Speaker 1: Welcome to Go, ask Alli, a production of Shonda Land
Speaker 1: Audio and partnership with I Heart Radio. When I have
Speaker 1: been with friends and that happened and I paid my pants,
Speaker 1: I did lose the room, they did leave. I saw
Speaker 1: her light up and I was like, I'm just going
Speaker 1: to work. But we are here until one of our
Speaker 1: last reps. I was just the one that was meant
Speaker 1: to take care of mamma. It's for me to remember
Speaker 1: every single day is that I always have a choice.
Speaker 1: Everyone always has a choice. Whenever somebody says no, you can't,
Speaker 1: or there's no rules for you, or you have to
Speaker 1: look like this, I go. I'll show you. I'll show you.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Go, ask Alli. I'm Alli Wentworth and this
Speaker 1: is season three. I'm so excited. Had a great hiatus.
Speaker 1: Thank you for supporting my book, Allie's Well That Ends Well.
Speaker 1: Had a great summer with that, did a lot of
Speaker 1: lecture series, clammed a lot of clam ms, and hung
Speaker 1: out with my two daughters. You know, I'm about to
Speaker 1: become a true empty nesters. So I am holding onto
Speaker 1: my daughters by their ankles, kicking and screaming um and
Speaker 1: so happy to be back, you know, George, My husband
Speaker 1: always jokes and says that go ask Galleys like my
Speaker 1: master class, because I get to invite all these experts
Speaker 1: and artists and thinkers and creators, and I get to
Speaker 1: ask them all kinds of questions and learn more about
Speaker 1: the things I want to know more about. And I
Speaker 1: know you do too, And so first up this season,
Speaker 1: you know I've been hearing more and more about psychedelics.
Speaker 1: Stephen Wright once said, I used to have an open mind,
Speaker 1: but my brains kept falling out, which is very aproposed
Speaker 1: to today's episode. So I have a few friends that
Speaker 1: have been micro dosing, and they swear by it. It's
Speaker 1: basically taking very small doses of some popular psychedelic lucinogens.
Speaker 1: So I've been a little fascinated by it because I
Speaker 1: know that it helps with PTSD and trauma. But would
Speaker 1: a little nibble here and there help just the everyday stress?
Speaker 1: I mean, we're living in a world right now where
Speaker 1: everything is terrifying. There's so much anxiety. Maybe maybe a
Speaker 1: little micro dosing might help it. And it occurred to
Speaker 1: me that maybe micro doosing might make us better mothers, wives, friends, humans,
Speaker 1: And there's no better guests than Michael Pollen to answer
Speaker 1: these questions. So. Michael Pollen is a writer, teacher, and activist.
Speaker 1: His most recent book, This Is Your Mind on Plants,
Speaker 1: is a follow up to his highly acclaimed How to
Speaker 1: Change Your Mind With The New Science of Psychedelics, teaches
Speaker 1: us about consciousness, dying, addiction, depression, and transcendence. He's the
Speaker 1: author of seven previous books, all of which were New
Speaker 1: York Times bestsellers. The Omnivores Dilemma was named one of
Speaker 1: the ten Best books of two thousand and seven both
Speaker 1: by The New York Times and The Washington Post. Several
Speaker 1: of his books have been adapted for television, including How
Speaker 1: to Change Your Mind now streaming on Netflix, which you
Speaker 1: should definitely watch. Pollen teaches writing at Harvard and at
Speaker 1: You See Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism. In two thousand ten,
Speaker 1: Time magazine named Pollen one of the one hundred most
Speaker 1: Influential people in the World. And stay with us afterwards
Speaker 1: for a short conversation with a mom about her personal
Speaker 1: experience micro dosing. Hello, Michael Pollen, Hello, good to be here. Ali.
Speaker 1: So I know you've been doing this grand book tour
Speaker 1: and I want to talk to you about something and
Speaker 1: I'm going to make it a little more specific if
Speaker 1: you don't mind, Okay, great. My question to you is
Speaker 1: does micro dosing make you a better parent? And the
Speaker 1: reason I ask is because I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: because of you. I don't know if it's happening in
Speaker 1: the medical world, but I have noticed more and more
Speaker 1: I have friends who are a mom or a dad
Speaker 1: who are micro dosing. And when I first heard about it,
Speaker 1: of course, my very waspy roots was taken aback and
Speaker 1: I clutched my pearls and I thought, oh my god,
Speaker 1: you're tripping on acid while you're parenting children. This is crazy.
Speaker 1: Since I've read your book, I am a lot more
Speaker 1: educated about it. So first of all, let's just put
Speaker 1: a toe in the pool and let me just ask
Speaker 1: you to explain micro dosing for those who don't know. Sure, so,
Speaker 1: micro dosing is the practice of taking a very small
Speaker 1: sub perceptual in other words, a dose so small you
Speaker 1: don't feel any psychedelic effects of LSD or psilocybin. Psilocybin
Speaker 1: is the chemical and magic mushrooms. People take basically a
Speaker 1: tenth of what would be an active dose, and they
Speaker 1: do it on some sort of schedule like one day
Speaker 1: on two days off, one day on two days off.
Speaker 1: You can't take it every day because you build up
Speaker 1: tolerance to and it doesn't work anymore. Many people report
Speaker 1: beneficial changes to their mood and their outlook and their
Speaker 1: productivity and their creativity. Whether these changes are real or
Speaker 1: a placebo effect is still up in the air. I
Speaker 1: haven't seen any research that suggests that micro dosing actually
Speaker 1: does anything, although people report that it does, and that's
Speaker 1: in a way the only thing that matters. There's nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with the placebo. Placebos are incredibly powerful. And when
Speaker 1: you think about it, I mean, even if if I
Speaker 1: gave you a sugar pill and I said this is
Speaker 1: going to make you a better parent or a more
Speaker 1: patient parent, let's say it probably would have some effect.
Speaker 1: That's how powerful the placebo is. But if you combine
Speaker 1: it and say this is a little bit of LSD,
Speaker 1: that amplifies the placebo effect because there's so much magic
Speaker 1: we attribute to that molecule, so that it may be
Speaker 1: a very powerful placebo effect is going on until we
Speaker 1: really do the kind of controlled double blind studies where
Speaker 1: people don't know what they're getting, uh, they get a
Speaker 1: real placebo where they get the small dose of LSD.
Speaker 1: We won't know that it's doing anything. If what people
Speaker 1: report is true, Yeah, it's conceivable it would make them
Speaker 1: better parents if they're you know, less depressed or anxious.
Speaker 1: You know, that should make them better parents. But um,
Speaker 1: it is illegal. I think it's important for people to know,
Speaker 1: even if it's a small dose. Haven't I read recently
Speaker 1: that it's it's sort of the lowest in terms of
Speaker 1: the criminal chain of offenses. Well, it depends where you live.
Speaker 1: There are many jurisdictions around the country, including Washington, d C. Oakland, California,
Speaker 1: and Arbor, Denver, Colorado, and a bunch of others, and
Speaker 1: there will be a lot more that have decriminalized psilocybin,
Speaker 1: for example. But decriminalized doesn't make it legal. It's still
Speaker 1: illegal at the federal level. And yes, and all it
Speaker 1: does really it doesn't change the legal status of the drug.
