TrueLife - Jennifer Chesak - The Psilocybin Handbook for Women

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

One on One Video Call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_US🚨🚨Curious about the future of psychedelics? Imagine if Alan Watts started a secret society with Ram Dass and Hunter S. Thompson… now open the door. Use Promocode TRUELIFE for Get 25% off monthly or 30% off the annual plan For the first yearhttps://www.district216.com/@jenchesakhttps://www.jenniferchesak.com/the-psilocybin-handbook-for-womenJennifer Chesak is an award-winning freelance science and medical journalist, editor, and fact-checker based in Nashville, Tennessee. Her work has appeared in the Washington Post, Healthline, Better Homes and Gardens, The Daily Beast, B*tch, and more. Her coverage focuses on chronic health issues, medical rights, health care, harm reduction, and the scientific evidence around health and wellness trends, including cannabis and psychedelics.Jennifer earned her master of science degree in journalism from Northwestern University’s Medill. She currently teaches copyediting, technical writing, and media studies in the publishing program at Belmont University, leads various workshops at the literary nonprofit The Porch, and serves as the managing editor for the literary magazine SHIFT. In her free time, Jennifer, who is originally from North Dakota, can be found covered in mud out on a trail run or in her garden. Find her work at jenniferchesak.com and follow her on socials @jenchesak. 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. Heiress through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Codex Seraphini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope that the world is singing for you. I hope there's miracles that are about to happen. And if you find yourself in a bit of a funk, I hope that you understand. understand that the heavens are about to open and you are about to be treated to a beautiful conversation from a beautiful human being that wants to make your life a little bit more beautiful.

Jennifer Chesick, I am so stoked you're here today and to talk about your new book. How are you today? I'm great. Thank you so much for having me on your show. I really appreciate it. Yeah. The pleasure is all mine. I love getting to learn new things and I love talking to interesting people, especially when

they have written words that can help make the world around us better. And you've written a book called the Psychedelic Handbook for Women. Is that accurate? It's the psilocybin handbook for women. Gosh, dang it. I'm sorry. Just about magic mushrooms. But yes, you were pretty close.

So, yeah. Okay. So let me ask you this. In those world that we see emerging with psilocybin being in the forefront of the psychedelic stage, and we've just had to. this huge event in Denver and we're seeing this idea of psilocybin being able to help out so many people in mental health. I think it's beautiful that we're beginning to find people who are walking down the path of certain areas. And you have written this book, while everybody can read it

and learn from it, it's geared mostly towards women, right? Absolutely. So what I learned from doing some preliminary research when I was diving into all of this is that there are some women who there are more women that are using some psychedelics than men are, which I found fascinating. Now I dug a little deeper, and then this was the thing that really didn't surprise me. What we're finding is that more women are using some psychedelics than men because they're using them to self-treat for, you know, PTSD, trauma, anxiety, depression, and then chronic health conditions. And so whereas men often use psychedelics more recreationally, and that's not true for everyone,

And of course, women are using psychedelics to self-treat. And then to dig a little deeper into that, again, they're using to self-treat for conditions. And this did not surprise me because I do find that a lot of times the mainstream medical system kind of leaves women behind. And, you know, I'll just throw a little thing out there to kind of explain what has happened. So it wasn't until the early 1990s that women were actually regularly included in clinical trials. They were largely excluded before, which is crazy because, you know, the medical system was treating our bodies as if we're all the same and they're not. And then to put this into perspective, like how does this affected women over time that we kind of got delayed and being included in clinical trials?

So for one example is that for men, with male sexual dysfunction, men got a drug for male sexual dysfunction in 1998. And we're all really familiar with that medication. And it's Viagra, right? Yay. Right. And so it's great. I'm so glad that they have Viagra. But it wasn't until actually 2005 that we got a full complete picture of the Clitoris.

So the clitoris has internal structures. It's not just the little knobby thing, you know, in the beginning. And so someone, a urologist, a female urologist, she did some MRI imaging to figure this out. And so thank you. And so it was 2005 when we finally get to finally get a, we finally, find the clitoris, right? And then it wasn't until 2015 that women got a drug for female sexual dysfunction. And if you look at the statistics, this is alarming because 40% of women of reproductive age have some type of sexual dysfunction. And that number goes up to 85% once someone,

once people reach menopause. So this is alarming to me. Men had Viagra in 1990s. Women didn't get a drug for female sexual dysfunction until 2050. So that's kind of the spiel I like to throw out there on the disparities in women's health. Yeah, it seems like the song remains the same, right? Yes. Right, exactly. Man, it's interesting to think about it. And, you know, when I think about Scybine, I think back to some of, for me, I go back to

Terence McKinnon and he talks about, you know, these different ideas or you can read almost, you know, John Allegro's, the mushroom in the cross. But in all these books, we talk about. people getting together. And it seems that there were these ceremonies where we had psilocybin. And we had a much more realistic idea of our sexuality. And it seems that like psilocybin was used in these sort of ceremonies to help us all have a little bit more functional sexual world, right? Is that, is that sound accurate to you? Yeah, I think the history sort of shows that. And I think, you know, going forward as we're sort of in this new psychedelic renaissance, and I always put that in

quotes because there was a renaissance before the war on drugs, of course. And, you know, I think what people are discovering is that it can, psilocybin can really be this tool to feel connected to other people. If you, if you're feeling very isolated, it can be a very connecting tool where you feel almost at one with the rest of the world or the people around you, nature, et cetera. So I do see some potential there for, for sexual health as well. Does it, so I don't know a whole lot about the difference in, I've never studied the real differences in the way the brain works and the sexual differences between men and women. But I've been reading some of the research the way in which psilocybin shuts off the default mode network. In your book, does it, do you talk about or have

you looked into some of the differences in the way in which psilocybin acts differently on the brain for men and women? So what they're thinking, researchers are sort of thinking about this and studying it, but we need a little bit more research. But what they've determined is that the female hormones potentially have an impact with psilocybin. So estrogen, progesterone, again, we still need more research on that, but it looks like there might be some sort of entourage effect. So people are probably more familiar with the entourage effect in terms of cannabis in thinking about cannabinoids. We've got THC. We've got CBD. I mean, there's so many other cannabinoids and cannabis. But often, Oftentimes, THC and CBD can work really well together to elicit a nice effect.

