TrueLife - Jenny Chen Robertson - Psychedelics, Science & Spiritual Sedition

Episode Date: May 25, 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/Jenny Chen RobertsonIn an empire of numbness, where sedation is sold as salvation,One woman dares to weaponize wisdom and baptize bureaucracy in the psilocybin sacrament.”Jenny is not a facilitator.She is a forger of frameworks,A cartographer of care,Turning risk-reduction into revolution.She walks the fault line between clinical ethics and ecstatic experience—MBA-trained, yes—But with soul credentials inked in sweat, in silence,In sacred listening.She’s briefed lawmakers with the calm of a nun and the clarity of a sniper.She’s testified with tremors in her voice and steel in her spine.Her resume reads like a paradox:Real estate magnate turned mycelial matriarch.Spreadsheet whisperer turned soul doula.Jenny co-founded the Safer Psychedelics Association of New EnglandNot to play nice with power—But to redefine it.She speaks for the trip-gone-sideways,For the mothers who don’t trust “the system,”For the cops confused by consciousness,For the firemen called to burning minds.This isn’t harm reduction—it’s harm revolution.This isn’t education—it’s uncolonized knowing.She doesn’t just talk set and setting—She re-sets the setting of the entire conversation.So lean in close, fam—Because when Jenny speaks,The old paradigm doesn’t just shudder—It begs for a blindfold.And the future?It’s already listening.SPAN: Safer Psychedelics Association of New EnglandJenny Chen RobertsonOn Psychedelics, Safety & the Psyche 1. In a world obsessed with optimization, what does it mean to heal rather than just function? 3. Do you think crisis is a rite of passage we’ve medicalized into silence?🏛️ On Systems, Legislation & the Sacred 6. What happens when you place a mystical medicine in the machinery of the legal system? Who gets rewritten—the law or the soul? 7. You’ve spoken to lawmakers—how do you translate altered states into legislative language?10. Do you ever feel the psychedelic movement is in danger of becoming another arm of the empire it once rebelled against?💀 On Death, Integration & the Edge 11. You’ve trained in end-of-life psychedelic care—what has death taught you about how to live? 12. Is integration a form of reincarnation? 13. What’s something you’ve had to let die inside yourself to become the leader you are now? 14. Do we need more ceremony, or less certainty? 15. How do you hold space for someone when they become the storm?🌍 On Community, Inclusion & Revolution 16. How do we ensure that psychedelic healing doesn’t become a luxury item—but remains a communal birthright? 17. How do we reclaim ancient technologies of care in a culture drunk on diagnosis? 18. What are the overlooked psychedelic traditions that modern clinical models need to humble themselves before? 19. What does culturally sensitive harm reduction actually look like when no one is watching? 20. If trauma is collective, must healing be public?🌀 Wildcards: Wattsian, Esoteric, & Meta 21. Do psychedelics want something from us? 23. Is a bad trip a sacred teacher disguised as panic? 24. Is love the ultimate integration protocol? 25. What does the mushroom say to capitalism? 26. If consciousness is a river, where do the laws, myths, and dreams all flow into? 27. What do you hope your great-great-grandchildren say when they read about what you’re doing now?⸻Zenesis: The Gospel According to Hereticsseduce the cosmos, dethrone false gods, and awaken what you buried to survive.⸻She came barefoot into the lecture hall,hair like wildfire braided with riddles,skin dusted in spores and solar ash,whispering equations to the bones beneath my thesis.She did not knock—She cracked open the doors of knowinglike a ribcage,and every book blinked in terroras her hips rewrote the curriculum in cursive flame.“I am not your muse,” she said,“I am the ghost of every question

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, furious 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 Kodak Serafini 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 A beautiful evening wherever you are I hope the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the wind is at your back. I got a great show for you this evening, and I want to start it off with a nice little introduction here. In an empire of numbness, where sedation is sold to salvation, one woman dares to weaponize wisdom and baptized bureaucracy in the psilocybin sacrament. Ginny is not a facilitator. She is a forager of frameworks, a cartographer of care,

turning risk reduction into revolution. She walks the fault line between clinical ethics and ecstatic experience. MBA trained, yes, but with soul credentials, inked in sweat, in silence and sacred listening. She's brief lawmakers with the calm of a nun and the clarity of a sniper. She's testified with tremors in her voice and stealing her spine. Her resume reads like a paradox. Real estate magnet turned mycelial matriarch, spreadsheet whisperer turned soul dula. Jenny co-founded the Safer Psychedelics Association of New England, not to play nice with power, but to redefine it. She speaks for the trip gone sideways, for the mothers who don't trust the system, for the cops confused by consciousness, for the firemen called to burning

minds. This isn't harm reduction. It's harm revolution. This isn't education. It's uncolonized knowing. She doesn't just set, she doesn't just talk set and setting. She resets the setting of the entire conversation. So lean in close, fam, because when Jenny speaks, the old paradigm doesn't just shudder, it begs for a blindfold. And the future, it's already listening. Jenny, thank you so much for being here today. How are you? I'm so great. That is the most impressive intro I've ever had. I don't even know who you're talking about anymore. I was like, who is this person? I need to be her. Well, thank you so much for having me, George. It's such a pleasure to be here to chat with you. Yeah. Well, thank you for your time. You've been doing, you've been working quite a bit. And you have

run all over from from academia into law and psilocybin it's such an interesting way to to find out where you are maybe we could just start there did you always think you're going to start off being in safer psychedelics or how did you get here no not at all um gosh that is you know I guess psychedelics has this way or like this this space has this way of sucking you in no um maybe drawing you in I I think that's probably a better way of saying it. And, you know, like you alluded in my intro, you know, I come from a pretty straight and narrow background. I did graduate UC Santa Cruz. And for those of you sleds out there, whoo, you know.

So it was, it was a fantastic experience. I really loved my undergraduate studies there. And you get a full breadth of education in humanities as well as kind of soul-searching opportunities. But really, after undergrad, I really thought that kind of like, you know, that is behind me. I am an immigrant myself, my family were immigrants. And so I think very common to the immigrant story, you want to, you know, kind of live up to the sacrifices that your family made. And so when I graduated, I thought, you know, I'm going to work for a few years, go to grad school, tutoring between law and business school, ended up in business school. And like you said, I love the

spreadsheets. You know, I have so many anecdotes I can give you with my friends making fun of me and my spreadsheets. They're like, do you sleep in spreadsheets? No. So, yeah, I mean, it was by, really by chance. I'm a huge fan of Michael Pollan being from the Bay Area. And I read everything he's written because I enjoy him, right and i picked up his last um the previous book how to change your mind not even knowing what he was writing about but i've always been interested in like brain science you know there's a history of um you know dementia alzheimer's in my family and so just kind of curious um i'm a curious person and listen i listened to the audiobook and i even asked myself am i hearing what i what i think he's talking about. And that really kind of planted the seed of, you know, is this something that

could possibly help? And at the time it was my ex-spouse, you know, going through a really challenging time of mental illness and depression. And through that process, I really discovered how much healing I personally needed, you know, and I think, you know, being, again, this is probably a very prototypical story. You know, you have, you know, you're an immigrant or a child of immigrants. You have the stoicism. So I've always kind of kept this very strong, you know, stoic demeanor and really just kind of power through everything. And I just, you know, after psychedelics, it just really blew away that system. I realized how dysfunctional, how dysfunctional. we, we, the paradigm that we're living in. So that's the short version. I love it. Thank you for sharing that.

It's, it never ceases to amaze me the people that are sort of called in. You know what I mean? But no matter what walk a life you're in or what nationality on some level, it seems like there was a tragedy in your life that allowed you to realize, like I'm part of something a lot bigger, you know, but it takes that tragedy sometimes to really be called in, whether it's mental illness or losing someone you love. And there's all kinds of ways. ways it can happen. But thanks for sharing it. I always enjoy learning what it is about this person that kind of called them. It's almost like an initiation or a right of passage. Do you think that's fair to say? Oh, definitely. I mean, I think this moves us into kind of our Western society,

especially in North America, right? We lost a lot of these rights of passage. You know, growing up, I was fortunate to grow up in the Bay Area. So a lot of diversity. And my Catholic friends had, what is it called, where they do their thing, like a catechism thing. Right. Yeah, you know. Like cincinnietas and stuff sometimes. Yeah, and then the cancinitas. And then my friends of Filipino descent, they had a kind of a cancinata type of thing as well.