Speaker 1: It basically just tells the law enforcement this should be
Speaker 1: your lowest priority. So it's probably hard to get busted
Speaker 1: in those places for possession, but but certainly sale would
Speaker 1: get you in trouble. But it has opened the door
Speaker 1: I mean here in I live in Berkeley, you know,
Speaker 1: one town over from Oakland, and a friend of mine
Speaker 1: was just at a farmer's market or flea market and
Speaker 1: they were selling psilocybin chocolates openly with with labels saying
Speaker 1: what it was. So things are changing. Yeah, it feels
Speaker 1: like it. And by the way, it's five to is
Speaker 1: how much you use when you're micro dosing. Right, what
Speaker 1: would be a full dose of LSD of a psychedelic
Speaker 1: if you wanted to really trip um, it would be
Speaker 1: about a hundred micrograms, So it's very small. Yeah, LSD
Speaker 1: is a very what's kind of incredible about l s
Speaker 1: D is it's such a I mean, micrograms are millions
Speaker 1: of a gram. This is a very tiny amount of
Speaker 1: a substance, and that wouldn't be a big dose, but
Speaker 1: that would be a dose you'd really feel. So I'm
Speaker 1: looking back at history, particularly with with moms, and certainly
Speaker 1: in the fifties and sixties there was valium housewife. You know,
Speaker 1: women were medicating for various reasons and helper mother's little helper,
Speaker 1: and so right now, and I could just be because
Speaker 1: of the people I know, but I'm sort of seeing
Speaker 1: a trend that micro dosing is actually helping people. And
Speaker 1: I certainly look at the world as we all do
Speaker 1: right now with everything that's going on politically, climate crisis, everything,
Speaker 1: and I go, well, why are we all micro dosing?
Speaker 1: I mean, it does everything I've read in your book
Speaker 1: and every research I've read. It does boost morale, it
Speaker 1: does give you more energy, it does sort of take
Speaker 1: the edge off anxiety. It's all a plus to me.
Speaker 1: Besides the fact that it's illegal. Yeah, I think that's
Speaker 1: the biggest negative about micro dosing is that it is illegal.
Speaker 1: There's not a lot of risk in micro dosing at
Speaker 1: those doses. You know, you're perfectly functional, you can do
Speaker 1: what you need. I think the biggest risk is and
Speaker 1: I hear this a lot. People describe micro dozing and
Speaker 1: then talk about feeling different and feeling a psychedelic effect.
Speaker 1: That means they weren't micro dozing, they took too much.
Speaker 1: And it's particularly difficult with psilocybin mushrooms because any two
Speaker 1: mushrooms can differ in intensity by a factor of ten.
Speaker 1: So you what was just a kind of a micro dose,
Speaker 1: little nibble of a mushroom, when you did the same
Speaker 1: thing with another mushroom, you Mike go WHOA, I can't drive,
Speaker 1: and you're usually managing your medication yourself when you're micro dozing. Correct. Yeah,
Speaker 1: people are not guided with micro dosing. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is something you can do on your own. You don't
Speaker 1: really need a guide. There's no experience to talk you through.
Speaker 1: It's it's more like a brain vitamin. I think that's
Speaker 1: kind of how people how people treat it. But as
Speaker 1: I say, you know, I think the jury is open
Speaker 1: on whether it's actually doing anything at a pharmacological level. Um,
Speaker 1: And I think we have to do that research. I
Speaker 1: think it's really important search. Yeah. I heard a story
Speaker 1: the other day from a good friend of mine and
Speaker 1: she was away on working and her husband was at
Speaker 1: home with their kids, and he called her up and
Speaker 1: he said, UM, is there something you want to tell
Speaker 1: me about this chocolate bar that you have hidden in
Speaker 1: the drawer of your desk. And my friend said, what
Speaker 1: do you mean? And he said, well, I just ate
Speaker 1: half of it and I am seeing colors. And she said, well, yes,
Speaker 1: that is a candy bar that has mushrooms in it
Speaker 1: for micro dosing, and you just ate half of it,
Speaker 1: so you are in fact tripping. So she had to
Speaker 1: call her children and put them on speaker and say,
Speaker 1: listen to me very carefully. Your father is tripping. I
Speaker 1: need you to make him a big thing of spaghetti
Speaker 1: because he's really hungry and you can't raise your voice
Speaker 1: or do anything that's going to make him feel disoriented
Speaker 1: or anxious. And the kids were like, what this is
Speaker 1: not This is not a family where the parents like
Speaker 1: talk about drugs openly. So she said she had to
Speaker 1: beg her children to kind of take care of him,
Speaker 1: to manage it. Yeah, to be his guide. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, if you have these substances around the house,
Speaker 1: somebody may take them, and uh, people should realize these
Speaker 1: are powerful substances and they shouldn't be casual about it.
Speaker 1: And it's one of the reasons that I emphasized the
Speaker 1: importance of working with a guide if you're going to
Speaker 1: take a substantial dose of a psychedelic and that you
Speaker 1: mitigate a lot of the risks. And but there are risks,
Speaker 1: their psychological risks, and people do end up in the
Speaker 1: emergency room because they have such a horrifying experience or
Speaker 1: or can't get out of it. But a good guide
Speaker 1: can help you get out of it and actually turn
Speaker 1: that bad experience into a positive experience because whatever is
Speaker 1: coming up, whatever terrifying things you're seeing or feeling, this
Speaker 1: isn't a product of the molecule. The molecule is just
Speaker 1: a catalyst. This is something that your brain, your mind
Speaker 1: is producing and therefore has some meaning, and with the
Speaker 1: help of a good guide, you can interpret it and
Speaker 1: and actually get something valuable. I noticed the researchers and
Speaker 1: the guides um that I've talked to, you don't use
Speaker 1: the term bad trip. They talk about a challenging trip.
Speaker 1: And that's because it has valuable material. It shouldn't it
Speaker 1: shouldn't just be ignored. Let's take it a step further,
Speaker 1: because if you feel you can manage your micro dosing
Speaker 1: as an anxious mom living in a world that seems
Speaker 1: to be on fire, you know, it could be placebo,
Speaker 1: it could be the actual mushrooms, but it seems to
Speaker 1: be helping people, yes, in a larger scale. So if
Speaker 1: we're starting to talk about m D m A and
Speaker 1: I have I have friends that have done that as well,
Speaker 1: where they're guided through a trip which is significantly more
Speaker 1: of the LSD, and it has been life changing for
Speaker 1: people that have experienced trauma. I watched the Netflix series
Speaker 1: you did with isolet Waldman, and she talked about being,
Speaker 1: you know, just chronically depressed and how much it helped her.
Speaker 1: So for me, I think, well, why isn't this being
Speaker 1: researched even more? I mean, we have a huge problem
Speaker 1: with depression, huge mental health crisis, especially with this younger
Speaker 1: generation with anxiety. So what why isn't this on the
Speaker 1: front burner of medical research. Well, it's getting there. Um,
Speaker 1: there is a lot of research going on right now.
Speaker 1: Part of the reason that there isn't more is, first
Speaker 1: of all, it was impossible to do the research until
Speaker 1: about twenty years ago. The government made it very difficult.
Speaker 1: There was such a backlash against psychedelics from the sixties.
Speaker 1: The NIH National Institute of Health, which funds most medical research,
Speaker 1: was allergic to psychedelics for many years. They felt it
Speaker 1: was too controversial. But just in the last year they've
Speaker 1: given their first two grants for psychedelic research to a
Speaker 1: to a really promising research program at Yale that's looking
Speaker 1: at obsessive compulsive disorder. Uh. And if you saw the
Speaker 1: Netflix series, one of the patients in that trial, Ben
Speaker 1: in the psilocybin episode, has an amazing story of transformation
Speaker 1: of Actually, he's like thirty years old, he's just had
Speaker 1: his first kid. He has been hobbled by o c
Speaker 1: D since he was ten, and it was like this
Speaker 1: this ball and chain he was dragging around, and in
Speaker 1: the course of one afternoon, he just he dropped the chain.
Speaker 1: He just didn't need it anymore, and his symptoms one
Speaker 1: by one disappeared. It was quite remarkable, incredible. So the
Speaker 1: government is funding that research and also a program in
Speaker 1: smoking cessation at Johns Hopkins. They've given a grant for that.
Speaker 1: By the way, is Harvard doing any research? I know
Speaker 1: Timothy Leary was there for a long time. Yes, they
Speaker 1: have reignited. It's the last place I thought would do it.