And so there might be something very similar going on with the female hormones and psilocybin. Now, there's some research that points to this idea that women are maybe more susceptible to having a bad trip, but that's not necessarily always going to be the case or, you know, it's just a possibility that it may matter in our cycles when we use psilocybin. So I did include information on that and just kind of to give you the nutshell about that. I did talk to someone who practices womb care. She's an indigenous wisdom expert and she works with people on if they're having issues with their cycles, how do they incorporate psilocybin into that?

And so if people are planning to use psilocybin in more of a deeper trip, doing a deeper journey, you would want to do that near ovulation rather than closer to when you're, you're going to get your period. And that is simply because, I mean, obviously this is rooted in indigenous practices, but in a nutshell, she told me that as we get towards our cycle, you know, all of the energy in our bodies being sort of, you know,

push towards the fetus. And so we have a lot of cravings and things like that. I crave chocolate. And so it's really hard to fast, as many people do fast before going into a psilocybin journey. And so it's really hard to do that as you get towards your period. But if you're in that ovulation time, so the middle of your cycle, you have a lot more energy to do those sorts of things. And you may have a better experience.

No, that's no guarantee. It's just what I'm learning through the research. Yeah, it's fascinating. And it's amazing to me to think about all the potential benefits. And the differences to it, was there any link to fertility or time to take it? Like, is there a link to that at all? So they haven't really researched on fertility. yet, but I'm hoping that that comes after a little bit more research.

Right. But what some research is showing, so some two female scientists out of John Hopkins have been studying, doing case studies on how psilocybin affects the menstrual cycle. And what they found, so they looked at three women, two of the women used psilocybin. And they, they, you know, took a survey to see how it affected their menstrual cycles. And these two women, they each had an issue with. their menstrual cycles. One had premenstrual dysphoric disorder, which is PMDD for short. And the other had polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is PCOS. And PCOS is definitely a, can be a fertility issue for people.

And what the researchers found was that in these women, after they did a psilocybin journey, their cycles came a little bit early. And they had had irregular cycles before using the psychedelic, But then after using, their periods became much more regular. So there's certainly some potential there to help with fertility issues. We just need a little bit more research on that. Yeah, that's a fascinating concept to think about the way it can help make things more regular. Or what about as far as changing the like alleviating. some of the symptoms? Is there like pain, like sometimes people, sometimes my wife will get like

horrible cramps or something like that. Is there, is there something that does psilocybin work on that aspect of it as well? Yeah, I think so. So again, we still need more research and I'll probably say that a lot. But I love that we're actually starting to study this. So, yeah, there's, there's potential for this to help alleviate heavy cramping. So I have a condition called endometriosis, which it causes excruciating cramping. And, you know, one in 10 women have this condition. But so I did a little digging on whether or not psilocybin may be able to help with that. And I came across this really interesting study where some scientists, they weren't actually looking into endometriosis or cramping, but what they did was they took four psilocybin extracts

and then placed them on cell, like human cells in a petri dish. And what they found was the psilocybin extracts reduced that the expression of these pro-inflammatory. cytokines. And so that's just, these are just sort of cytokines are things that cause inflammation in the body. And when we look at a condition like endometriosis, those growths that, that, you know, are from endometriosis inside the pelvic area, those end up secreting these these inflammatory cytokines. So there's some potential there, I think, again, need more research. And these researchers weren't looking at endometriosis. But if we're reducing that inflammation that's causing some of the, the,

pain, there's definitely some potential that, that microdosing psilocybin regularly may help with that. And what the indigenous wisdom expert that I talked to who practices womb care, she suggested that if people are considering microdosing for their cycles, to give it three months. So follow whatever microdosing protocol that you want to follow. I do list a couple in the book. You follow that for three months and see how it affects you over time. and maybe keep a journal about your symptoms and things like that. And then see where it goes three months later.

And then if it's not working, try a different microdosing protocol or something like that. So just a really good wisdom from her. Yeah, that does sound like great wisdom. This sounds, I love the way your face lights up when you're talking about the book that you wrote. Like I could tell that you had a good time writing it. And you did a lot of research into it. And I'm often curious about the origin stories of how something like this gets written. And I was curious, maybe you can share a little bit of, of it with you.

It seems like a little bit autobiographical in some ways. It seems to get a lot of fun writing. How did it come to be? Thank you. Yeah. So it came to be in a very weird way where there was a publisher looking for someone to write a book about psychedelics for women. And I happen to have a background in writing about psychedelics for different news outlets.

I'm a journalist and a fact checker. So I've been writing about psychedelics fact checking. Are there other articles about psychedelics? And I'm a huge, I also focus hugely on women's health when I do my journalism work. And so it just seemed like this natural merging of the two to put the book together. And then, as I mentioned, I have endometriosis. So I've been through the ringer with the regular medical health system. And I get so frustrated with it and how women are treated at the doctor's office that, you know,

I really did incorporate a lot of personal information. And, you know, as you said, it was a little bit autobiographical. Definitely is. Included a lot of information about my struggles with endometriosis. And then I also wrote, my first chapter is really all about my personal psilocybin experience. And, you know, I know sometimes hearing from people about their trips, it's like listening to someone talk to you about their dream. It's nonsensical. It doesn't make any sense to you. I tried to make it as clear as possible in terms of describing my journey with psilocybin because I think that takes some of the fear out of it for other people when they can read from other people's experiences. And I also included

stories from other women who've had success with psilocybin for various conditions or just things that are affecting them in their lives. I love it. I love listening to people's dreams. And I think it's important to establish a relationship with the reader. And one way you can do that is by being vulnerable and explaining to them your relationship with what you're talking about I think it's a beautifully, beautiful way to do it and probably a very successful way to do it. Was there anything that you found in this research that made you just like stop and be like, whoa, wait a minute. Yeah, absolutely.