And I just kind of thought, oh, these are so wonderful. These, like, in rites of passage. And then I participated in some of them. But, you know, in my own family, we didn't have these, you know, because we wanted to be, like, really American and really just, you know, integrate, you know? And, um, and one of the things was like, you know, you're going to speak English without an accent, you know. So I've accomplished that, that one part, um, that, you know, everything else, you know, disappointed my family left and right. Um, but it's, um, and I just really thought like, wow, these are, it was just so interesting how these other

cultures have these, these initiation type of processes into a, And we, in the Western world, we don't really have that. We have this overarching culture that is so survivalistic and kind of vanilla. I mean, I don't want to knock on vanilla. Vanilla's fine. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's kind of, there's no depth. You know, we are such a society that is so keen on like higher function.

And higher functioning is just simply survival. It is actually not thriving, right? We've optimized everything, everything. We don't even have to leave the house to, to, to, to, to, to, grocery shop or to, you know, say hi to our friends anymore, right? And so, yeah, we're at peak optimization. And now we're optimizing, like, our, you know, talk about all the wearables out there, all the supplements, you know,

just the, you know, peruse Reddit casually. you're going to see people that are taking like 15, 20 supplements a day and they're like 25 or something. You know, like I'm just, yeah, it's just, it's interesting. Check out my stack. I'm taking these four no tropics. I have taken these kind of seven functional mushrooms. It's so crazy. Exactly.

I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not knocking at that at all, right? But now I think if we look at the kind of the history of our progression, like we've optimized. our lives so well and now we're like turning almost against ourselves in a way right like our body is not optimized enough we need to optimize our body like this is the last frontier and it's it's it's self-hatred i mean i that might sound harsh but it's a little it's it's it's yeah it's just um so it's penalizing to ourselves it is you know you know somewhere along the line i think that we put an optimization mask on a society that's so specialized.

That's not the right way to say it. But let me just say it this way. In a world obsessed with optimization, what does it mean to heal rather than just function? Right. Yeah. Excellent question, right? Because like healing, we don't prioritize healing, right? We prioritize function because function leads to productivity.

Yes. The priority is short term, right? So, you know, I studied businesses as a graduate student. That's what you do as an MBA. And, you know, now when I look back and I'm like, that seems so boring. But, you know, again, I'm not knocking anyone here. If that's what you're into, that's cool. Like, I was into that. You know, like, I did the whole thing, right? But survival or, like, optimization is shallow, right? Yes. Healing is deep. Healing is really inefficient. And it's, it's, it's, it often looks so, um, like, lasse-a-dazel, like a waste, like a wasting time, right? Yeah. No, there's just, there's as much time as there is time, right? Like, um, it's healing looks inefficient because it's resting, it's grieving. It's Maybe it's actually taking a moment for yourself to unlearn something that might be harmful to you, right? And it's just non-productivity. And in our super hyper late stage capitalist society, but there's no time for healing.

You know? So yeah, it's challenging to win someone. says, I mean, you see this in the corporate world, too. At least, I mean, I felt it. If you are not well and you need to take time away, our... Good luck. Yeah, it doesn't allow for that. Not at all.

There's something wrong with you. It's so, and it's so strange to me, the corporate world. Like, we have gone so far down this road of productivity that we no longer really care about healing. We put on the mask of healing. Are you okay? Okay, get to work then. Okay, are you okay? Because it's, you've been out for two days.

Are you sure you're okay? Like, what's your problem? What they're really trying to say, we need you here now. I don't care what's happening to you. And if you can't come back, I've got to look for someone else. Yes, yep, without a doubt. Without a doubt, there's this illusion of safety. There's this illusion of healing.

There's this illusion of we care. But so much of it is like, what's the bottom line? And you get it. Like in a world of so much competition, people are stressed at the highest level, at the lowest level. Do you think that that is what's causing? Like, there's so much mental illness. And sometimes I'll flip to the DSM and just be like, look at all of these labels that we've created for people. What a convenient way to make everyone have a label and have it be their fault and to not push it back on the system and for insurance companies on so many levels.

By being too hard? Yeah, no, I completely agree with it. We need a label for everything, right? Because God forbid, how would an insurance company hold this to refund or whatever? For the service, right? So it's, I mean, this is the paradox, right? We live in this system and we have to be able to function in it somehow. I'm a huge believer in like, okay, this is what we have and we got to do what we got to do, right?

I also believe that change happens. So one of, and I've been thinking about this a lot because, and again, I don't want to get like too personal about it or make it too much, you know, this thing. but my grandparents immigrated to us, right? And then subsequently my parents and then, you know, everyone and my brother and I, everyone else. And they were young. My grandparents were not that young when they immigrated. They were in their 50s.

Imagine going to be a country and like not speaking the language and then having your whole family come with you, right? Resilience. Yeah. It's, it's courage. It's resilience. Hope. That is what it is.

It is hope, right? And when I think about. the hope and just the post-war or like post-war America and what America stands for. And, you know, I've been doing a bit of travel and through Southeast Asia and happened to be in a place where they're celebrating the end of the American war. We know it as a Vietnam War. And just seeing the resilience of people and just thinking about what does this mean? What is this country that I belong to or that I'm, you know, a citizen of?

And do I still feel like I really belong there? Like, I feel like America was this beacon of welcoming and like we care. And now we've optimized ourselves. We still have this mask of we care. Right. We don't, right? Like, we, the way, I mean, there are other countries that just simply don't care. And they don't pretend that they care.

Like, you know, I can think of a few countries. They're just kind of like, no, we don't really care about our people. And we're still trying to straddle this, but maybe it's ending a little bit because I think our country has also shown some of its colors, right, in recent political developments. And maybe this is in a way good, in some good in some ways, because at least it's honest. And we cannot have any change without honesty. Yeah, maybe this is what the beginning of freedom looks like. It's messy. It's hurtful.

It's painful. it's the darkness. You know, it's an ordeal. And, you know, the same way when we go through these psychedelic journeys, you know, I'm a big fan of the big doses that cause you to have an ordeal. I see them as initiations on some level. And I can't help or I can't help but think, wow, what we're going through right now in the world and, you know, choose wherever you're at.

You can see it, but especially in the United States, like, this is an ordeal. Like, we're going through this thing. And it should be reason for rejoice. It's not going to be easy. But all this law. Like, you know, you spoke about your family coming here and having, you use two words that I think are fundamental in anybody becoming the best version of themselves. And that's resilience and courage. And these are the things that psychedelics show us on so many levels.

You have to have a lot of courage to be like, okay, I'm going to take this dose. And I know when I take this, I've done the research. I have my set and setting. I have people there to watch. You know, I've done all the responsible parts about it. But it still takes courage to sit down and look at a giant plate or sit down in a ceremony somewhere. There's a lot of courage that needs to take place in order to have real change happening in your life. What are your thoughts on that?

Completely agree. It is so, I am always so humbled and in awe when I hear about people going through a ceremony because it's courage to look at yourself. When you're going through that ceremony, you're looking at yourself. You're dissecting who you are. and, you know, the, it, it just takes a lot of courage to confront yourself. Like, you, we are, we do it on a daily basis. So, for first of all, I want to put that out there, right?

Like, we credit, we are our own worst critics, but we, you know, I don't know what that statistic is, but we have like, I don't know, 20,000 recurring same thoughts or whatever every day, right? And some of those, some of that dialogue with ourselves probably isn't super healthy, probably isn't super nourishing or caring either. And yet we have these conversations. But when we're in ceremony working with the medicine, it's somehow, it's different, right?

Because we kind of space from ourselves and we can just kind of look in with ourselves. And we are really thinking like, oh, wow, wow. Yeah. Huh. That's what I did or that's who I was. And this is why. And now I have the agency. and the knowledge to change it.