Speaker 1: Mass General, which is part of Harvard, has launched a
Speaker 1: psychedelic research center and they're working specifically on rumination as
Speaker 1: the common denominator of a lot of these rigid thinking disorders.
Speaker 1: I think it's a really interesting study. So the stigma
Speaker 1: is lifting. The research is happening right now. I could
Speaker 1: point to a dozen trials underway for everything from addiction
Speaker 1: for alcoholism, cocaine and cigarettes, to o c D to
Speaker 1: depression rumination. But right now, the thinking is that it's
Speaker 1: most effective on those forms of mental illness or mental
Speaker 1: distress that are characterized by brains that are too tightly wound,
Speaker 1: too too rigid in their thinking. And that's all at
Speaker 1: one end of the spectrum, and that is depression, anxiety, rumination,
Speaker 1: addiction O c D. These are all the products of
Speaker 1: minds stuck in loops that they can't get out of,
Speaker 1: or destructive narratives. You know, I'm unworthy of love, or
Speaker 1: my work is ship, you know whatever. So m D
Speaker 1: m A is a very interesting substance and very useful
Speaker 1: in the therapeutic relationship. It deactivate the amygdala, which is
Speaker 1: the fear and anxiety center in your brain, the fight
Speaker 1: or flight response, and this allows people to take out
Speaker 1: very painful memories and look at them and talk about
Speaker 1: them without the accompanying charge of anxiety or fear and
Speaker 1: for people with PTS, so you're not reliving them while
Speaker 1: you were living them without emotion, and and that allows
Speaker 1: you to process them in a way you can't normally,
Speaker 1: and instead of just being tormented by these memories, you
Speaker 1: can like take it out and deal with it and
Speaker 1: talk to a therapist about it. The value of this
Speaker 1: research has been demonstrated. I mean a Phase three study,
Speaker 1: which is the last phase before approval, was released last
Speaker 1: year and I think it was two thirds of the
Speaker 1: people with PTSD no longer qualified for that diagnosis after
Speaker 1: their treatment, so they were no they no longer had
Speaker 1: PTSD by the normal scale the CAP score and UM.
Speaker 1: So it will be approved for that, but I think
Speaker 1: it will be used for other things as Well's it
Speaker 1: is incredible. I think m D m A is an
Speaker 1: amazing substance from my own experience, I think it's going
Speaker 1: to be great for couples therapy because it allows two
Speaker 1: people to UM to talk about the most difficult topics
Speaker 1: without getting antagonistic, without getting defensive. Um, it's just kind
Speaker 1: of remarkable the kind of conversation you can have. And UM,
Speaker 1: I'm just scarious, Michael. What would be in a couple
Speaker 1: therapy situation? What would be an example of something that
Speaker 1: you could work on in this setting that maybe it
Speaker 1: wouldn't be as effective in regular therapy. UM, it needn't
Speaker 1: be trauma. I mean, it just could be the frictions
Speaker 1: of everyday life. It just could be that your partner
Speaker 1: is driving you crazy. You know something about his personality,
Speaker 1: or his habits or his you know, behavior, or the
Speaker 1: way he deals with the kids or whatever it is.
Speaker 1: You could have that conversation without it going to def
Speaker 1: conn and like instantly, which often happens in relationships and
Speaker 1: people fall into these patterns of defensive response. It disarms
Speaker 1: all that and you can you can talk about these
Speaker 1: things in a very cool and helpful way and and
Speaker 1: also feel the strong bond At the same time. It
Speaker 1: has more risks than other psychedelics, physical risks and raises
Speaker 1: your heart rate and things like that. It is an emphetamine,
Speaker 1: but I think it's going to have great value. And
Speaker 1: what do you think about trying micro docing m d
Speaker 1: m A with teenagers because you know, their frontal lobe
Speaker 1: hasn't completely developed and the brain is still growing. Is
Speaker 1: there any research on that? No? Um, It's interesting though,
Speaker 1: MAPS the organization that has done most of the m
Speaker 1: d m A research. It stands for the Multidisciplinary Association
Speaker 1: of Psychedelic Studies. Once they get f d A approval
Speaker 1: for m d m A, which they will get probably
Speaker 1: in the next two years, at the outside, they have
Speaker 1: to one more study that the FDA has asked for.
Speaker 1: They have been asked to test it on adolescence. That's
Speaker 1: kind of FDA requirement because if it has some benefit
Speaker 1: for young people, you want to know it. Yet they
Speaker 1: may need a different dose, so they will be studying
Speaker 1: it in adolescence. And I mean there are many adolescents
Speaker 1: who suffer trauma um in terms of psilocybin treatment and
Speaker 1: young people. You know, I say in my book How
Speaker 1: to Change Your Mind, there's kind of a throwaway line
Speaker 1: that I think psychedelics are wasted on the young, and
Speaker 1: that they have particular value as you get older. And
Speaker 1: the reason for that is as you get older, you
Speaker 1: are locked into ways of looking at the world, looking
Speaker 1: at yourself. You you do have these narratives of who
Speaker 1: you are that are kind of limiting, and you're a
Speaker 1: creature of habit increasingly, and habit kind of dules us
Speaker 1: to the world into reality because we see things in
Speaker 1: a conventionalized way, even if it's our own personal conventions.
Speaker 1: And psychedelic melt all that and allow you to form
Speaker 1: new habits and get out of old habits and get
Speaker 1: a perspective on them. And I think that's all really valuable,
Speaker 1: but especially valuable as we get older. One of the
Speaker 1: things that happens on the classic psychedelics on a macro
Speaker 1: dose is something called ego dissolution or mystical experience. This
Speaker 1: is an experience where your sense of self completely dissolves,
Speaker 1: and when that happens, it can be terrifying or wonderful,
Speaker 1: depending on the context you're in. I mean, if you're
Speaker 1: in a safe place with the guide you trust, it's
Speaker 1: a wonderful experience because when the walls of the ego
Speaker 1: come down, you merge with whatever else is out there,
Speaker 1: and it could be the divine. If you're a religiously
Speaker 1: inclined person, it could be nature, it could be For me,
Speaker 1: it was a piece of music that I completely merged with.
Speaker 1: It was this remarkable experience of of um, you know,
Speaker 1: there was no subject object duality. It wasn't me listening
Speaker 1: to it. It was like I was it. So I
Speaker 1: wonder about ego dissolution to someone who hasn't fully formed
Speaker 1: their ego yet, and is that a good time to
Speaker 1: experiment with that kind of radical self transcendence. I don't know. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I know lots of people who had good
Speaker 1: psychedelic experiences in their youth. Young people sometimes they're a
Speaker 1: little careless about when and where they take it. You know,
Speaker 1: they don't pay enough attention to set and setting. I
Speaker 1: wonder about addiction to not there's no real addictive element
Speaker 1: to this. No, there's no addiction risk. Two very interesting
Speaker 1: things about classic psychedelics again I'm not talking about m
Speaker 1: D M a UM, is that they're not habit forming.
Speaker 1: The classic experiment to prove addictiveness where you have a
Speaker 1: rat in a cage and they have two levers, and
Speaker 1: one lever administers heroin or or cocaine to their bloodstream,
Speaker 1: and the other lever, you know, sugar water. Uh, and
Speaker 1: the rats will pick the lever with the drug over
Speaker 1: and over again until they're addicted or dead. It's just irresistible.