So I think, you know, there's a lot of confusion about how does this all work? How does psilocybin elicit these effects that we're seeing come out in research in terms of like easing PTSD or anxiety and depression or helping to change behaviors? like it's being studied for smoking cessation or substance use, things like that. And so I think a big question people have is how does it happen? How does it work? What does it do? And so obviously people can tell you their stories of their trips, but you're not

understanding necessarily what's happening in the brain. And so I came across this amazing model that researchers have created to sort of explain what happens when you're on a psychedelic journey. And so it's called the Rebus model, like R-E-B-U-S. And that stands for relaxed beliefs under psychedelics. And the researchers created this analogy of sorts to sort of describe it. And so I love explaining this analogy because it's so easy to understand. So in normal states of consciousness as we are right now, our minds as adults are fairly rigid.

So you can think of it as being almost like a frozen pond. And if you're trying to get new information into your mind about how, say, the world works or how you feel about yourself, then there can be this difficulty of making something gain input into that frozen. So imagine trying to take a rock or something and throw it on the pond that's frozen. It doesn't gain entry, the rock being this new information that we're trying to get into our brains. It just hits the surface. Maybe it causes a crack, but it doesn't do a whole lot. When we're on psychedelics, then our minds become much more flexible. So we can think of that pond being thought now.

Now you take that rock, that new information, whatever it is, a better belief about yourself, you drop it in that pond. It sinks in and it causes a ripple effect. So we can gain in, we can get something into our minds that we're really trying to work on getting in there. Again, whether that's a new belief about yourself, how the world operates around you, how you interact with your family members, all of that. So I think that's such a great way to explain it. And when I read that, it just everything really clicked for me.

I was like, yeah, the things I learned on my own psilocybin journey really I couldn't have learned without doing psilocybin, I think. Yeah. I agree. That is a beautiful way to look at it. And I've never heard that particular model for it before. But it makes perfect sense to think about the way in which we can be susceptible to new ideas. and not only susceptible, but incorporate them in there, right?

It's like, you become and again like that. That's beautiful to think about. Right. It really, really is. You know, one, it seems to me that one of the really unfair things that women have to deal with that men don't is this postpartum depression. And you can read books and I've talked to people who have, who it's been a real problem for. And not just for them, but for their whole family. And it seems to me, if we look at some of the studies that,

psilocybin has with depression or, you know, changing the mind or allowing someone to have some new thoughts. I bet you there's a connection there. I bet you psilocybin could really help with that. Is that something you talk about in the book? Yeah, I do. I include that in chapter 11 of the book where I go through all these different conditions and pre, at postpartum depression is one of those things that I did write about. And so I do, I do see some beneficial or potential for beneficial effects for people. Now, you know, it's not going to immediately fix postpartum depression the minute you do a psychedelic journey, but, you know, there's the importance of what's called integration after a journey. So in a nutshell, that is just really how you start to understand

what happened during your journey, what was, what insights were given to you, what do you want to do with those going forward? So integration can happen with a therapy, with a psychedelic, therapist, someone who's trained in that, or you may just have a community of people who are well-versed in psychedelics friends, whatever that might be, or a circle in your community that focuses on this. And getting together with those people can really help you talk through your experience from your journey. And that can start that healing process regarding postpartum depression. Again, not going to be a magical solution, even though we call it magic mushrooms, but it may help ease some of that grief or depression that someone might be experiencing during

postpartum depression. Yeah, that's well put. And it makes me think that, you know, sometimes, at least in my life, psilocybin has really helped me cope with really strong emotions. And it seems that, you know, men and women cope with emotions. Each individual deals differently with their emotions and stuff. And I love the idea of women really beginning to use. psilocybin in a way that helps them become the best version of themselves and men doing it.

And wouldn't it be interesting if we had like psychedelic relationships? You know what I mean? Like wouldn't that be so much better? Right. Absolutely. You know, I, you know, I, even if you and even if your partner isn't doing a psychedelic, I think it's super beneficial for the individual. Yeah. And then giving them new insight about their relationship, just, you know, as an example,

for me, you know, I use psilocybin, but my husband is not, he's not, he's not interested in trying it, which is totally fine. Right. But I, you know, what I felt on my journey was like I could envision, again here it sounds like I'm talking like a dream, but I could envision our entire relationship, not, not as like a slide show of like existing from past to now. It was more like seeing everything all at once, all the things we've been through together, all the love we have for each other. I could just feel it and see it. And then I could also envision this future of like all that my relationship will become. And so he didn't need to do the journey. Like that was something I did and it felt really cool.

And I came back to my relationship after that and and because I did my journey separate and, you know, came back and it was just like I could just feel this intense love. And it's not that I didn't have love before, but it was so much more like visceral, I guess. So it could definitely be a really good, powerful thing. for relationships. Yeah. And I think especially too, when we start talking about the title of the book, Sillus Sibin, A Handbook for Women, it makes me, you know, sometimes when you see something, I think it's called the reticular activating system.

But it's all of a sudden you buy a red car and then you see a red car everywhere. Or if you buy a new shirt, you see that shirt everywhere. But you never saw it before. And so as soon as I caught the title of your book, all of a sudden I started seeing, hey, there's a red tent event over here. I'm like, what's a red tent event? event, you know, and all of a sudden, like, I'm starting to see in my peripheral or, you know, the same way when you take psychedelics, all of a sudden you see these new things happen.

But it does seem to me that there is this new, beautiful understanding emerging that, hey, we, we are women and we're doing our own thing and this thing works with us this way. And, you know, it just seems beautiful to me. Is it, is it just that I'm noticing it now? Or do you think that these things are kind of moving together? Because when I think at the Red Tent event, I was talking to a Sophia Dogg, who's down in She was down in South Africa, and she was talking about taking psilocybin and going to this event. And I'm like, what a cool thing to do.

Like, have you noticed that kind of moving in that direction? Absolutely. I think that's been happening. And I think it's happened outside of psychedelics, too. It's just women are really coming together and trying to help each other. And what I love to talk about is, so when we think about fungi, fungi, however you say it. So I don't know if you've ever heard of the wood wide. web. So there's a scientist, a female scientist. Her name is Dr. Suzanne Simard, I believe. And she

discovered, I guess, I think it was in the 1990s where she discovered that, that mushrooms or fungus in the forest have this full underground network. And a lot of people know it as the mycelium network. There's all this, there's this huge root system. So, you know, if you go out to the woods, I mean, you don't even have to go out to the woods, we can just think about it. But underneath all the trees and all the soil there, there's this whole network of roots systems going on. That's called the mycelium network and then the larger mycorrhizial network. And Dr. Suzanne Simard labeled it the wood wide web.