And so that's why I think everyone who goes through this is so courageous. And again, you know, as the executive director of Spann, Safer Psychedelics Association of New England, mouthful, you know, we're not encouraging people to do, to work with psychedelics. What we are saying is that you may work with psychedelics and personally, my co-founder and I, and I also want to give a shout out to my team, you know, my co-co-execkelics. founder, Dr. Brie Reeser, she is an amazing person. This would not happen without her. And all the leadership at our organization as well and their backgrounds, their specializations. I sometimes I feel so humbled because I'm just like, what am I doing here? And so I do want to definitely give it

to everyone on the team. But yeah, and we have our own personal experience. And so therefore, or, you know, we definitely have our positions. But, you know, as an organization, our position is that you may engage with this. And when you do, please be safe. And this is how you can be safe doing it. But that aside, for me on a personal level, yeah, psychedelics has completely changed everything. You know, I'm still who I am. But it really gives us a portal to see, you know, it's, how did I say this?

like people can get to this state with like yoga meditation breath is kind of like the slow lane psychedelics is kind of like the fast lane you can't keep traveling in the fast lane eventually you're going to crash and burn right and i just kind of see the two kind of together and like the middle lane which goes also really well with like the buddhist philosophy of the middle path i happen to be buddhist so i kind of like that but um but yeah so it's um yeah healing is is hard it's it's it takes a lot of courage to confront yourself. It's so true and it's really well said. You know, I sometimes get tied up in the language, Jenny, where, you know, we have so much

language in the Western world that doesn't, like the language of science doesn't seem to really count things that aren't measurable. You know what I mean by that? Like we have these clinical trials and stuff. But so often the things that are left out are so important. I know back in the 50s, I was talking to Dr. Erica, Dr. Erica Dick about this. And she was saying, you know, George, back in the 50s, they would have these incredible questionnaires where they would bring in the wife of someone who had some real problems. And they would ask the wife, is your husband less of an asshole?

You know what I mean? And they had like, they had these really brilliant questions, though, because that matters. You know, like who knows the person that's in pain more than their spouse or their children or their mother or their father? Like that sort of stuff seems to be left out of the Western world of science on some level. And it's so important. Are we going to see, especially with you being a Buddhist and having a background and more of an Eastern tradition, do you see these two things like the mystical side and sort of the science side, beginning to spiral together, like the double helix, kind of coming together to build something new?

Yeah, I mean, I'm not a scientist, nor am I a lawyer, any of that stuff, right? And so I do think, I do, and I also want to really be totally straightforward and transparent. I'm one of those people that, you know, believes in science, right? Like we have this whole debate of, in our country of like, you know, science is real. And yeah, science is real. I believe science. I believe in vaccines. That's okay.

And I also think that, you know, this is the thing about psychedelics where it creates space to a container for some mystery, right? for some, that mystical experience as the language is calling it. The NF of it, right? Yes. And we do try to kind of stuff all of this into like a clinical box, a legal box.

And this is where science and the law kind of come together in a way too that the laws are based on scientific findings. Well, but science is also ever moving. Like good science actually changed. And that is a, a kind of, well, I just a good science. There's just laws that are like, you know, there. Like gravity is true, right? And, but, you know, the idea of science is that we constantly evolve and grow without the certainty, right?

Because with certainty, then we wouldn't need science, right? Yes, yes. And I think that's the challenge in our world, especially now. we want a world of certainty because we have experienced such stability for so long. And, you know, going back to kind of a prototypical, maybe a prototypical story, if you will, you know, we do all the right, people do all the right things. They get the job. They maybe even end up with the right person.

And yet there's a reason that we don't feel internally like our soul is not satiated. And then we think there's something wrong with us. Yeah, there might be. There might be things that, but the answer doesn't lie in a pill. You know, it lies in kind of looking within. And I think psychedelics is a way to do that. I don't want to call it a tool because I think that diminishes the sacredness of it. But it does allow.

And again, people reach these states without psychedelics, right? And that's totally possible. And I just think that in our, sorry, going back to our super, our conversation about our topic about super optimization in this world. Yeah. We have been trained so well. We have been so domesticated in this capitalistic kind of structure that we might need a little bit of tools, right? And so, you know, people say like, well, how often, you know, there's concern. How often do you need to do it?

Or, you know, do you need to do it every day? And that's like, no, people do it once. life sometimes that's it sometimes you do it once a year and that's it um it's really hard to put into language you know when we try to do that because we're always up here um but really psychedelics brings it into our body because we are constantly up here in our brain in our minds all the time and what psychedelics does is allows our bodies to experience our feelings and to really process through. There's a saying, I'm sure you've heard it. You can't heal what you don't feel. Right. It's true. It's so well sad. And shout out to your team, Dr. Bree, and everybody over there.

And I'm so glad. I'm so happy that we brought up this idea of language because you guys are working with legislators. You guys are talking to lawmakers. And I guess the question is, you know, how do you translate altered states into legislative language? It's a tricky one. It is really, really, really tricky. Yeah, thank you. I mean, again, your questions, George, are so like, oh, my gosh, I'm like, oh, man, there's a lot of prep I have to do for this. So, yeah, no, I mean, the law, law by design, you know, wants, you know, prefers precision, predictability, you know, whereas this, the mystical and the kind of the unpredictability of, of these experiences, they only emerge in contradiction in a way.

Right. Yeah. One of the things I learned for me personally is just how to hold the contradictions in your own life. Like I had a huge lesson of grief and joy in one of my earlier experiences. And again, I was going through this personal period of intense, intense grief and just this feeling of being bereft. And I had a lot of loss in my life at that time.

And through the experience, I was able to hold both. But you can't. How do you write that into law? You really can't, right? And so this is why Span is a huge fan, a supporter of decriminalization. I love it. You really need to write into law, you know, X, Y, and Z.

This is how, you know. And one of, you know, as you alluded to, I worked with the measure in Massachusetts, measure four. And one of the challenges, as I was phone making for the campaign was, you know, People are like, well, there's this homegrown provision. It outlined it was way too precise. It was interesting.

It was a huge lesson how people get so hung up on the language. And yeah, it really just really taught me and showed me something about like how this political process works and how like the machine, like what the machine feeds on. You know, it's kind of, it's kind of ugly actually. So, and the risk of kind of these types of legislations, you know, it's always a catch-22 is that we might be, and again, I don't want to get too esoteric here, but like we might be colonizing the sacred. And it was, you know, do we want that? Like, yeah, we do, because it enables other people to do it.

Because I have tons of friends that would benefit from this, but they would never. ever, you know, whether it's their job or personal values or ethics, do anything illegal, right? And I get that. I respect that because I used to be that person. And at the same time, I know this could be so beneficial. So, yeah. I love it. You know, it's so interesting, you know, the debate between legalization and decriminalization. And, you know, I see it a lot like in psychedelic science that we're both going to. Everyone should check out. Psychedelic science is going to be a great venue. There's going to be some really cool stuff there. There's a free, I'm going to be hosting a free concert at the Boulder Canyon Theater for Iboga Saves. But it really brings up this

point about the legalization. And you would mention something as near and dear to my heart. And that's this idea of, you know, commoditizing the sacred. And I see it happening with like a lot of these certificate programs. And for me, I push back pretty hard because what I see happening, and I could be wrong. I'd love to get your thoughts on it. It's this idea of sort of commoditizing vulnerability, number one. And there's so many people out there right now, especially some of these certificate programs of some pretty big names out there. And I get so upset because it seems to me they're setting up on some level these sales funnels disguised as psychedelic events. And then they bring in these people that are halfway broken and then they charge them all this money. And it seems

to be built on the same school model that's failed so many people. And it's like, these kids are going to borrow money to go to your one year that's going to turn into a two year. It's probably going to be a four year. What are they going to do with this degree? And I'm starting to see students come out and say, look, I got this degree. Now I'm working at this place. And I'm not very happy with what I'm doing. I can kind of see the push back. And I think that that comes from commoditizing the sacred. It's taking this thing that's a sacrament. It's taking this thing that's a birthright and just wrapping its arms around it, like it's just centralized. on so many levels. I know that's a lot, but what are your thoughts?