Speaker 1: If you put LSD in that set up, they'll try
Speaker 1: it once and then never again. There. They don't like
Speaker 1: to trip. I mean, it's too weird. It's like, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it doesn't it doesn't have it doesn't give the
Speaker 1: kind of reward and animal wants. I mean, we don't
Speaker 1: know how animals trip, obviously, but they do and they
Speaker 1: don't like it. UM. So it's not habit forming by
Speaker 1: any kind of standard, And and that intuitively sounds right
Speaker 1: after a big psychedelic experience which is all consuming for
Speaker 1: a day, your first thought is not when can I
Speaker 1: do this again? It's like, do I ever have to
Speaker 1: do this again? Because it's it's really hard work. It's
Speaker 1: really hard work. Even if there are moments of incredible euphoria,
Speaker 1: you feel like you've run a marathon or something. Afterwards,
Speaker 1: there's a lot more to come after this short break
Speaker 1: and we're back. Just walk me through it for my
Speaker 1: own curiosity. If I were if I met with a
Speaker 1: guide I felt safe with, I would probably go to
Speaker 1: their place. Usually sometimes they'll come to your place. It's
Speaker 1: I think it's better to go to a place where,
Speaker 1: like your neighbors are not gonna, you know, knock on
Speaker 1: the door for a for a cup of sugar, or
Speaker 1: the FedEx guy's not going to show up. I mean,
Speaker 1: you just don't want to worry about your body, you know,
Speaker 1: you just want to be in a safe place. Someone
Speaker 1: else is looking after you. It's their environment, they control
Speaker 1: it and it's safe. That's ideally what you want. And
Speaker 1: how long would this go? Well, I'll walk you through
Speaker 1: a psilocybin session, okay, which is shorter than an LSD session,
Speaker 1: but psilocybin is being used in research LSD not so
Speaker 1: much in this country, not because it doesn't work, but
Speaker 1: because it takes a long time and you have to
Speaker 1: pay your guides over time, because it's like eight hours. Now,
Speaker 1: we're not talking about microdocing. Now, we should really make
Speaker 1: clear the distinction. We're talking about macrodocin with a guide,
Speaker 1: which is a combination of talk therapy and a drug
Speaker 1: that involves uh several hours of preparation by your guides,
Speaker 1: and they're usually two of them, a man and a woman.
Speaker 1: So anyway, first of all, before the day of your experience,
Speaker 1: you will have already met with that guide and had
Speaker 1: a pretty extensive conversation where they might take your medical history.
Speaker 1: Any responsible guide should know any medical issues you might have,
Speaker 1: and they may, based on that disqualify you. You know,
Speaker 1: if you have a second order relative who has schizophrenia,
Speaker 1: they probably won't want to work with you. So they
Speaker 1: take your medical history, but also your psychological history, like
Speaker 1: what do you want to work on? What's your intention
Speaker 1: in doing this? Why have you sought this therapy? You know,
Speaker 1: you could say, well, I want to develop my spiritual
Speaker 1: side or I want to learn something about my mind.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be I want to solve my
Speaker 1: obsessive compulsive disorder, whatever it is. But it's it's really
Speaker 1: useful to frame an intention for the experience. It may
Speaker 1: or may not become the center of the experience. Your
Speaker 1: experience may take you somewhere very different and unexpected, but
Speaker 1: it's it's useful to have an intention. I've gone into
Speaker 1: an intention thinking, I mean, as you know, my dad
Speaker 1: died a few years ago, that I really wanted to
Speaker 1: like be with him and have him appeared to me
Speaker 1: in some sense and and have a conversation with him.
Speaker 1: And I went into it with that in mind. Experience
Speaker 1: ended up being all about my mom. And it was like, you, idiot,
Speaker 1: she's a lot. He's here. You should be taking care
Speaker 1: of her, not your memory of your father. And I
Speaker 1: was like, but that was very valuable, and that I
Speaker 1: remember that very day. I was planning not to come
Speaker 1: to Russia Shaun a dinner, and I had this experience
Speaker 1: the day before in another city, and I came out
Speaker 1: of it saying, I've got to go to Russia shawn
Speaker 1: a dinner, and we changed our plans and we flew
Speaker 1: to New York. That's incredible. So yeah, I mean it
Speaker 1: was kind of a banal insight, like be with your
Speaker 1: mom as long as you can. But but your point
Speaker 1: is you go in maybe with one intention and but
Speaker 1: something else completely and you come out with another. Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is very interesting, and you should pay attention to
Speaker 1: what comes up. There's a reason it comes up. So
Speaker 1: hopefully by the time she or he administers the psychedelic,
Speaker 1: they know about you. They know like what's on your mind,
Speaker 1: they know your history, um, and you have developed some
Speaker 1: trust some confidence in them. I did interview some guides
Speaker 1: that I did not trust and I didn't want to
Speaker 1: work with, and you should be alert to that. It's
Speaker 1: like choosing a therapist. Yeah, so it's it's intuitive basically, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it is. It's it's intuitive, you know, you know if
Speaker 1: some if you trust somebody or not. And it's it's
Speaker 1: style too. Someone could be a little too new ag
Speaker 1: or too casual about what to me is going to
Speaker 1: be a big frightening experience. How much time do you
Speaker 1: put aside to do this? Do they say, like you
Speaker 1: have a free day, you should have a free day.
Speaker 1: You may not need a free day. I mean, different
Speaker 1: people metabolize the substances differently. You should expect four to
Speaker 1: six hours on a psilocybin experience. They give you the drug,
Speaker 1: it takes about a half hour to come on. Typically
Speaker 1: they give you headphones or play music, and they usually
Speaker 1: have their own playlist, and you shouldn't choose the playlist
Speaker 1: yourself because you'll have all these associations and um, so
Speaker 1: they have a playlist that it is incredibly important to
Speaker 1: the experience. Um. Music takes on enormous meaning and and
Speaker 1: kind of drives the experience. There's something called synesthesia where
Speaker 1: your different senses get kind of cross wired and you
Speaker 1: can actually see music sometimes or taste it or smell it,
Speaker 1: and it's the most wonderful thing. Um. You don't want
Speaker 1: music with lyrics though, you don't want to be, you know,
Speaker 1: trying to make out the words. But um, but many
Speaker 1: styles of music work. Okay. So it starts to come on.
Speaker 1: You start to realize that, oh my god, things sound
Speaker 1: a little different. Maybe you have some visuals, maybe the
Speaker 1: walls are starting to pulsate a little bit. Um, but
Speaker 1: you you you realize you're altered. Here's another thing that
Speaker 1: might surprise you. You're wearing eye shades and the reason
Speaker 1: for that is you could get really hung up on
Speaker 1: all the sensory things going on around you, which is
Speaker 1: all fascinating, but you want to have an internal trip.
Speaker 1: You're doing this for therapeutic reasons. You want to learn
Speaker 1: something about your mind. And if your eyes are closed,
Speaker 1: you will go deeper. And um, so very often you
Speaker 1: have the eye shades on and the music and this
Speaker 1: takes you out of the room you're in and you
Speaker 1: and you travel, you venture and uh, there is a
Speaker 1: succession of different many different things happen. Um. People talk
Speaker 1: about hallucination, and I think that that word gives the
Speaker 1: wrong idea. It's sort of like you're having waking dreams.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're perfectly awake, you know that this isn't
Speaker 1: really happening to you, but you kind of allow it to.
Speaker 1: So there may be a period at the peak, which
Speaker 1: comes after a hour to where you cannot exert any
Speaker 1: control over your mind where you it is just taking
Speaker 1: you and you're following. And this can be, you know,
Speaker 1: a wonderful experience. You could travel to really interesting places,
Speaker 1: or it can be frightening. I mean, and and and
Speaker 1: part of the preparation is telling you what to do
Speaker 1: when you have a frightening experience, and they'll tell you
Speaker 1: if you see a monster, don't try to run away,
Speaker 1: step right up to it and say, what do you
Speaker 1: have to teach me? Why are you in my mind?
Speaker 1: They'll tell you if you see a door, open it,
Speaker 1: if you see a staircase climate. Basically, the advice is
Speaker 1: to surrender to whatever is happening, which is really I
Speaker 1: think the key piece of advice in a psychedelic experience,
Speaker 1: because it is when you fight it. It is when
Speaker 1: you try to resist what's happening as your ego gradually
Speaker 1: softens and melts or whatever it is, and you try
Speaker 1: to hold on for dear life, that you get very
Speaker 1: anxious and paranoid. I thought, as someone who I think
Speaker 1: of myself as kind of a control freak in in
Speaker 1: normal life, I thought I would have trouble letting go.