And the cool thing about the wood wide web is that if you've got a tree, you know, way over there and it's starting to die, this mycelium network will take nutrients from a healthy tree and send it. It sends it for, you know, I don't even know how feet, miles, whatever it is. And so that's so amazing. And when I think of women, I think of that mycelium network. We're these nurturers.

We help the person that is struggling. We send this energy their way or we help them out, however it might be. I really like to think of women as being this nurturing system like the Wood Wide Web. And so I think that's what you're seeing, you know, that's coming up for you, is seeing women come together for all of these different events. And I love that. Yeah, me too. That's a great way to describe it.

I think that it's fascinating to, I think one thing, while there's many differences between men and women and psilocybin, I think one thing we share is the relevant understanding and learning about relationships. We may interpret that differently, but there's something to be said about psilocybin and relationships and the way you get to interact in them, and the way you get to see him and the one you have with yourself. That's a fascinating concept in itself, right?

Absolutely. I think one of the major gifts that I got from my journey, and this happened on just a small dose. I did a small dose one day and then a deeper dose the next day. And my first experience, I was lying down on a mat with an eye mask over me. And so just kind of going into this very deep meditation. And I could feel all the light and love coming from. from people that are in my support network, friends, family from afar, sending me love.

And I was sending love back to them on these sort of like, I don't know, paths of light. It's hard to explain. And again, it sounds like I'm talking about a weird dream or something. But it was a really nice gift to be able to feel that because I think we know that we have support systems out there. We have our friends. We can call them and lean on them. But to really feel it as this true thing was such a gift for me.

And I think that's a common theme that people experience when they do psilocybin. They sense that really strong connection with others and that they are supported and cared for. Yeah, that is such a great point. We should talk about that for a minute. I've spoken to so many people who when they're beginning to explain some of their first experiences, they say things like, it was the first time that I really let myself love myself. Or it's the first time that I really felt accepted. You know, or it was the first time I realized how much my family loved me.

But there's always this, this bringing up of, oh, my God, it was one of the first times. Or I hadn't felt like that in a long time, you know. But it's, it is just this reconnection. And it's interesting that you talked about the World Wide Web. Because the same and the way you see women in the mycorcial, you know, relationships that happen because it does seem like on some level, maybe it's the society we live in, maybe it's that we worship money too much or we live in this material realm, but it seems that we have lost our way when it comes to relationships in some ways. And psilocybin helps us figure that out.

Yeah. And I think it all does that by sort of disconnecting that default mode network. And, you know, that helps us. So the default mode network is, um, It's a group of brain regions that work together. So it forms the default vote network or the DMN for short. And that, again, is it contains your ego, your sense of self, all of these things. So when that gets a little disconnected during a psilocybin journey, which is what happens, suddenly we feel less looking so internally at like ourselves or what, you know, the bad ideas we have about ourselves. And instead, what this does by disconnecting that default mode network is it makes us feel more connected to the world at large or the whole universe or it might just be the people around you. But that is that magical thing about magic mushrooms is that it kind of cuts the ego out for a bit.

And when you can take that away, you really feel that sense of connection. I love that because we do feel, I feel like in this world, we can often become disconnected. because we're staring at our phones all the time rather than talking to the person across from you at the table or whatever it may be or your partner when they're in bed with you, you're both staring at your phone, right? And so that ability to reconnect is so powerful, I think,

with psilocybin. Yeah, you know, as you were talking it, we use so many different words for rigid control systems. But I think they're all kind of similar. Like if we just take the word ego and then we place it next to patriarchy or government or corporations, it's this perceived authoritarian that is controlling us. And it's interesting to think about it like that. I never really thought about that.

But once you let go of that, all of a sudden the whole world opens up to you. And there's so many more connections that aren't cut off to you. I don't know. Absolutely. That's trippy to think about. Thanks for me. Yeah. I love it.

Yeah. So in James Fathamon's book, he has, he made famous the Fateman Protocol. And it seems to me that in a lot of different handbooks or in a lot of different guides, people are finding ways that help them move through this magic space or understand the relationship with Sillus Ivory. And I'm wondering, is there like, is there the Jennifer Chesick protocol in this book? No, I do mention the Fadamon protocol in the microdosing section of the book. And then I also talk about the Stamett stack. as another microdosing protocol. So I think those are the two main ones that people kind of follow. But I think also people can really, you know, decide on their own protocol. It doesn't have to match one of those. You can use your intuition, your own intuition about what your body needs, when. You know, maybe you feel great for a few days.

And then you realize, you know, I could use another little microdose. And you can just go by that intuition as well. It doesn't have to be this very rigid protocol. you know. Yeah, it doesn't have to be, but you know what? I think you're going to find. And I think that you should have your name on this. I think that there should be the Jennifer Chessick protocol. If a woman is beginning her cycle at some point in time, I bet you there's a dosage. And we've already spoken about it a little bit. Maybe the dosage in the beginning is different than the dosage in the middle that is different than dosage in the later. But as far as I know, there's not a protocol

for that. And I think that would be incredibly helpful for women. And since you're writing a handbook about it, I think your name should be on it. I love it. Okay. I'm going to get on that. I'm going to create a protocol and I'll, you know, put it out there on my website or something. We'll do it. Let's get together with some people that are writing papers on it. And then like your name will be on that paper. You know what I mean? Because look, let's figure out a way to help everybody. Why not, right? Absolutely. But yeah, I don't have to have my name on it. I don't have an ego anymore. I just still decide it. That's right. As long as the information's out there. Right. That's funny. Yeah. I think it's amazing.

to think about. And like I said, it's an honest, it's an honest observation because I think we're going to find out the deeper we dig, the more it can help the different kinds of us out there. There's probably lots of ways it helps different people with different brain chemistries or different genders or, you know, it's going to help athletes different than to help someone with a mental illness. And if we can begin to figure these things out, then it opens up the world to people that can go out and learn on themselves, instead of having to go and, you know, pay $20,000 to go to a retreat somewhere, they can pick up a handbook and, okay, I can experiment with this and I can find out what I'm comfortable with. Is that sort of something that you want people to be able to

do is, is, yeah. So I have a whole logistics chapter about, you know, creating what's called your set and your setting. And that's a, that's a term in the psychedelic sphere is set and setting. set is really your mindset going into a journey if you're going to trip. And then setting is, you know, what is your environment? And I think those, you know, practicing those things, looking at your set and your setting, can really help set you up for the best trip possible. And of course, there's the whole saying of you don't get the trip that you want. You get the trip that you need.