Yeah, I mean, I agree with you. I mean, I don't want to name any specific means, but like, you know, I went through a training program, right? I'm a graduate of Intertrecht, and I can think I can say that because I did go through that program. I thought it was great. We had such an amazing speaker, you know, Robin Carhart Harris. Gosh, there's another one. Kaila Taylor. Like, it just some amazing thinking, like my, in the field, right? And I found it really of value. But, you know, they don't have the same speakers every cohort and, you know, et cetera, right? And that's, that is, that's the risk, right? Like,

we need systems to be able to hold the sacred, sacred without domesticating it in a way, right? I can't think of the. No, it's beautifully said. But in a way of just, and there are, you're totally right, there are graduate programs. You know, California, there's two, right? There's one at, like, I think Cal, right? And then big, big names, like big, big names, right? Like, Stanford's doing a lot of psychedelic research as well. There's a lot of clinical trials going on. And there's, you know, graduate degrees. And I totally even confess, like I, I perhaps this is just me, I suffer from imposter syndrome. And I thought, huh, you know, I work with these amazing PhDs, these super smart people. I'm supposed to lead them somehow or leave,

this organization somehow. Maybe I needed you. Maybe I need another graduate degree. I don't think good goodness, like the people around me like yeah, you can do it if you want, but you're you're good at what you do. And I'm just kind of like, I'm decent, thank you. You're good. But yeah, but we all fall into that, right? Like, you know, this idea of like more, whether it's for some people it might be the bigger house, the bigger car, the better job. And for me, apparently it's collecting that letter. behind my name, you know, like, we all have the same. So like, and I'm just like, you know what? No, no. No, enough is enough, right?

Like, we, how do we feel and be okay? And, but I think that's the thing. Like, I think one of the things that our system really does is to tell us we are not okay. Yeah. To have us consume more, to have us buy that wearable. add to that stack, you know? Yeah, totally. You're not okay. Take this, you'll drink this and you'll be okay. And that's, we live in that system where we're constantly optimizing and being told,

this is what you need in order to be okay. And social media doesn't help, you know, social media. And I think that maybe perhaps I'm being naive on this, but I generally think it started out as a positive thing to connect you with people from afar, you know, family members and so forth. And now every other, every two seconds, you know, maybe even 20 milliseconds, whatever it is, you're being sold something, right? Our attention has been commodified as well. And this is why psychedelics is threatening in a way, too, if you think about it,

because when your consciousness is open and you realize, hey, I could be okay. I don't need to mindlessly scroll social media. I don't need to purchase every single thing that's being advertised to me. I can choose where my eyeballs lay. I could choose to read a book,

you know, a magazine or whatever. Yeah. And that's scary because that is disruptive, right? So I guess that's just manifesto there. I love it. You're getting all. Ted Kaczynski on us over here. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. But might that be, though, like might that be something that all of a sudden people get wind up? I know that when you start looking back at the 60s, some people say like, look, that's the exact reason this thing got shut down, is that it dissolves boundaries.

It allows you to maybe see things in a way that you didn't before. Maybe it breaks that hypnosis that we're all under. And maybe that's something that people in charge are like, wait a minute, I don't know if I want another 60s revolution. Maybe that's the reason for the medical container. Maybe that's why it's so heavy on the medical language. And maybe that's why we're building an industry around it to medicalize it on some level. I know that's kind of an outlandish thought a little bit. But what are your thoughts on that?

Might it be something that people don't want? Oh, definitely. I mean, you know, that's, I mean, I think that's the thing, right? Like when we, and I think that there's something that you said that I think that really resonates with me. So thank you for that is that you're talking about values, right? Yes. And what this world talks about is what this world is selling you are visions. This is how you can be slimmer.

This is how you can be, you know, bigger, whatever, whatever it is that you're looking for. Right. And when we talk about values, that can be kind of threatening to people, right? Because we're talking, we're sharing our idea of, you know, what's safety, what's access, what's dignity for people, right? And what can actually help people heal for public health, right? And so you alluded to earlier about kind of, you had said in the earlier, can't remember what it was now, but what came to mind was how access, the medicalization of this.

And Dr. Brie and I have talked about this a lot. Like, you know, I don't know that I exactly know what type of access is the best access, right? I have to really kind of think about like the systems. I do know that maybe putting it in a medical access may not be the best way. And Dr. Brie, she has much more behavioral health experience. So she's talked about like an outpatient model, like the way that, methadone is dispensed as an example, right? And that, but we obviously with more, more guardrails, right?

And so we don't want to just give it to me, let him go home. And so, but in a way where, you know, we have existing, we're really smart. Like, we're smart. And we can figure this out. And, and it's, I think it's just bridging the pragmatics of policy and kind of the the poetry of the ineffable, right? And it's, you know, how do we, how to bring this together? It's really hard in a legal and medical model.

And then now it's like, I feel like we are so polarized on what people want. Like, again, people are envisioning, right? People on the one side of the aisle has this vision for their, for, for, for, for, for, America or whatever, you know, their community and other folks have other visions. But we're making the assumption that these visions are representative of our values. And I think at that end of the day, we all kind of value the same thing. We just have different ways of approaching it. And don't get me wrong, there are some methods that I approve of more than others. But I do think that we're smart and we can get there.

It's a messy process, right? But change is always a little messy. Of course. I guess one example is coming in mind right now is, you know, my friends are starting families and having a child in your life is hugely disruptive, right? It's messy, it's loud, it's disruptive, you know. But it's also beautiful, right? And it's something that you don't want to just power through raising your family, right?

You really want to enjoy that moments. And I think this is kind of we are birthing in a way, you know, excuse the metaphor here, but we are kind of birthing a new paradigm. You know, at least that's what I hope we're doing. And, you know, the point of span is that we're hoping to kind of give some guardrails and some foundational support for this new framework to enable people to engage with. with medicine and substances safely. It's so well said.

You know, and I, you brought up the word dignity. Like, my heart sank a little bit. Thank you for that. Dignity, grace. Like, this is what's going to allow us to move from, you know, dignity and grace will allow us to be the midwives of an awakening versus the middlemen for misery. You know what I mean?

Like, we need these things more than ever right now. And I see them on the forefront. People like you and Dr. Bree and Dr. Jessica Rochester or Matt Zeeman, there's so many incredible people out there that are really taking a step back and being like, okay, look, it's going to be messy. We need to watch out for this part over here. We need to watch this. But I want to shift gears just for a moment.

You've been working with a lot of first responders, and it's safer psychedelics association of New England and Spanbase. You guys have really been working with some people in the trenches on the front line. Can you share with us like some stories about, like, what are you guys seeing out there? Are there things you should be aware of? Or what are you and Dr. Breen, a team over there seeing as you're working through all these things? Yeah, thanks for the question.

So I really want to be clear. Like we haven't, our goal is to train first responders. Okay, okay. And yeah, so we have not, our goal is to get into higher houses, police stations, and so forth. One of our advisory council members is a lieutenant in a Winthrop and police department. He's a peace officer. He's mass trained.

a phenomenal human being, right? And so he's really giving us some guidance on, you know, what type of responses stations are seeing, precincts are seeing. We're also working, we're also one on, I'll want to say we're working. We're supportive of decrimm efforts in the city of Boston. So in eastern Massachusetts, Somerville, cities of Somerville and Cambridge are decrimmed right now. And there is an effort to decrim in Boston. With decriminalization, we anticipate that, and there's a statistic in our e-book right now, and I can't pull up the distance, I can't remember the statistic right now, but we suspect, or we anticipate that there will be a slight increase in emergency calls. And so our goal is to train

first responders how to respond, not react, right? Respond. We also think it's super important to get out to parents, teachers. Yeah. Community members, right? Especially in underserved communities where, you know, maybe kids have a little bit more freedom. Maybe they just have more time, you know? Like, I had a lot of kids. I love for a kid and so and just maybe there's more experimentation, right?

And so our goal is to provide. We have three excellent free webinars, trainings on our site right now. You just have to give us your email and we'll email it to you. So unsubscribe after that if you want. But our goal is to provide these as low cost as possible because we want to educate as many as possible. We think of it as kind of like a dare program, but like the opposite of dare. Like we want to teach you how to engage safely, not abstain, not abstinence. Yeah.