Speaker 1: But I found that working with a guide that I trusted,
Speaker 1: as soon as I ingested the substance, I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, here we go, you know, and I was
Speaker 1: able to surrender and and therefore had an experience of
Speaker 1: of of complete ego dissolution. That that was, you know,
Speaker 1: a wonderful thing, but it's unpredictable. One of the interesting
Speaker 1: things about psychedelics compared to most other drugs, since it
Speaker 1: is really your mind that's producing what happens with this catalyst,
Speaker 1: experiences are as different as people are. I mean, there
Speaker 1: are some common denominators, but different people go different places.
Speaker 1: Some people recover traumatic memories and that can be difficult
Speaker 1: to deal with. Other people, you know, have kind of
Speaker 1: uncomplicated trips that are just kind of adventures taking them
Speaker 1: to interesting places. I've had many experiences where all the
Speaker 1: people in my life appear to me and I feel
Speaker 1: like I'm in conversation with my sisters or my parents,
Speaker 1: or my wife or my son, and I think about
Speaker 1: those relationships and I come out of it invariably with
Speaker 1: this powerful feeling of gratitude to all to all these people. Um,
Speaker 1: that's you know, I just get very emotional. Imagine if
Speaker 1: we could put it in the in the water in
Speaker 1: Congress and the House of Representatives. Well, you know, that's
Speaker 1: a It's a common kind of trope in the psychedelic
Speaker 1: community that it would be great to give certain people psychedelics. Um,
Speaker 1: but I think we should do more research before we
Speaker 1: take that risk, because it may just push people to
Speaker 1: be more of what they already are. Yes, well that
Speaker 1: would be terrifying. Yes, yeah, there's this cool research that
Speaker 1: shows that after a psilocybin trip, uh, people's nature connectedness
Speaker 1: scores go up, in other words, the extent to which
Speaker 1: they feel they're part of nature and not standing up
Speaker 1: heart from it. And so that seems like really good news.
Speaker 1: We need more of this to solve the environmental crisis.
Speaker 1: But I think the people who volunteer for a psychedelic
Speaker 1: experiment or take psychedelic aready there. Yeah, I think I
Speaker 1: think it's intensifying a feeling they already have until we
Speaker 1: give it to the Koch Brothers and you know, people
Speaker 1: like that, people who are not environmentalists. You know, then
Speaker 1: we can safely make that conclusion. But that's research that
Speaker 1: needs to be done, and in fact will be done.
Speaker 1: Maybe if we start with ecstasy with those people and
Speaker 1: then we can work our way, that might be smart. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good idea good plan. When you come out
Speaker 1: of the trip, though, are you tired? Are you thirsty?
Speaker 1: Does it? Everything starts to get very lucid and then
Speaker 1: you realize, oh, I'm back. It's not that sudden. So
Speaker 1: after the peak of the experience, this period where your
Speaker 1: mind is going to take you where it's going to go.
Speaker 1: You enter this long danument. This this period that can
Speaker 1: last a couple of hours. That is I think, really
Speaker 1: a wonderful part of the experience that doesn't get talked
Speaker 1: about nearly enough. And it's a meditative frame of mind.
Speaker 1: You've regained the ability to think about what you want
Speaker 1: to think about, yet you're utterly absorbed and not distracted,
Speaker 1: so you can It's really where I learned how to meditate.
Speaker 1: Actually it was in that period and I had amazing focus.
Speaker 1: I was undistractable and did a lot of thinking. And
Speaker 1: that goes on for a couple of hours, and then
Speaker 1: gradually your guide probably wants to go home, and you know,
Speaker 1: gradually starts taking you out of the experience, and um,
Speaker 1: you don't say very much at that point about what
Speaker 1: happened to you. They really leave that for the integration session,
Speaker 1: and and there is this process of making sense of it.
Speaker 1: And for me, it was talking to Judith, my wife
Speaker 1: at dinner when I got home, and she would kind
Speaker 1: of debrief me. And it's a it can be a
Speaker 1: very confusing experience and you have to turn it into
Speaker 1: a narrative, and and by telling the story to somebody
Speaker 1: who understands you, you start to see, Oh, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what was going on here, this is the theme of
Speaker 1: the trip. And she would help me connect the dots
Speaker 1: in various ways. So I got more out of integrating
Speaker 1: with her, frankly, than I did from most of the
Speaker 1: guides I work with. I wanted to ask you, when
Speaker 1: you're in this guid to trip, can you tell me
Speaker 1: the difference between spotlight consciousness and lantern consciousness? Yeah. So
Speaker 1: this was a term I learned from a psychologist at
Speaker 1: Berkeley I was interviewing and she was arguing that there
Speaker 1: are two kinds of consciousness. Actually, there are many kinds
Speaker 1: of consciousness, but this is a very important distinction. Um.
Speaker 1: Spotlight consciousness is characteristic of adults, especially adults who do
Speaker 1: thinking work, and it is what allows you to block
Speaker 1: out everything and focus on one thing. The way we
Speaker 1: are now focused on one thing, and we're ignoring a
Speaker 1: lot of things going on around us, right, and uh,
Speaker 1: and a lot of things coming up internally. We're just
Speaker 1: kind of doing this. This is a very important adult skill.
Speaker 1: Children have a different kind of consciousness. I'm talking about
Speaker 1: like you know, younger than five or six, say, before
Speaker 1: they go to school, they have what she calls, or
Speaker 1: several psychologists called lantern consciousness, where instead of focusing on
Speaker 1: that one point, they're taking in information from all sides.
Speaker 1: They're very sticky, they're they have trouble focusing. They you know,
Speaker 1: the trade off is they're getting all this wonderful sensory information.
Speaker 1: You're getting all these you know, the hilarious things kids
Speaker 1: say to us about how the world works. And it's
Speaker 1: because they have this three sixty degree aperture to take
Speaker 1: in information from the world. Her theory and we need
Speaker 1: to test it is that um psychedelics gives you a
Speaker 1: taste of lantern consciousness, that you are suddenly much more
Speaker 1: open to sensory information coming in. You can hear things
Speaker 1: in the music you've never heard before. Whatever kind of
Speaker 1: algorithms you run to have an experience base don having
Speaker 1: had that experience before is out the window. So everything
Speaker 1: is incredibly fresh, and that, you know, she believes that
Speaker 1: young kids are essentially tripping all the time, and that
Speaker 1: our access to that consciousness comes through these substances. It's
Speaker 1: a very intriguing theory, but it is a taste. I
Speaker 1: think of how young children go through the world, and
Speaker 1: for that alone, it's it's fascinating and valuable. I think
Speaker 1: so fascinating. Well, Michael, this was very helpful. Micro Dosing
Speaker 1: seems to be getting a lot more popular. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: if you want more information, there's a website. There's a
Speaker 1: psychologist named James Fatiman who started a website for people
Speaker 1: interested in micro dosing, and he offers online the He
Speaker 1: doesn't sell substance, obviously, but he he tells you the protocol,
Speaker 1: how much to do, how often to do it, and
Speaker 1: he's collecting a lot of data from people based on
Speaker 1: their experiences. So it's it's so if you search James
Speaker 1: Fatiman micro docing, you'll find it and that will tell
Speaker 1: you all you need to know about the practice. Great,
Speaker 1: and don't don't hide chuck of oars in your desk,
Speaker 1: not once with psilocybin in them yet though. And now,
Speaker 1: before I let you go off and trip or whatever
Speaker 1: it is you do over there at Berkeley, UM, you
Speaker 1: get to ask me a question, and you can ask
Speaker 1: me anything. Well, it's interesting you've talked a lot about
Speaker 1: your friends and their experiences with psychedelics, UM, but I'd
Speaker 1: be curious to know about your own experiences with psychedelics,
Speaker 1: if you'd be willing to share that, I'd be happy
Speaker 1: to share. I have never taken mushrooms. I've never taken
Speaker 1: a psychedelic before. I smoked pot um when I was
Speaker 1: in college. My boyfriend was at Harvard. I went to
Speaker 1: meet him and had to go to a Crimson Club event,
Speaker 1: and the pot I smoked I believed was laced with something.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was PCP or something, but
Speaker 1: we were sitting at his Dean's dinner and there was
Speaker 1: a fish on the platter, and I believed the fish
Speaker 1: was alive and kept asking me to save it. Yes,
Speaker 1: And I kept turning to my boyfriend Jake and saying
Speaker 1: I've got to get this fish back into the ocean,
Speaker 1: to which he knew that I obviously smoked something that
Speaker 1: wasn't just normal marijuana. So that's really the only time
Speaker 1: I've had any kind of altered state. But as a teenager,
Speaker 1: I was terrified. I never, you know, wanted to not
Speaker 1: be completely lucid, And even as an adult, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't drink just because I don't like the feeling
Speaker 1: of being drunk or buzzed. But the more research I've done,
Speaker 1: and after reading your book, I am kind of fascinated
Speaker 1: with it because I sort of feel the way you felt,
Speaker 1: certainly the way you spoke at the beginning of the
Speaker 1: Netflix um series, which is, you know, I I feel
Speaker 1: like our life doesn't change that much from here on in.