The mushroom is going to teach you whatever it is that you need to learn. But it does help to get into a mindset of really just agreeing that you're open to the experience. You know, so some people go in with like a very specific thing that they want to, you know, try to work through. And, you know, you can do that. But I think just being open to the experience helps you set yourself up for the best trip possible. Because, again, you're going to get the trip that you need, not the one that you necessarily want. And so a ways to do that in terms of, you know, getting into the right mindset is to kind of clear your schedule if you can before doing a journey. If you're really stressed about a deadline that you have, a work thing, or you've got a trip coming up the next day, you got to be at the airport at 5 a.m.

I hate those flights. But, you know, that's probably not the time to be doing a journey. It's when you can really kind of take some time for yourself and get into that right mindset. And then in terms of setting, setting can really be a lot of different things. Some people really love to be outside with the woods and things like that. That's where I've had my best experience is outside. That doesn't mean you have to do it outside. If you're stuck in the city and you're in your apartment or whatever,

you can still create a really inviting environment with being comfortable. Your space is clean, less, you know, not cluttered, and you've got some nice things around you, like comfy pillows, you know, whatever it is that makes you feel really safe and comfortable, then yes, you know, that can also be an environment. It doesn't have to be in the woods, you know. Yeah, it is, it is nice to be out without any responsibilities and being in a place that's beautiful and have time to integrate everything. But like you said, it need not be that way.

Sometimes, you know, if you need a vacation and you can take a little mental vacation for like six hours, you put the kids to bed, you're like, okay, it's eight o'clock. If I take this, I'll probably crash out. out by two because I don't have to get up till seven or eight and I don't have a whole lot on the books. I think you can really get a lot of work done there. And in some ways, it is like a little mind vacation because it allows you to really get a third person perspective on some of these problems that we find ourselves in sometimes.

And sometimes in today's life, if you have kids, you have a job, you got a mortgage, you have Twitch, you have all these things that are just, you know, they're just knocking on your door all day long and they won't shut up. sometimes you need to get away. And I really have found that psilocybin particularly is a great way to just stop all the noise for a minute and cut through to what's important. It's a really profound way to manage stress, a really profound way to manage what's important in your life and relationships.

Have you found it to be the same way? Absolutely. You know, it's always great to take some time for yourself. And, you know, whatever that may be, even if it's a lot. not with psychedelics, but, you know, during my lengthy psilocybin journey, I, you know, I spent, I put my phone away. And that was really nice because, you know, again, you've got, you know, the whole world wants a piece of you all the time, whether it's work or, you know, something that you're doing, school, whatever it might be. Friends are reaching out to you for whatever

purpose. And to really just carve out time for yourself in this world is so important. Again, whether you're doing psychedelics or not, that's very important. And actually, actually, even not on psychedelics, it can be very beneficial for that default mode network to just take some time, get away from your phone, get away from all screens, do something just for yourself. That can be very beneficial. So anyone who might be hesitant about psychedelics, you can start there, just taking some time for yourself. Yeah. Was part of this book born through a psychedelic journey? No, really just coming from my journalism background. And so that I felt like I need to do this journey to really dive into what am I experiencing, what happens

during a psilocybin journey? And then after the journey to really look at that science of what happens in the brain because it's so fascinating. And to really make those connections was important to me to be able to write the book, to experience that disconnect of the default mode network. And to have it have been so recent and then digging into the science about that. I was like, oh yeah now I get it I get why this happens I get why we feel connected to other people or we love nature or the colors are so much more vivid I remember during my outdoor session looking at the green of the moss and then the green on like the it was just moss on rocks and on the bark of the trees and I was like oh it's such a green green green I was looking out at the mountains and the mountains

had so much texture yeah I was kind of laughing at myself because I said oh I'm so cliche, like girl takes mushrooms and thinks trees are pretty, you know. You know, then my journey went into something much deeper, much more profound. I mean, it was still profound to see those colors and experience nature like that. But then, you know, I went into more of a deeper emotional journey. And I was like, oh, okay, now I get it. You know, it wasn't just that trees are pretty. Yeah.

So you were, so just do I have the street. you had decided to write the book and then you took mushrooms for the first time yes yes so it was wild yeah okay that changes everything okay I think that's important for people to know because now you have a really fresh perspective on what that okay I love it I love it that's that gives me a whole fresh perspective on it yeah you know I was that was like a couple years ago or it was just last year last summer in August so yeah it was incredible And, you know, I come from a background of, you know, I've always been around people doing some type of substance, whatever it might be. Cannabis.

Acid, whatever, you know. And, you know, I was always fearful about trying it for myself. And the reason that I was nervous is because I've had health conditions in my life and I thought, I'm going to be the person that takes this and everyone's going to rush me to the ER and I'm going to ruin everyone's life. And I had this a lot of fear about it. And then, you know, working on the book, I was like, all right, I've got to get over this. I've got to write about this in a way that can help other people feel more at ease, you know. And so that's what I did. I just had to put that fear away and trust in the process.

And I'm so glad that I did because, again, it was life changing, absolutely life changing. You're in good company. Like Carl Jung's Red Book, you know, all just Huxley's Doors of Perception. These are all books that happen after someone takes this substance and it changes the way they see the world. And what a profound idea that you can live your whole life and then come into contact with something and it changes your perspective. Like that's pretty amazing, right? It is. It's magical, those magic mushrooms. It's really, really, really magical for sure. I agree.

Do you think that the people in your life can see a change in you since you've taken them? I do. Yeah. So, I mean, I feel like I'm just so much more at ease with myself. I'm much more at ease with life stressors. And something that was really bothering me before doing my journey is, so I have aging parents, my mom's 80s, just like my best friend in this whole world. And my dad's a few years younger, and they've had some health issues. And so I'm facing down their inevitable mortality, right?