Yeah. But really like the dare model is a good model, right? It's like everywhere, right? It's so pervasive. And it's like, you know, even decades after the fact, you know, I think there's somewhere in my, me and my dad's house, there's a dare t-shirt somewhere. But, you know, it's kind of that, that's what we want to, we want that type of consciousness for psychedelic response. I love it. You know, I think there's something so beautiful in the messaging, too.

And I was talking with a gentleman earlier today. And we came to this idea about the contagion of a. awareness. You know what I mean? It's interesting to think about how awareness becomes contagious. And that's the same way in which, you know, something might go viral or, but especially with a program like you're doing. How do you make it contagious? Like you want it to be inviting. Like you want to reach the kids that are experimenting already. You know, the absence of desk. That's not going to work. But what can you, let's talk strategy for a minute. Like how do you make it contagious? Like how do you sit down with your team and talk about the best?

way to get it into these neighborhoods. Do you change the wording of it? Do you have someone go in? Do you have a band come up and maybe there's a concert or like, you know, what are some of the strategies you're using to make this policy contagious? Yes, to all of it. No. Tell me more, George. What should we do? Yeah, I mean, we, so this, so this, we're relatively new kid on the block, right? Dr. Bray and I, we met through Intertrecht and we really really, started planning this in September of 2024. We incorporated January of 2025. So we've been incorporated for five months now. And we are in strong, what's the word I'm looking for? Donation seeking mode, development mode. And we've had a few successful campaigns. And we're really this first year,

this first year, maybe to two years, is about, brand recognition. This is where I think business school is actually kind of useful. So we're really about brand recognition right now. We want to share the message of what we're about. You know, I have already spoken and testified to lawmakers. I'm in touch with some lawmakers and we've offered them, you know, if you want to learn about second dollars, again, we're not here to convince you of anything, right? And like, you know, being in real estate, when I used to teach real estate and I used to teach my students, like your your license might say you're a person, you're not selling anything, right? You are, like the person sitting in front of you,

they've already decided. Are they going to sell buy rent, whatever it is? They're just simply evaluating whether or not you're the person to get them where they need to go. And so when I say that we've talked with lawmakers, we're not convincing them of anything. We're apolitical. What we are for is education. If legislation is presented to you and you do not understand it as a lawmaker, you probably shouldn't vote on it. But that's not what happens, right? But what we're saying is if you want to learn about it, we don't care if you're purple, green, turquoise, yellow, blue, whatever.

We will teach you how psychedelics archetypically works, the benefits, and the drawbacks. We're not saying psychedelics is going to cure the world. It's going to cure every vet of PTSD. No, it's going to take a huge investment. It is a, it is a, it is a, relationship and relationships take a long time to develop. But what we're saying is, hey, this might open a door. And this is how you might want to consider walking through that door.

And so that is our first, that is our strategy that we, you want to, I can talk about this all day. And we've spent minutes about it. But like, you want to learn about psychedelics. We will give you research based, evidence based, and our personal experience. if you want it, right? That's anecdotal and some people don't want that. So that you can understand how and if this might work.

And this and why people are so passionate about bringing this legislation to fruition. It's interesting because, you know, I travel a lot. I have friends all over the world. And, you know, as an American, I often get this thing. of, you know, Jenny, you're an American and you think America is so free. I was like, whoa, whoa, no, no, no. That's the, that's like the motto of my country. I'm not saying, you know, and are there, is America free in many ways? Sure. But, you know, but we are also so entrapped by ourselves. And bringing this type of legislation actually might give more freedom. And I think maybe,

like you were talking about in the 60s and everything, maybe that's why it's been so hard, you know? I also have a dear, dear friend. She did a webinar for us. Carrie Roe, she's a nurse practitioner, and she said something to me that was so influential and so just kind of just sat in my heart. And she said that she thinks that psychedelics are coming back now

because we are in so. so in danger of destroying ourselves. I was like, whoa. I mean, I'm chuckling about it, but it sat with me. And it's like, it really, it's like, I think about that. I think your friend Kerry Rowe is amazing. I love that, you know. He is amazing.

Yeah, I'm amazing. Of course you do. That's why, you know, birds of a feather, they say. It's interesting to think about it from like that esoteric level. fortunate. I get to sit down with the Mahadrina of Santo Dime and we talk about self-love, self-care, self-respect, and just the evolution of consciousness on some level. And it does seem that these, my personal belief is that you don't come into this world, you come out of it. The same way that an apple tree grows apples, the earth grows people. And when you start thinking about that level,

you go, oh, well, if the earth is an organism and it's, it is changing itself, of course we're going to change with it. And of course there's going to be these fruits that we can have to help change our consciousness along with it on so many levels. And it does seem to me that we are in need of, we are in need of leadership. We are in need of change. We're in need of, of return. You know, I think Terrence McKinnett called it like an archaic revival, these rights of passage and these, you know, these things that we go through, these ceremonies. And I think that's what's happening on so many levels. You're beginning to see this sort of new kind of awakening happening. And if I don't get to these questions, people are going to start getting mad at me, Jenny.

So we're going to jump into some of these questions over here. We'll come back and talk more about it. But this one first is coming to us from, where is this? Let me start at the top here. Okay, this one's coming from Desiree. She says, you've trained in end-of-life psychedelic care. What has death taught you about how to live? Desiree, thank you for this question.

My gosh. Wow. So that is, this is an amazing question. I don't even know where to begin. So first of all, thank you for this question. Yeah, I don't even know where to begin. I think for me, it just as a personal contrast, I really, really liked certainty, you know, previous.

I joke, again, I joke with my friends. I have Jenny 1.0, and then we kind of went through like 2.0, 2.5. I'm somewhere between three, three, and four right now. Maybe, I don't know, there's infinite versions, right? Because there's always updates out there. Like, you know, we're always getting updated. So I think for me personally that I've learned that less certainty doesn't mean chaos. So just my background, I needed a lot of, I had a lot of hypervigilance, a lot of certainty.

And I needed a lot of certainty or perceived certainty. Let me be more accurate on that. And it didn't. And I felt that this control, I could control my life, so to speak, right? And I think a lot of people, I don't want to speak for a lot. I don't want to speak for, you know, be so blanket on it. But I do think a lot of people suffer from this. And, you know, we see it in our government.

And so weird, you know. And so less certainty, the biggest lesson I learned, is like less certainty doesn't mean chaos. It doesn't mean that my life is going to end and it's going to fall apart. What it does mean is more humility, more humbleness. I've learned to be more open to what life just unfolds for me. I've learned to not push so hard and to allow it just to kind of flow, which is hard. I mean, the idea, like we think like, oh, they're sitting there not doing any.

That is the hardest thing I've ever learned how to do. And one of my early mentors taught me this, and it's in here somewhere, but sometimes I forget it. She said, non-action is an action. Non-action is a decision, right? Yeah. Because we're taught to constantly do, do, do. And so just the humility, openness, and being able to accept and to sit with and to hold not knowing. and not knowing sometimes that puts me right in the present moment and being in the present moment

is the biggest lesson I've learned about living life. So thank you. That's right for that question. Yeah, it's beautiful. Sometimes the not knowing allows for so much more freedom too because we're constantly searching for answers or you ever find yourself talking to someone like I think they're wrong, you know? Or like, the truth is, I don't know.

You know, so you just say, like, I'm not sure. Like, it's so freeing on so many levels to not have to be in that, in that fight or flight mode of conversation or side monologing or stuff like that. But not knowing is a beautiful thing that breeds curiosity, right? Question marks look like size and you can tear things down when you start having the right questions. And it's, Desire, thank you so much for that. I love it. Thank you.

Let's come over here to, let's come over here to Neil. Neil says, how do you hold space for someone when they become the storm? How do you hold space with someone behind the storm? I guess let me make sure I'm understanding this correctly. Like they've become disruptive in your life. And now I guess I'm trying to kind of maybe make sure I'm understanding that. Or maybe you're in ceremony with each other and they're having a challenging time. Okay.