Speaker 1: You know, this is who I am, These are my kids,
Speaker 1: this is my husband. I don't see anything imploding anytime soon. Um.
Speaker 1: I re the books I read, I have, the friends
Speaker 1: I have. You know, I'm sort of feeling like I
Speaker 1: need to expand and maybe next year when I'm an
Speaker 1: empty nester and you know, there there's going to come
Speaker 1: a time where I'm like, Okay, let's open up the
Speaker 1: universe a little bit. So I think it's on the horizon.
Speaker 1: That's a classic situation. I think it's very hard to
Speaker 1: deal with these experiences or drugs while you still have
Speaker 1: kids at home. Yeah. I've noticed that the people most
Speaker 1: interested in in what's going on with psychedelics and the
Speaker 1: and the potential of psychedelics are either on the young end,
Speaker 1: people in their twenties or people in their fifties, and
Speaker 1: the kids have left home. Um, And that's kind of
Speaker 1: where the curiosity comes in and the opportunity, because frankly,
Speaker 1: it's a hard conversation if you're having these experiences with
Speaker 1: your kids, if they're young. I mean, by the time
Speaker 1: I was involved, Isaac was already in college or maybe
Speaker 1: out of college, and so we could talk about it
Speaker 1: and he shared his experiences. I shared my experience. But
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how to talk to a fifteen year
Speaker 1: old about this, frankly, and uh, and I'm glad I
Speaker 1: don't have to. Yeah, I don't think I could either.
Speaker 1: I think it I think it would give mixed messages
Speaker 1: about all kinds of stuff. Anyway, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for talking to me today. I really really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: And um, everybody must I read all your books and
Speaker 1: watch this Netflix series which is incredibly enlightening. Thank you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how to change your mind? I really appreciate it. Was
Speaker 1: great talking to you. Ali. All right, Michael, talk to
Speaker 1: you soon. Take care. Coming up after the break, a
Speaker 1: mom is going to tell me all about micro docing.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to go ask Ali. Now we're going to
Speaker 1: hear from a mom who micro doces, and remember this
Speaker 1: is just one person's experience. Okay, I'm fascinated by micro docing.
Speaker 1: I spoke to Michael Pollen all of out it, but
Speaker 1: also I have more and more friends that are starting
Speaker 1: to do it. Tell me about when you first micro
Speaker 1: doced and why, Uh, my gosh, it's been probably about
Speaker 1: five or six months. Um. You know, my the last
Speaker 1: few years, my anxiety has been off the charts and
Speaker 1: I'm normally very able to regulate myself, and you know,
Speaker 1: with just normal therapy and everything. UM. I've gone the
Speaker 1: route of antidepressants and anti anxiety medications before. UM, but
Speaker 1: I don't like I don't like not feeling in control
Speaker 1: of myself. I don't like the feeling of being being
Speaker 1: on something, whether it's whether it's pain killers or you know, medications. UM.
Speaker 1: So when it came to micro docing, I was I
Speaker 1: was apprehensive because you know, you think of mushrooms and
Speaker 1: micro docing and you think that you're going to be
Speaker 1: tripping and then um, it's it's it's remarkably not like that.
Speaker 1: So it was anxiety that initially brought me to this path.
Speaker 1: I honestly, I saw the information through a friend of
Speaker 1: mine who's a PhD and a therapist on micro docing
Speaker 1: on her Instagram page, and I was like, Okay, this
Speaker 1: is intriguing. And I started kind of, you know, I started,
Speaker 1: I started looking into a little more. And around that
Speaker 1: same time, my mother, of all people, brought me a
Speaker 1: newsweek with you know, the mushrooms on the front of it,
Speaker 1: UM and she said, honey, you should you should look
Speaker 1: at this. And she's always been a very homeopathic type
Speaker 1: of person. And I remember distinctly, I was working in
Speaker 1: my corporate job and I said, Mom, this isn't some
Speaker 1: hocus pocus hippie dippie crap that like you that won't
Speaker 1: fix it. And she said, honey, you just need to look.
Speaker 1: And I did at the time, and UM, I just
Speaker 1: kind of got into it. I filled out the questionnaire
Speaker 1: that is on the website that that I saw, which
Speaker 1: is my collegy Psychology. UM. I filled out the questionnaire.
Speaker 1: I was contacted by one of their intakes specialists. They
Speaker 1: have therapeutic practitioners there and UM. I chatted with her
Speaker 1: for half an hour or forty five minutes UM and
Speaker 1: then she recommended a blend to put me on to
Speaker 1: start out UM and that was it. I ordered it.
Speaker 1: I got it two days later and I started it
Speaker 1: I expected it to be something that made me feel
Speaker 1: loopy and weird, and um, it surprisingly wasn't. So the
Speaker 1: more that the more that I take it, the more
Speaker 1: I realized that I don't feel I don't feel any different.
Speaker 1: I just feel better. It's very, very hard to explain.
Speaker 1: It's hard to say, well, no, you don't feel anything.
Speaker 1: You just feel better, because no medication just makes you
Speaker 1: feel better. It always has some kind of cloudy side
Speaker 1: effect that makes you, you know, not not be able
Speaker 1: to function in one way or another. And it's just
Speaker 1: it's just a different clarity and a different joy. It's um,
Speaker 1: you know, it's It's allowed me. It allows me to
Speaker 1: focus more on my work when I'm working. It's allowed
Speaker 1: me to get more creative and just completely immerse myself
Speaker 1: and what I'm doing and enjoy every single second of
Speaker 1: it rather than be bogged down by I have to
Speaker 1: do all of these things. I'm just like I do them,
Speaker 1: and I moved to the next one, and it's it's
Speaker 1: just this different state of being rather than worrying about being. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you have to walk me through this because I've
Speaker 1: never done it. Okay, what do you get in the mail?
Speaker 1: Just like dried mushrooms or you know, what does it
Speaker 1: look like? Oh, and that's that's one of the reasons
Speaker 1: I was apprehensive to even do something like this, because
Speaker 1: I'm not the kind of person who can be like,
Speaker 1: well then I eat this cap of a mushroom and
Speaker 1: feel better. I That weirds me out, honestly, because again,
Speaker 1: I don't like feeling like I'm high. I have kids,
Speaker 1: I'm you know, I'm self employed. I have to be
Speaker 1: on top of things. Um So what you've got. What
Speaker 1: I got is literally a bottle with thirty capsules in it.