And so we're all mere mortals. And that's been a lot of, that's been a huge stressor for me. I have a lot of anxieties surrounding that or I did before my psilocybin journey. It was something that I hoped to, you know, work on during the session, my psilocybin session. But, you know, again, you're not guaranteed that. But the mushroom essentially showed me that I have the tools to get through the loss of my parents. It's not going to be pleasant. It's going to be really difficult.

But I can't control it. there's nothing I can control about this, right? And I think that's, there's a lot of things in life that we, that we have to realize we have no control over. And the mushroom really showed me that, but also showed me I am a strong person. I've been through very difficult things before. I can get through this. It's going to be hard, but I have a support system and I have the tools within me. And that was such, that was like the most profound thing I could ever have experienced during that journey. And it's been life changing because now, you know, you know, you know, you know, as I face their different health conditions and things like that,

I feel much more at ease with it because I know I can't control it. All I can do is be there for them, love them in the time that we have left. And that, to me, is just so profound. Wow. Thank you for saying that. I couldn't agree more. And I'm always amazed to get to hear people's stories about how their perspective on life has changed, how the relationship has changed. And it seems to me that

we have a real opportunity to help people that may be facing this mortality experience. Because there's a lot of baby boomers that are getting close to the end of their life. And while I don't know what that's like, I mean, I'm not, I'm not there yet, but I keep reading a lot of these stories in it. I think that there's something to be said about psilocybin and and the aging process. I think Amanda Fielding was recently on Rogan, and she was talking about using psychedelics for dementia, whether it's 5MEODMT or psilocybin or LSD.

And when you start looking at Albert Hoffman or so many of these individuals that seem to be icons in the psychedelic space, they used them throughout their life. And they lived, you know, 70, 80, 100 years old, and they were lucid. And I've found that I've been talking to my parents about using psychedelics. And they are both brought up in the, you know, this is your brain. This is your brain on drugs.

Yeah. Link letter's daughter jumped out of a window, George. I'm not going to take that. I might jump out of a window. But, you know, it's, I really think that there's something to be said about helping people towards the end of life use this if they wanted to. I wonder, is that something that you have thought about or maybe it's even in the book or what do you think?

Yeah. I touch on that a little bit. obviously researchers are studying this for people who have, you know, cancer diagnoses that are, you know, not treatable and they're essentially in palliative care, just keeping them comfortable. And they are facing their death, you know, coming soon. And so what I've read is that psilocybin is really in these, if people do a psychedelic-assisted therapy session, when they're facing something like this, that a lot of people are able to more readily accept. the idea of death or that they will no longer be in this earthly realm. And so I think there's a huge benefit there. And, you know, if you just look at our, you know, the United States, we just don't do death well, you know, we have weird, we don't talk about it. You know, it's crazy right now that a lot of us in middle age are facing the losses of our parents. And it's like this thing that people don't

really talk about. So I'm trying to talk about that more to make it more of a universal experience rather than something that we all deal with quietly and silence and are miserable. Because it's so important that we start discussing these things. But I do think there's a lot of potential for not only people who are facing the loss of a loved one to come to terms with that, but people who are facing death themselves with terminal illnesses to experience this ease of making that transition. And then you mentioned dementia and, you know, it's being psychedelics are being studied for their ability to cause neurogenesis or the growth of the neurons and synapses and forming new connections or better connections and things like that. And so I think that's a really exciting

area too. It's possible that someday we're going to determine that psychedelics are the cure for dementia. Obviously, we don't know that yet, but I see potential there that there's definitely a benefit of some sort. Yeah. Is it possible that we may see a new book from you that's like my mother, myself and our journey with psilocybin? I don't know if I can convince my mother to take psilocybin, but,

but you know, she's really open to learning about my experience. Right. And she's been really fascinated by it, which is a big step because, you know, I was raised in that just say no to drugs. Yep.

Because you're right on drugs with the egg and the pan, like you were just talking about. and then the DARE era, just all of that. And, you know, drugs were considered bad and stuff. But, you know, some of the best people I know are people who've experimented with substances. And so, you know, I have moved away from this idea that drugs are bad because obviously, clearly there are some drugs out there that are extremely beneficial for people. Psychedelics included, cannabis included, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah, it's fascinating to me.

And it's so exciting to see the way in which we are beginning to embrace what is possible. You know, we see the language around us changing and the ideas changing with them. And it's such a beautiful time to be alive, albeit uncertain. But I think that's another aspect of it. But I think I think that psilocybin really helps you deal with uncertainty. Maybe another word for uncertainty is anxiety. And what is anxiety but being trapped in the future and not knowing and being afraid of not knowing. And you take psilocybin and you're like, you know what, this whole idea about time?

I'm not even sure about it. Maybe all we have is right now. Yeah, that was actually something that during my journey, I just like briefly checked in with my husband just to let him know I'm still alive, basically. And that I'm like, I'm alive and also time isn't real because I really felt that way during my journey that time is sort of this false construct that we have. I mean, yeah, I know. We've all got the clock and the calendar and not happened. But I felt very connected to my past where I think a lot of times we can feel very disconnected from our past. I also felt very connected to my future.

And it was just like this, I don't know, space and time thing that I could move through to where I wanted. And not necessarily time travel, but, you know, tapping into these vivid memories of childhood and what made me really happy and really understanding that even though we've all, we change and we grow as we become adults and into adulthood we continue to grow, you're still that same person that you were in your 20s or when you were 15. That person's still in there. And I think that's a beautiful thing because I think we become very disconnected from

our former selves, but it's important to be connected. And psilocybin does that. Other psychedelics do too. So time isn't real people. Yeah. It's so true. Like I remember not too long ago I had taken a really big dose of some mushrooms

And I remember standing in the mirror And just staring at myself And like I can just see like Like all these different versions of me And I'm like oh my God That was me a thousand years ago That was me a hundred years ago That's almost like in the future

I don't know I have no idea How long I was standing in front of the mirror But I was just standing there Just thinking like wow And you really begin to understand That this idea of time It's so constrictive but it's necessary.