Let me just answer this generically, Neil. I'm not sure if I'm going to, if this is helpful. I'm just offering this to you. I think the ability to sit with anyone, regardless of whether they're okay or not okay or whether you're okay or not okay. And it's totally acceptable to not be okay, right? I really want to make sure that people understand that.

And because, you know, we're constantly told that we're not okay. and we need to fix that not okayness, right? I think the ability to sit with anyone is the first starts and the ability to sit with yourself. So if someone is chaotic, if someone is stormy, you know, to be able to find the calm and to not be pulled in to that chaos as well, to know where you stand and your own groundedness.

So I think that's another thing thinking about all the lessons that I've learned and that have been provided to me is a sense of groundedness. So we talked a little bit earlier about my friends having children, right? And one thing I've learned. So I'm an auntie. I'm a very, very thankful and gracious. and like humbled auntie and i've spent a lot of time with like i'm cousins and they're all a little bit younger and one thing i did learn and even just even with clients if you will right if you are not

feeling okay that other person's going to feel it so all the time i've spent with um my own family and their children my friends kids and my friends kids um i've learned that as long as you can be okay the other person's going to feel it and you can it's that um what you're is it's a co-regulation, right? Again, making it clinical. But I think it's the co-regulation is what it's clinically called and the attunement. So, Neil, I hope that whatever you're going through or that your friend or loved one is going through,

I hope they really get what they need. And I hope you get, you know, that you can receive what you need to. Yeah. So thank you for chiming. Yeah. Thanks, Neil, for chiming in. Next up we have the great Ranga, Patamanabon. I'm sorry, Ranga.

I always get his name wrong. Ranga, Patamanabon. He's told me like 10 times. Ranga, I love you, buddy. He says, what does culturally sensitive harm reduction actually look like when no one is watching? I love you, Ranga. It's beautiful. I love that you have these like regulars and fans.

Such great questions, honestly. This is such a great conversation. Thank you for that question, Ranga. You know what? doing the right thing doesn't matter who's looking or not looking. That's just that's just a value that I hold, right? It doesn't matter who's looking or not looking. You just do the right thing, right? And so, and I know that I make it sound so like cavalier. But I honestly, that's one of my values. Like, we just, you just got to do the next best, right thing, right? So being culturally sensitive,

so one of the things that we talk about a lot, like I'm located in the city of Boston. I don't know if the statistic is that accurate anymore, but Boston is historically pretty racist. I think it's changing. Definitely, no, no, I know it's changing. Like we have a very progressive Taiwanese American female mayor. Like, that's cool. Like I'm Taiwanese Americans, I'm like, woo, you know.

And so, you know, it's definitely changing. But, you know, change is slow. Progress is slow. And so we, at Span, we also, I'm very much involved with the melanating, psychonauts in Boston. It's like a bipot group for the etheneogen. No, oh my gosh.

They're EMC, ethenogen melanated collective. And they are like the bipot group based in Boston. And we talk about how do we provide education support for those in these communities that may not trust our medical systems with very good reason, right? Even as a kid, if something happened in my, home we wouldn't want to call the EMTs like have these strangers trapezing through our house and like you know saying this stuff that me my family doesn't understand right or and and then not to mention all of the actual harm that our medical system has perpetrated against you know black

Americans right or black American right or non white people um and so we talk about just cultural attunement and which is why we are so passionate about training teachers, community leaders, you know, parents, because we think that in these communities, these are the elders that people will turn to. These are the aunties and the grandmas. I don't know how, Ranga, you know, what your community looks like, but growing up, you know, I had a lot of aunties, a lot of uncles, grandmas, you know, everyone's a cousin, everyone's an auntie. And these are the people that, you turn to you to ask for advice. Is advice good? But hopefully, you know, at least someone's asked, right? And so that's why we are so passionate about training community members in these communities

to understand psychedelics and not to freak out if your teenager, you know, swallowed a handful of shrooms and that it's going to be okay, you know? It's going to be okay. Without a doubt. Yeah, it's such a great way to bring awareness into the homes of the people who may not know what it is. Because I think it was McKenna who said something along the lines of psychedelics are a substance that when you take them, it makes everybody around you trip out. You know what I mean? Like so everybody around you is like, whoa! And you're like, I'm all right.

It's a little groovy over here. I'm all right. And then it gets back to that. It gets back to that. The idea you were talking about the clinical word for it I think you used was like the not coherence, but the co-regulating. You know, if you've taken a substance and you feel different and everybody around you is freaking out, whoa, that's going to put you in a space where you're really going to have a difficult time on so many levels right there. It's amazing.

Right, right. Ranga, thank you so much for chiming in over here. This one comes to us from Betsy. Betsy's from Oceanside. Betsy, I love you. She says, is a bad trip, a sacred teacher? Betsy, this is such a great question. Thank you so much for asking this because, so at the end, I'll give, I'll provide it.

I'll offer your listeners who've spent so much time with us now some resources. But one of the resources we have is an e-book. And I actually just finished editing, re-editing our chapter on a bad trip, right? And I'm not saying it to, like, diminish it. When we say bad trip colloquially, we typically mean something, like the trip was challenging. Like, you know, I've had so many bad trips if we want to think about it, right? I'm crying, weeping beyond belief, right? I'm just like, where are these tears coming from?

I should be desiccated by now. But like, but those are challenging trips, right? We define a bad trip as something actually bad happening to you. Like maybe you get up and you fall and you hurt your hand or you twist your arm somehow or you stub your toe when you're going to the bathroom because, you know, you didn't have a sitter with you or a facilitator with you, whatever, right? something actually bad happening. And bad trips typically, like these bad trips happen, both the like kind of mental bad trip, the metaphysical one and the actual physical space one with lack of preparation. So we do believe that preparation, set and setting will mitigate as much as possible of a bad trip.

Now, Betsy, to your question, is a bad trip a, you said is a bad trip a teacher? Is that the question. She said a sacred teacher, but... A secret teacher? My personal opinion, I want to say yes, but there's no, but again, there's no certainty, right? It's, it's what you take from it. And so the ability that the ceremony is, um, it's not a prescription. It's a container.

Like whatever's in that container that comes out in the non-specific amplifying ways that psychedelics are, um, you know, they kind of emerge and what lessons are you going to take are you going to receive? I mean, I don't like the word taking. It feels so forceful. But these lessons emerge and can you receive them at the time? You know, one of the things I also learned from the first question is, you know, how, what have I learned?

One of the things I tend to realize was, you know, I'm not like the super devout Buddhist, but my grandmother was on my maternal side. And she would say these two things to me like throughout my life before she passed on. And one of the things I realized coming out of my experiences was, oh, that's what she meant. Oh, I get it now. These are decades later, right? Wow. And so I think, Betsy, thank you for this question because I think anything can really be a teacher.

I really do believe that I'm not saying if there's a lesson in everything. Sometimes bad things just happen, right? But I think that if we can be reflective on it and see the world as a mirror and even the journey experience, a ceremony experience as a mirror, I think there could be some value in that, you know? But again, that's just my personal opinion. And Betsy, everyone's journey is so personal to themselves. So, and I really encourage people to get support, you know, therapy, integration, and just, you know, support to kind of see what emerges for you. Thank you.

Yeah. Yeah. Shout out, Betsy. And I'll tell you this, Betsy, because I know what kind of doses you're doing. You're doing like five gram doses. There's a big doses. Here's something that I have found that I think works pretty well. the more you try to push it away, and I'm talking about when you take the dose and maybe a couple hours in,

and all of a sudden you have these really uncomfortable thoughts. That's kind of what her and I were talking about a while back. What I found Betsy works is that the more you try to push it away, the bigger it gets. Just sit with it. And here's one thing that I've learned is that think of all the thoughts when you're tripping as like a line of people waiting to sit in your lap. And they just want your attention. So the bad ones, the good ones, the rowdy ones, the people in line getting crazy. Okay, they want your attention.

So take all your thoughts, Betsy, bring them right up on your lap, sit them down, put them on your lap and just talk to them. Be like, what do you got to tell me? What is it? And just listen. Let the thoughts sit as long as they need to with you. And if you don't try to force them away, they'll leave on their own. But the more you try to push them away, the rowdyer they get. So just sit with them, Betsy.