Speaker 1: And I just take a pill every morning, okay, And
Speaker 1: you take one every morning like you would a vit
Speaker 1: him and see, I do five days on two days off. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I take them Monday through Friday, and then Saturday
Speaker 1: and Sunday. I don't take them. Why, It's just to
Speaker 1: give your body a chance, in your in your mind,
Speaker 1: a chance to just not have it in your system
Speaker 1: and kind of like reset a little bit. Okay, So
Speaker 1: you take the pill first thing in the morning, and
Speaker 1: so can you kind of walk me through how you
Speaker 1: feel physically and mentally? Yeah, so, um my, I do
Speaker 1: have a pretty stringent morning routine. And think that's what
Speaker 1: works for me. UM. In the morning, I wake up
Speaker 1: very early, I take my pill, I go for a run.
Speaker 1: I might be out for about a half an hour
Speaker 1: forty five minutes. UM. If it's one of the four
Speaker 1: days of the week the work week that my son
Speaker 1: is with me, then UM get him up and going
Speaker 1: and ready for school and everything. And it's not the
Speaker 1: kind of thing where, at least for me, and I
Speaker 1: know everybody is, experience is vastly different with this. UM.
Speaker 1: I I don't feel an actual hi or any anything
Speaker 1: for that matter. And that's what's so kind of weirds
Speaker 1: me out is I thought that I would feel like,
Speaker 1: like you said, like rainbows, and UM it's not like that.
Speaker 1: It's just I feel calm and I it's so hard
Speaker 1: to explain it. UM, it's not like when you take
Speaker 1: an antidepressant and it's kind of this. UM. For me,
Speaker 1: at least, that was like a numbing or a blanketing
Speaker 1: of like putting a band aid on something and saying, there,
Speaker 1: don't feel anything. It's not like that. UM. It's I'm
Speaker 1: more focused on my work, UM, and just instead of
Speaker 1: dwelling on the things that are bogging me down and
Speaker 1: causing that anxiety that I can't get out of my head.
Speaker 1: Like if you're a chronic overthinker, which I am, I
Speaker 1: have a zillion things going through I had at any
Speaker 1: given moment, and a lot of them, you know, especially
Speaker 1: given today's climate. Sometimes they're just not good and they
Speaker 1: can be overwhelming. Um, and it just stopped that. It's
Speaker 1: just it doesn't make me not think. It makes me
Speaker 1: realize that not everything so bad and that there are
Speaker 1: beautiful things. So would you say, you know a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of people with anxiety have something where
Speaker 1: let's say you got fired off a project and you
Speaker 1: it's almost like if you have a clip in your
Speaker 1: head that says, oh my god, I'm never gonna work again,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna be able to pay the bills, I'm
Speaker 1: never going to work again, and it just goes on
Speaker 1: a loop over and over over in your head. Does
Speaker 1: micro dosing kind of make it disappear or does it
Speaker 1: just calm it down? Are you able to kind of
Speaker 1: stand back and deal with your anxiety like from a distance. Um,
Speaker 1: it's allowed me to more reasonably and calmly evaluate whatever
Speaker 1: such a nation is causing the stress and realistically just
Speaker 1: be like, is this really the end of the world?
Speaker 1: Are there are steps out of it? What are the
Speaker 1: steps out of it? Instead of being this conglomeration of
Speaker 1: this of a mess inside your head that's you know,
Speaker 1: swirling around, it stops all of those things for me
Speaker 1: and makes me go, king Number one, I'm going to
Speaker 1: take care of this. Number two, I'm going to take
Speaker 1: care of this. And it it just allows me to
Speaker 1: um more easily handle things, one thing at a time
Speaker 1: rather than just a mess of my life is over right?
Speaker 1: And how how quickly does it take effect? First of
Speaker 1: all when you first started doing it, because you know,
Speaker 1: antidepressants take like three weeks. And second of all, can
Speaker 1: you tell if it's taken effect? Um? I was telling
Speaker 1: my girlfriend that I would go from my run and
Speaker 1: I would have this moment of just like a like
Speaker 1: a deep breath and like a kind of letting go,
Speaker 1: and um, it's just kind of like they're all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, it's just a piece. So it's so hard
Speaker 1: to explain because I relate that to being you know,
Speaker 1: like if you're stressed out and you have a glass
Speaker 1: of wine. When we start feeling that like glass of
Speaker 1: wine and then you're calm a little bit. It's not
Speaker 1: like that, it's just clarity. Does it feel like what
Speaker 1: you wanted antidepressants to feel like? It feels like in
Speaker 1: a perfect world, that is what an antidepressant would feel like,
Speaker 1: but that is not, in fact, what actual antidepressants feel like.
Speaker 1: And how are you feeling on Saturday and Sunday when
Speaker 1: you don't take the capsule? For me, there's no difference.
Speaker 1: There's no difference. And can you micro dose whenever you
Speaker 1: want and stop whenever you want? Oh yeah, it's absolutely
Speaker 1: non addictive. It's not you know, there have been times
Speaker 1: where I've I was really I was really busy and
Speaker 1: totally last track of the fact that I was running
Speaker 1: out of them, and then I've yeah, I forgot and
Speaker 1: maybe I'd go like a week where there there have
Speaker 1: been times where I've felt just fine and I didn't
Speaker 1: need them, and I was like, all right, well, I'm
Speaker 1: just not going to take them for right now. There's
Speaker 1: never once spent a moment where I was where I
Speaker 1: felt like I had to have them. And as a
Speaker 1: matter of fact, I've actually stopped drinking since I started
Speaker 1: taking them. Wow, I'm so fascinated. Is there are there
Speaker 1: things about it that you that would surprise me, besides,
Speaker 1: of course the feeling of calmness or that surprised you
Speaker 1: when you first started micro docing. Yeah, I found that
Speaker 1: I am more calm about literally every aspect of my life.
Speaker 1: And I've always been a very very busy and very
Speaker 1: go go go go, Like I have a schedule. We
Speaker 1: have to adhere to it, you know, kids get on board,
Speaker 1: you have to go like it. And this is definitely
Speaker 1: just made me chill more. For lack of better words,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm nicer. Would you say you're a better mother
Speaker 1: for it? I I absolutely would. And I will also
Speaker 1: say that kids are are definitely they're older now. M
Speaker 1: I wish that I would have had this tool when
Speaker 1: they were younger. Um. I think it's easy to, like
Speaker 1: I said, get get busy, busy, busy and go go go,
Speaker 1: um and especially in today's world, and I think it
Speaker 1: would have made me stop and just kind of smell
Speaker 1: the roses a little bit more, you know. I. Um,
Speaker 1: my youngest is is actually a sophomore in high school
Speaker 1: and he's in baseball and hardcore like and I would
Speaker 1: sit as baseball games and stress out about all the
Speaker 1: things that I needed to be doing while I was
Speaker 1: sitting there watching his baseball game. It's like just taking that,
Speaker 1: you know, a couple hours or a few hours to
Speaker 1: do that was something that was just it was hard.
Speaker 1: I would do it, but I would always be thinking,
Speaker 1: I need to be doing this, this isn't this. And
Speaker 1: I go now and I sit with him, and I
Speaker 1: just enjoy it. I enjoy our conversations more. And not
Speaker 1: to say that I didn't before, but I just I
Speaker 1: see a different side of them. Um. We laugh or
Speaker 1: I out myself to laugh more, and not because I'm high. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you had a anxious child, would you introduce micro
Speaker 1: dosing to them? I'm my oldest, well, and I know,
Speaker 1: I know the world child is kind of He's not
Speaker 1: a child, he's my child. Um my son was twenty one,
Speaker 1: my oldest, and I did recommend as to him as
Speaker 1: an antidepressant and he started doing it before I even
Speaker 1: touched it. And how did that work for him? It
Speaker 1: worked well for him. He's always been a very he
Speaker 1: had a learning disability growing up that he still has
Speaker 1: um and he's never been really comfortable with with the
Speaker 1: pharmaceutical company because he was on so many medications when
Speaker 1: he was younger, and it got to the point where
Speaker 1: when he was in high school, even he um he
Speaker 1: got a prescription for an antidepressant because the medication that
Speaker 1: he was on causes side effect of being oppressed. And
Speaker 1: his doctor said, if this antidepressant causes some other side effects,
Speaker 1: then we'll go ahead and put you on something else.
