yes, so thank you. Thank you very much for the conversation.

I also enjoy this very much. I always feel like when we talk that really the goal over the place, it's almost like, Almost like not everyone is open to this type of discussion. It's almost like a psychedelic experience just with normal consciousness, like jumping going over the place with the dog online without constraints. But anyway, so in terms of contact information, so professionally, so I have a website with my company. My company is called Objective Recovery.

We have a website called it can be found an objective recovery.com. It's actually very simple at the moment. We'll update it later this year. And so you will find some information there. If you want to connect with me, I am very active on LinkedIn. I post on LinkedIn once twice, more or less every week, sometimes related to similar things that we are discussing today. So via LinkedIn and so at the website again, there is a contact.

And also we have now podcasts, so we just launched a podcast. Actually, George, you were a guest, one of the guests, we will release that episodes, so that will also be interesting. So that's on the full-last episodes of the podcast. It's also called Objective Recovery, and they found full-length episodes on YouTube, Objective Recovery accounts, so there are all the few episodes. We speak a lot about addiction there, but there will be other episodes. So it's the one about with Georgia, with something else.

I won't spoil it. So you'll see in a couple of weeks. And then we also have a short version, see post of those podcast episodes. I posed them on LinkedIn. I also TikTok. And basically that's it. So on social media, it's like just anyone Googles my name.

I don't think that there is, there is anyone else. I'm not ever with his name. So it's easy to find me. And I would encourage everybody to go down of the show notes and check out the links and do yourself a favor you post so much incredible things on lincoln on a wide variety of topics and i just want everyone to go over there and look for themselves to see the things you're writing about and to inquire about objective recovery and the things you're doing i really appreciate the way in which you approach the recovery and

your style of communication and your openness and i'm i'm really thankful that you're here today so hang on briefly afterwards but to everybody within the sound of my voice thank you you so much for being here. Lighter, Sean, Deanna, Glenda, Robert, Orah. Thank you everybody for chiming in Betsy. Everybody in the comments on the monitor over here. Thank you so much for today, ladies and gentlemen. Aloha. Thank you very much for the evidence for the comments. George, for having me today. Really enjoyed it. Thank you. Me too. Okay.