Well, I mean, it seems like our idea of time has allowed us to get where we are in a weird sort of, you know, limited way because it allows us to punch a time clock. It allows us to see our lives as cradle from the grave. And in some ways, it's such a limiting way to look at our lives when, and another thing it does that ties with time is it allows you to see. see like generational trauma. You know, I just talked about how I got to see myself in the past or look in the future. What also psilocybin can do, and I think it's for most people, is that it allows you to understand that maybe the way you're acting may not be because something you did. It may be something because of something your grandparents did or your mom did.

And now you're just carrying this pattern with you. And what you recognize, the thing about patterns is what you recognize is you can change it. So what do you think about patterns and the, I mean, and the, I don't know, you know, idea of, you know, generational trauma in time in psilocybin. Yeah, I find that so fascinating all this, how generational trauma can really be passed down and some of the fear instincts that we have that I may have may be a result of, you know, something that happened to my grandmother.

I, you know, I just don't really know. And, yeah, so that is really fascinating. And I've heard stories from people of, you know, doing a psilocybin journey and sort of digging, They learn within that journey, something that happened to an ancestor or just, you know, the historical context of whether people come from and what happened to them. And they recognize then that pattern within themselves that they are repeating that, again, had nothing to do with them personally. It just happened to someone in their lineage. And that is so fascinating to me. And there's real science behind this idea of passing down generational trauma.

We learned that trauma impacts DNA. And so, yeah, it is passed down from generation to generation. How can we break these cycles, you know? And that's something I'm really excited about with psychedelics. So there's something out there when we have adverse childhood experiences. These are called ACEs, for short, in the scientific literature. And ACEs are things like, you know, maybe you have a parent that was incarcerated when you were young. or maybe your parents got divorced or there was violence in your home or you were ill as a child.

That was something that that's an ace for me. I was very severely ill with asthma as a child and hospitalized a lot. So that's something that, you know, is traumatic for me. But the thing to recognize is that they're about, I think it's 60 or it's one in six people, one in six adults have four or more aces. So we've had four or more adverse child that experiences. And if you're, if you've had four or more adverse childhood experiences, you are, your children are more likely to have four or more adverse childhood experiences. So even when we are consciously trying to interrupt these cycles of trauma, they tend to happen. And I see a lot of potential with psychedelics to interrupt these cycles of trauma, especially if we're doing things like using psilocybin to, to, to help with PTSD.

PTSD, anxiety, depression, we can potentially interrupt these cycles that are passed down generation to generation. Yeah. I'm glad you said that. You know, when one, I feel like all of us get like a unique perspective sometimes and what we do or who we talk to. And as doing what I'm doing right now, I'm so fortunate to do this. And I love talking to people and learning things. And I want to share with everybody.

Like I have noticed that for the first time in my life, I must. I must have heard like 20 different people say the following statement. I have broken the generational trauma my life and I will no longer continue that pattern. And I'm like, and I hear it like all the time. Maybe it's because the people I'm speaking to me because they're all using different substances or, but like that's a pattern to me. And on one level, I'm like, wow, that must be because I'm doing it. And on another level, I'm like, wow, if I'm doing it and all these other people are doing it,

like that's making the world better. And it just made me so proud and so thankful to hear all these people that are like, I have just purged for my family, meaning that I have solved this problem. So this one will no longer go to my kid. And it's like, yeah, it gives me goosebumps. It's so beautiful to see the world healing from trauma. And in a way, when you see it happening,

you can be like, oh, I'm going to apply that to my life. And it's just so beauty to get, it's so beautiful to get to see the answers revealed to you in a way that is, it's magic, right? It's so beautiful to me. It's magic. Yeah. I love that. that too, and I think that is, it's such a smart thing if people are tackling their own traumas in some way, whether that's psychedelics or through therapy or whatever it is, to prevent that

future generation from experiencing the same thing. Now, that's not to say that we can protect the generation from every trauma out there that's not possible, but you're doing your part when you take it upon yourself to try to heal some of the stressors in your own life or the trauma in your own life for sure the beautiful thing yeah and i i found that i was talking to some friends of mine at work and we were talking about you know challenges and and being our best version of ourselves and you know it it became clear to us all around the same time that like whatever problem you don't solve as an adult in your life you leave it to your kid to solve and for me like that was enough that realization was enough for me to try to find the heaviest thing and fix it.

Like, okay, you know what? I better start fixing some things in my life. Otherwise, I'm leaving my kids to do. What kind of a dad would I be if I did that? And it's interesting how just a change in the way you think can have a radical shift in the way you live your life. That's a crazy, right? It is crazy, but it is so true.

And, you know, a lot of people don't recognize the traumas that they are facing or dealing with or the fear response or stress responses that they are having as a reaction to something that happened to them. So it's easier said than done saying, hey, I'm going to heal my traumas and not pass it down. So certainly a difficult work, but so worth doing, so worth investigating your past and seeing how you can affect change for the future for other generations and for yourself, too. Yeah. Jennifer, what were some of the, before you wrote this book, was there another book?

you wrote or what were some of the articles or the things that you are researching before you wrote this book? Oh, sure. Good question. I've written about everything. During the pandemic, I was, you know, writing a lot about COVID as it evolved and things like that. But I've got a few articles that are coming out soon that I wrote last year about, and I'm super excited about these. They're about menopause. and this idea that the symptoms that you have and menopause can really be connected to your metabolic health. So there is a correlation between having like higher blood sugar and having more hot flashes or more severe hot flashes or having insulin resistance and things like that. So I see a lot of potential for, you know, for us tackling menopause in a different way, rather than throwing a bunch of medications at menopause. we might be able to tackle it a little bit more naturally by focusing on our metabolic health.

But I also see some potential there for psychedelics, which I'm hoping to write about a little bit more. I did write about menopause and psychedelics in the book, specifically psilocybin, because obviously we know that psilocybin can help with depression. And depression is such an active symptom of menopause for many people. And so I dug into that a little bit. And I interviewed this really excellent woman. And she talked about how, you know, a lot of times when people are going through menopause and they start to have this depression that creeps up, they'll be given an antidepressant, so an SSRI, a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor.