Just let them sit down at your lap, you know, put your arm around them and listen. What is this thing really telling me? And once you figure that out, you're like, Okay, I got it. It's not really a bad thing. It's just something that I need to be aware of. And you start changing your language from bad to aware. It'd be really helpful. It's helped me out quite a bit, Betsy. And I'll talk to you a little bit later about it. But yeah, thank you for chime in over here. I really appreciate it. I love that, George. Thank you. I'm going to use that. I mean, another one, as you were saying, like, all the people that want your attention. Imagine like, I mean, imagine like as a kindergarten teacher, all the students, all of your class, like teacher, you know.

Yeah. For dog lovers and dog owners out there. Yeah. I'm a dog lover. Beautiful. Your dog comes to you, want something. They're just going to keep looking at you until they get the pets, until they get the treat, whatever. And that's kind of, you know, they just want your attention.

And so that's an excellent, that's exactly it, George. So thank you for bringing that. Like in the psychedelic experience, because. it's non-specific, whatever bubbles up, emerges, it is calling for your attention. And if you can just sit with it,

you know, be able to hold it for a little while as much as you can, and then it will go. And then that's another saying, right? What you can't heal, what you don't feel, one, what you resist persists.

It's so true. So true. So true. Yeah. You know what? Like it almost serves like a simulator, too because once you figure that out in the psychedelic state, you can take that with you outside of the psychedelic state and you realize these things that pop up because they happen to

outside of a psychedelic state. Oh, you get this a panic attack. You're feeling some anxiety or something. Just sit with it. Oh, yeah, yeah. In some ways, I really feel the psychedelics are an intelligence talking to us, simulating what we need to do in our lives in order to be better. And it puts us through these situations. And once you become aware of that, you can change your relationship with psychedelics, at least on some level, like, oh, I'm actually simulating these real feelings or maybe I'm processing them different with this particular substance. Now I can take this lesson outside of here and do the work or however you want to describe it. But it's, you know, I see it as like, you know, really getting to sit with things that are wrong in your awareness.

And it's changing the way you see it. Maybe that's the neuroplasticity. Maybe that's the set and setting has something to do with that. But it's a real lesson that you can learn from there. And some of the big ones are really tough. It's tough to sit with them. It's scary. Like I've been, I've cried my heart out and I've been curled up in a ball. And like, but afterwards, I'm like, okay, if you can ask the question, what did I learn? What did, another one, Betsy is another one I use quite a bit is. What else could this mean? What else could this mean? And if you sit with what else could this mean, you know, where you've got that reticular activating system. It'll find another reason what it is. So try, try sitting with that one too. What else could this mean? Who's this one coming from? This one has no name, but. But the question is, what does the mushroom say to capitalism?

Whoever you are, it's a brilliant question. Love it. Gosh, where do we begin? So, I mean, I do think that plant medicine is reemerging for this healing, for this healing that we need. Because we are in this ultra unhealthy. I mean, I could talk about, I always tell people, they're like, wait, Jenny, you went to business school, right?

And I was like, yeah, I'm like the worst business school student, right? I'm like anti-capitalism, right? And so, and they're just kind of like, I was like, yeah, I know life choices. And so, and that's the thing, right? Like capitalism and this constant need for optimization feeds the machine, keeps the machine running. And plant medicine and healing actually asks us to slow down and even has the inquiry of should this machine, should this machine, even exist. Like, is this what we want for ourselves, right? I think we've completely failed to stop to ask, you know, is this, is this what we want? Right. And we live and I think we often fail,

like, in our optimism and hope to kind of see the dark side of things in a way. Like, there's always unintended consequences, right? Always, right? You know, Some real life examples because I happen to work in real estate in Boston, which there's a huge housing crunch. This is a very pervasive U.S. problem, et cetera, et cetera. So then the city puts in low housing requirements to help keep those who run our city in the city so they can actually get to work and work, God willing, right? Oh, go figure. But then developers don't want to develop because now these requirements are too stringent and it's costing the money. So there's always like an unintended consequence, right?

And so we fail to ask these questions. And I do think that plant medicine helps us open our eyes to kind of see both. You know, again, we are not, I am not advocating that plant medicine is for everybody. You know, here's some mushrooms, here's some mushrooms. Like I'm not the Oprah of like second all of medicine here, right? Oprah. Although she's in now, you know, she had that talk with Michael Paulin. So, so, you know, but it should be used with discernment, with respect and with care, and just a humbleness, right?

They are, I do believe, like you said, that they are a teacher. They teach us about ourselves. So going back to that very first question that asked about, you know, what have I learned? I learned so much about myself. and that has been illuminating. Like we live in our bodies for, you know, however many years I've been in this body now. And I feel like, oh, wow, that's why I do this thing. I had no idea for what some of the things I'm not doing, but just kind of like,

huh, oh, yeah, that makes sense. This is why I'm the way I am. And now that I see it, I get to decide. I get to change and decide if this is how I want to be. And this is how I want to show up. I love it. Yeah, you said something earlier in the conversation, too, about holding two competing ideas. And I recently had on a really cool philosopher named Graham Priest, and he wrote a book called True Paradox.

It's fascinating to think about, you know, what is true? And can two things be true at once? And if the answer is yes, what do you do? It's an interesting thought, right? And I think that more people are beginning to come aware of that. like, yeah, that's true and that's true. I know when I moved to Hawaii, like I was, I was born in San Diego, spent most of my life and Caucasian acres.

And when I moved to Hawaii, it was, it was such a different melting pot of so many different Eastern influences and so many people. And I remember I was talking to this gentleman from Japan. And, you know, I had one idea of what happened in World War II. And he had a whole other idea. And I remember sitting with them and being like, oh, you know, and I, I don't want to say I'm a shame because I don't want to betray my former self. But, you know, I didn't know. I didn't know. And so you didn't know. You don't know what you don't know. And so when I when I talk with them,

that's the one of the first times I realized that, oh, both of these things are true. This is what I was taught and that's what they were taught. Like both things are true. And I think there's some real learning that can get done when, whether it's through psychedelics, because I think they can teach you that or whether it's traveling. But what are your thoughts on that about? Maybe we can jump back to that two things being true and how that intersects with psychedelics. You know, thank you for this question, George, because so I was recently in Ho Chiman City, right, Saigon, and they, April 29th, I don't know if the world knows this, I did not know it, was the, the Vietnamese called the Reunification Day of North and South.

You know, obviously during the war, Americans support the South, the North Vietnam, right? And the North won, right? And then so it was funny, I was texting my friend and he asked me, oh my gosh, I was like, this is fascinating. You know, as an American being here right now, and he's like, did you know? I'm like, no, of course I didn't know. I'm American. We don't talk about our losses. Like, and it's also fascinating because my grandparents fled communism, right? And then like my, my other grandparents on my other side, like fought communism, like in like actually in the war, took a bullet, you know, fought against the Japanese and all these things, right? And, and what I, and I make this

analogy with psychedelics in a way because here I am physically traveling our earth, our home, right? Our globe. Yeah. And just kind of expanding literally kind of in this life, expand or in this in this plane, expanding my horizons. The psychedelics, they call it a trip for a reason. You literally journey, right?

And when I say, hey, you need to prepare. It's like, oh, you're going to go to Hawaii tomorrow. You're going to go to Barbados tomorrow. Do you just jump on the plane and you don't take anything with you? You know, so you need to prepare. So I've had people say, this is just too much work. I don't want to do this.

Okay, then you really don't want to do it. You really just don't want to go. And they're just like, what do you mean? I'm like, it's a trip. It's a journey. You prepare for it the way you would if you're actually traveling somewhere. You know, are you going to bring your swimsuit? Are you going to, you know, how many pieces of underwear are you going to bring, you know, whatever?