And what she said was kind of profound to me. It's that SSRIs, and I'm not against SSRIs, I don't want to present myself as being. It's just, you know, if you haven't been on one and you don't feel like you need one, And still, doctors will try to throw them at you. And SSRI sort of blunt your mood. They blunt the highs. They blunt the lows. The difference, so a lot of people are trying to microdose psilocybin for depression.

And what she said was that psilocybin, instead of blunting that high or low, it makes you more able to accept your highs and lows. It makes you okay with your highs and lows. And I think that's really beneficial because if we can be, yay, we have our joys and we love our joys and that sort of thing. our highs are great. But what if when we have a low, we kind of lean into it, we feel the feelings that we're supposed to feel, and then we can also think about our highs and our enjoyment of life and lean on those times to help elevate us back up again. And so I love that idea of psychedelics maybe instead of blunting our moods, really helping us be okay with all the facets of ourselves. Yeah, that's really well said. And I do, I would agree with that.

that wholeheartedly. I think it helps you sit with the real trauma in your life. And sometimes it's the pushing that down or it's the hiding it or locking it away or the feeling of defeat because it's so big. You know, and I love it. I think it's a great way to look at it. Yeah. I think in the future, like, why couldn't we have, yeah, I don't know.

Why can't we have a more. holistic approach to different phases of our life. Maybe it's the fact that we don't have any sort of, you know, there's echoes of like a kinsignera or there's the bar mitzvah, but there's these rites of passage that we have echoes of, but we no longer practice them. And it seems to me there should be a right of passage for a teenager, becoming an adult. And there should be a right of a passage for someone in middle age that's becoming an elder. And there should be a right of passage for someone elderly.

that's moving on. And I often wonder how much of the absence of these rights of passage are leading us into just neurosis and problems, right? I agree. You know, I think a lot, you know, going back to the concept of menopause, if we thought of that, if we thought of menopause as this right of passage, something to celebrate, I think it would be beneficial for people because we, our society tends to look at it like, oh, you're going to hit menopause, and have all these crazy symptoms. You're going to feel horrible. And it doesn't have to be like that. What if we treated it as the transition? And this indigenous wisdom expert, she talked a little bit about that when I interviewed her for the book is that, you know, mushrooms, magic mushrooms help us with transitions, right?

And what if we use psilocybin in that context to celebrate this right of passage of being menopause? What if we did that instead of treating it like this condition? that women have to face and it's so awful or whatnot. What if it is this rite of passage? Yeah. A celebration of coming into your like wise woman era or whatever you want to call it, you know? Yeah, like it totally should be that. Like, finally, I don't have to do all this crap all that.

I'm finally going to be at this position where now I am the storyteller. Now I am the leader. You know, it should be a celebration. It's like you made it that far. Like you should be congratulated for getting there, right? People don't ever make it. They're like, congratulations. Roll out the red carpet and, you know, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And what better way? I think that would go a long way for women's health, too.

I mean, it can't be, it seems to me, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like it's something women dread to look forward to in a way. And I don't know that, but is that true? Is it looked at with like, oh, geez, I got to go through that? Yeah, I do think people tend to dread this idea of it. And it just doesn't have to be something that we dread at all. Now, I'm the opposite. I've been looking forward to menopause since I started menstruating because I hate, you know, I had such a troubled time with endometriosis. But yeah, but I'm like, bring it on menopause. Throw it at me.

So I do believe a lot of people dread this idea because it signals being older and things like that. But what if we celebrated aging? We should celebrate it because, you know, it's such a people, older people have so much wisdom to pass down. And so I personally love all my elders and appreciate their life wisdom. And so we just celebrated that idea. It would be a lot easier for people, I think. Yeah.

And I think we will. I think what we're seeing is another transition as a, if we look at the world, all the people in the world is a singular body. I think we are in a transition. Yeah. Right? Like we've just treated ourselves so horrible. It's like we're just coming out of like this, you know,

19 or 23 year old bench phase where we just wrecked ourselves for like a month in Vegas or something. And like, you know, and like we put our kids in schools. We dropped off our elders at all the folks' homes and told them we don't need you anymore. And like all of the people in the middle age, we're like, okay, we're just going to quit everything, go work for somebody else. And now we're coming to this realization, like, holy shit, we drank how much? Oh, man, we got to knock this off. We can't keep doing this. But I think we're coming out of like this dark spell.

We're like, okay, let's get it together. We can move forward here. We've got a lot of room to grow. And I'm really hopeful. And I see the light that's coming down our way. And I think it's showing us a path forward that is going to be wilder and richer and more beautiful than we can imagine. I'm excited for it. Yeah, me too. Absolutely. Well said.

Jennifer, we're coming up on a little bit over an hour here. And I got to tell you, this is a fantastic conversation. I really enjoyed it. And I really enjoyed learning not only about what you've written in the book, but learning about you and how you look at the world. And it makes me want to dig into the book even deeper. And it makes me want to read more of your work. And thank you for writing the book.

Where can people find you? What do you have coming up and what are you excited about? I know everyone keeps asking me like what's your next book going to be? I'm like hold your horse it is. No, I will continue to write books. I'm continuing to turn out journalism work. So you can follow me at at Jen Chessig, so at J-E-N-C-H-E-S-A-K on any social media platform. I'm mostly active on Instagram, but I do a few TikToks now, man, to keep it hip, you know?

Yeah. And then you can also, you can, if you can, if you're, you're interested in the book, you can buy that pretty much anywhere books are sold. I always encourage people to buy from their local independent bookstore and, you know, shop local, shop indie, all of that. Got to get that plug in there. But that's good in a nutshell. Well, congratulations. It's really cool. And I'm, I'm stoked that there's people doing what you're doing. And I think that anybody who's interested in psychedelics and where they add are on their journey, regardless of what gender you are, I think you can learn a lot from reading the book.

I think it helps with relationships. And I think you should tune in to Jen and read everything she's doing because she's a cool and fascinating person with a really unique insight. So that's all we got for today. Jen, hang on one second. I'm going to talk to you, but I'm going to hang up with the folks online. Thank you so much for having me. Sorry.

Go ahead. No, absolutely. I'm trying to work on my skills because sometimes I cut people off my head. I have to fix that right there. So, yeah, I'm really thankful. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for being here today. I hope that the world continues. to rain, sunshine down upon you

and your world gets better and everyone loves you. That's all I got for today.