You know, just being facetious and silly. But, you know, but it is literally kind of, um, expanding your horizons so that both can be true, right? Because your truth is your experience of it. And I think sometimes we, we especially in the West, especially in North America, especially in America, our biggest export is our culture, right? We export, this is what a family looks like. This is what a vacation looks like. This is what a picture perfect Instagram post looks like, right? And this is what music, should sound like and this is what people should look like right and then so you know someone was making fun of like my american teeth because everyone gets braces you know and so um you know so our biggest

export is you know supposedly freedom and culture whatever and but that's not everyone's experience and not everyone's truth right so yeah be true yeah i mean again you know the vietnam my experience of it was so fascinating there's just such a proud you know beautiful and yet humble people and but you can feel that dignity of like you know this is what happened and we we are proud that this is what happened we're okay with it and it's just a very humbling humbling experience just completely surreal yeah it's it's so it does blow my mind to think about how the language for an internal journey is very similar to an external journey You know, even the language of people say, oh, you get high.

Well, what happens when you get high? You have a different perspective. Like you're looking down on something. You know, you see things different. It's, there's like a lot of neuroplasticity when you go to a new place for the first time. Like you're open to all these ideas. You're letting the environment course through you. And it's so similar with these just consciousness changing substances.

It's, it can't be a coincidence that we use the same language, right? Yeah, completely. Yeah, I think, yeah, you're, if you go to when you go to a new city, like all of the sights and sounds and smells and everything is kind of like accosting you, right? And that's, I don't like that in a ceremonial experience, right? Like everything is, what do you see on the horizon? So you've been working, talking to lawmakers, you said you're the new kids on the block

and you have these really brilliant strategies about how to, you know, sort of make things aware for the people, the community leaders, the teachers, the parents. What do you see as the next step for safer psychedelics association of New England? Yeah. We really hope to educate and in that education process to influence, you know, lawmakers to, you know, while we're not advocating for any specific law laws, we've been asked to give our input on them, right? Both Bree and I are trained as psilocybin facilitators, and of course she has the doctorate of behavioral help as well. I have more of a slightly legal background, but also from like a more business background, right? So we've analyzed language for legislation when we've been asked to do so.

And we really try to give the pros and cons. We really try to give it all, right? Like, again, we're not trying to say this is the right path or anything like that. But we do believe that more access could be helpful. for people and that if people are going to engage with it, there are some guardrails that people want to think about. And what I think what we do best is we don't describe the trip because, again, that's so personal. That's, that's, that's, I'm concerned. That's really irrelevant, right? We describe, we talk about the values and we describe the transformation. And the transformation,

if we were talking earlier about the science of it, the science is there. Like people leave these experiences transformed. And when I think about why it's taking so hard, taking, why it's been so hard and taking so long, it's because this type of radical transformation is so threatening and so foreign, right? I mean, think about, I mean, I, again, I'm trying to kind of bring our exterior to our interior and then vice versa. But if we think about our,

everything that is outside of us, starts, is created twice, right? Once it starts here and here first and they gets translated out, right? So everything that our government is doing right now, this is like the second iteration of it, because the first iteration is in here somewhere. Yeah. And if we look at our protectionist policies, we are regressing, right? And again, I'm not trying to make this into like a political conversation at all, but we are, there is massive fear out there. And these protectionist policies are trying to stem change, right? No change. Everything stays static. Everything stays safe, right? And that's partly why I think psychedelic legislation takes so long because they're so, it's inherently it's change.

And it's Google change. You know, it's not like saying, you know, one thing that we talk about, like what does Trump want to do now start accounts for children to start saving or something like that. Yeah, okay, that sounds like a lifetime, I don't know, 529 college savings plan. Like it's kind of the same as something we already know, so it's kind of digestible. But what psychedelics brings and what I think this type of legislation, this type of healing opens, like blows the doors open to is so radical and possibly so peaceful. that people just don't want it because we don't know what peace feels like. Yeah, it's tough to sell stuff in times apiece.

You know, you need that. There's so much of what we have is built on just hardcore competition and scarcity mindsets and, you know, pumping up prices on so many levels. But yeah, it's, I think that the more resistance we get from be it the administration or corporations, the more radical, the psychedelic,

psychedelic is going to be. You know, it's yet to be seen, whether it's going to spill into something outside of the medical container. And we're going to see something like that. But I think the more resistance, the bigger the psychedelics will come in and change, change the way people work. It does seem to me that people, the change is going to come from the bottom up. You know, when you become the best version of yourself, all of a sudden you start changing your community. You start changing your dynamic. You start changing your relationships. And when enough people do that there's no law or there's nothing up top that's going to be able to hold it back in my opinion you think that's a fair assessment yeah completely i think um i mean if you think about all of our

our i want to say heroes but all the great change makers that we've had right um you know one of my favorites is tichna han right he's a buddhist monk right and um ultimately uh ultimate like peace warrior in many ways with Martin Luther King Jr. And when you change yourself is ultimately how you can radiate any type of change. And that, but I don't think that's an easy message for people to accept, right? Because we want these externalities. We want to take a stack that's going to change us. We want to, you know, buy this whatever that Facebook or Instagram is selling me

because it's going to make me feel better somehow, whatever, you know. And so we've really lost, I think, I mean, I can't, I'm not taking for everyone here, but what I do, I speak for myself, that I think there was a time where I really lost the ability to be grounded in myself, and we look for externalities to make ourselves feel better, because we need to keep feeding this machine. And because, God forbid, this machine dissolve the water we left. That's scary. Yeah, I think it's necessary on so many levels.

It's just the fear. It's just running on fear. Maybe that's the thing with the tragedies, too. Maybe that's why so many people that hit rock bottom absolutely come out and they come out change and they see and they start living a better life for themselves and their families and their relationships is that you really have to work on that fear. You really have. And it's different for everybody. Someone might have the fear of not being enough. Some people might have the fear of, you know, losing their life.

soon, you know, getting towards the end of their time. But it's just that fear alone that, you know, once you wrestle with it, you begin to realize, look, I think I can, I think I can beat this fear over here, but it's such a powerful thing. Jenny, we're coming up on this hour and a half. I walk you right up to the line right here. And I don't think we even really, we scratched the surface, but I feel like we could talk for another couple hours. So you've got to come back and maybe Bree can come with you next time or Bree can come on or maybe some people from your team. I would love to talk to everybody. So, yeah, thank you. Yeah, but before we land the plane here, where can people find you?

What do you got coming up? What are you excited about? Yeah, thank you. So as you mentioned earlier, we're going to be at psychedelic sciences. So if anyone's interested in attending, our organization has a discount code for tickets. He at 15% off at the discount code, should I just pop it in the chat or what should I do here? Yeah, yeah. Can you do that on?

There should be a present button right there. Should allow you to pop it up. Present. slides and PDF. Oh, should I share screen? Oh, yeah. Can you do that? I don't know if I should do if I can do that. Well, you know what? Here, let me just, let me just tell it to people. It's just spam. And I'll finish one of it too. Okay, thank you. S-P-A-N-15. That gets you 15% off of the tickets for the conference. We will be there. So if you do, if anyone is attending, please, please come up to us and introduce yourselves. We'd love to get to know you.

We also have a LinkedIn. Follow us on LinkedIn. We also have IG. You just Google us, spanbase.org, spanbase, that's S-P-A-N-B-A-S-E dot-O-R-G. Our LinkedIn, you can just Google or search, I guess, on the top, Safer Psychedelics, and we have our LinkedIn there. We are, we have volunteers, and we also, I'm remiss. I want to give a shout out to our volunteer team because without them, none of this could happen. So our volunteer team, they're wonderful. they volunteer with us because they also believe in the mission and to believe to get this information out to people who really need it and who can benefit from it. So thank you to you for

having me here. Thank you to all supporters. And thank you to your listeners for all these fantastic questions. So evocative and deep. My gosh. Yes. Well, hang on briefly afterwards, Jenny, but to everybody within the sound of my voice, Desiree, Betsy, Neil, Ranga. I had a few people without their names, put your names, and I want to give you guys some credit. So thank you to everybody that listened with us today that hung out. And Jenny, hang on briefly afterwards to everybody. Have a beautiful day. Go check out the links in the show notes.

Check out Jenny and Span and check them out of Psychedelics today. Once again, the company's Safer Psychedelics Association of New England, spanbase.org. That's all we got. Ladies and gentlemen, have a beautiful day. Thank you.