Speaker 1: And I remember we walked out of that appointment and
Speaker 1: he crumpled all of his prescriptions up and he threw
Speaker 1: him on the foreboard of the car, and I said,
Speaker 1: what are you doing? And he said when does it stop? Wow?
Speaker 1: And he was like, when does it? This causes another
Speaker 1: side effect, that causes another side effect, that causes another
Speaker 1: side effect. So he's always been interested in finding out
Speaker 1: different routes two handle mental afflictions or whatever the case
Speaker 1: may be. Was very brutal on him, as it was
Speaker 1: for a lot of us UM and he was severely depressed,
Speaker 1: and it was it was something that I brought up
Speaker 1: to him, just saying, hey, you're over eighteen, like maybe
Speaker 1: this is something that you should look into, and he
Speaker 1: jumped on it right away and it changed him right um,
Speaker 1: seeing the change in him. He's always been a very
Speaker 1: goofy and light heart it and just beautiful, so human.
Speaker 1: And I saw him go so deep and dark and
Speaker 1: depressed for so long. I mean, he couldn't get out
Speaker 1: of bed. It was it was I didn't know what
Speaker 1: to do. I legitimately was worried about him for a
Speaker 1: very long time. And um, he's a musician. He started
Speaker 1: playing music, he started writing music. He started immersing himself
Speaker 1: in that again. And you see he was getting up
Speaker 1: and he was showering, and he was making chokes and
Speaker 1: we were laughing and he would say, hey, mom, let's
Speaker 1: go for a run and we get out. Like he
Speaker 1: it brought him back to who who he was. I
Speaker 1: recognized him again. It happened. How fast did that happen?
Speaker 1: Like he He didn't happen like the first day he
Speaker 1: micro dosed, right. It was very fast, though, it was
Speaker 1: very fast for him. It was. I remember I was
Speaker 1: in my room and I hadn't heard music in my
Speaker 1: house in months, you know, I hadn't heard him, And
Speaker 1: all of a sudden I heard one of his amps.
Speaker 1: He plays electric guitar and bass, and he's brilliant and
Speaker 1: so good at it. And I heard one of his
Speaker 1: amps turn on, and I went wow, and then and
Speaker 1: then I heard him start playing and he was playing
Speaker 1: jazz and he was he he was just he was
Speaker 1: going crazy on his front boards and his little fingers
Speaker 1: were going all over the place. And I went and
Speaker 1: I walked and I stood in his doorway and he
Speaker 1: was sitting there and he was in his pajamas and
Speaker 1: I went hi, and he was like hey, mom, and
Speaker 1: he it was just like he was never in bed,
Speaker 1: he was never depressed. It was just this. It was tremendous.
Speaker 1: It's amazing for him. And like I said, I can't
Speaker 1: stress enough that that every single person is different. Every
Speaker 1: single person's physiology and makeup and everything um react to
Speaker 1: different ways. But that's again the beautiful thing about it
Speaker 1: is that if one thing doesn't work, try another one.
Speaker 1: You know, if that chocolate bar didn't work, try taking
Speaker 1: the pill. If you take one of the pills and
Speaker 1: that doesn't work, let him know and they'll be like,
Speaker 1: let's switch this up and try a different things. Like
Speaker 1: there's no harm in trying it different ways. And that,
Speaker 1: I think for me, was like that was the hugest thing.
Speaker 1: It's you don't get addicted to it. When he stopped,
Speaker 1: When my son stopped he Um. I remember because we
Speaker 1: were ordering. I was ordering him another bottle and I
Speaker 1: said to you, how are you doing on your pills?
Speaker 1: And he said, I don't. I think I'm fine, mom.
Speaker 1: And I was like, are you sure, like you know,
Speaker 1: and he was like, no, I think I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: it without And so it kind of gave him that
Speaker 1: step to be okay on his own without needing anything.
Speaker 1: So he's not reliant on them at all. It's incredible. Oh,
Speaker 1: it's remarkable, Um. But they definitely did help him through
Speaker 1: a very very dark time. And it was the change
Speaker 1: that I saw on him also that I kind of
Speaker 1: sat back and went, wow, this is kind of crazy.
Speaker 1: And it's I think one of the reasons that I
Speaker 1: allowed myself to step into it also. And I'm curious,
Speaker 1: do you have to be careful about the amount? Only
Speaker 1: because one of the one of my friends, uh date
Speaker 1: too much of a chocolate part and had mushrooms in it. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean you'll just I mean, if you if you
Speaker 1: eat a lot of it, you'll you know, probably have
Speaker 1: some trip right, Yeah, you'll have some holiocinergenic effects. But
Speaker 1: the thing that for for me, um, I had to
Speaker 1: have some kind of um structured or like a regulated
Speaker 1: way of doing this. I guess I'm not much of
Speaker 1: a control freak that I have to know that I'm
Speaker 1: getting the same amount every time. UM, but I know
Speaker 1: that that what I'm taking right now is a very
Speaker 1: calculated and measured dosage. So I would have to consciously
Speaker 1: take an extra pill in order for it to be
Speaker 1: too much. Right, It's amazing, amazing, It's pretty good. It's
Speaker 1: I had one person the other day, one of my friends.
Speaker 1: She was like, are you like a spokesperson? Are you
Speaker 1: getting like kicked? And I was like, no, I get
Speaker 1: I get zero. I just it's it's done that much
Speaker 1: for me that I and no matter whether it's through
Speaker 1: this channel that I'm going through or I have I
Speaker 1: have a friend who does get to chocolate bars and
Speaker 1: for her that works. You know, it's it's you have
Speaker 1: to kind of find your your groove and go with that.
Speaker 1: And everybody's different. Can you imagine all of us mothers
Speaker 1: started micro dosing. The pharmaceuticals would lose their minds. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, we all got off the anti depressants in Zanna.
Speaker 1: I mean they come and kill us. That in the
Speaker 1: wine industry would just take exactly. Um, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for talking to me. This was really really insightful
Speaker 1: and it's it's so nice to talk to somebody that
Speaker 1: actually is taking them and has given me sort of
Speaker 1: an idea of what would be like to start micro dosing,
Speaker 1: which I kind of want to do. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: try it. If you don't like it, you don't have
Speaker 1: to do it again. That's what's wonderful about it. It's amazing.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, thank you for listening to Go
Speaker 1: ask Alli, and a very special thanks to my new
Speaker 1: micro dosing mom friend for sharing her insight on micro
Speaker 1: dosing with all of us. And just to be clear,
Speaker 1: I'm not suggesting condoning or in any way trying to
Speaker 1: convince anyone to try psychedelics or even micro dosing, and
Speaker 1: it is still illegal to buy the stuff, at least
Speaker 1: for now and now. Michael Pollen. You can find tons
Speaker 1: of information and resources at Michael's website Michael Pollen dot com.
Speaker 1: You can follow him on Instagram Michael dot Pollen and
Speaker 1: on Twitter at Michael Pollen. If you'd like more info
Speaker 1: on what you've heard in this episode, check out our
Speaker 1: show notes next week and go ask Alli I bring
Speaker 1: you the one and only Julia Roberts, Yes, the prettiest
Speaker 1: woman Julia Roberts. We talked about her newest film, Ticket
Speaker 1: to Paradise, her love of cooking, her passion for her
Speaker 1: husband Danny, and how I always mispronounced young. You'll want
Speaker 1: to hear it all. Be sure to subscribe, rate and review,
Speaker 1: Go ask Alli, and follow me on social media on
Speaker 1: Twitter at Ali e Wentworth and on Instagram at the
Speaker 1: Real Ali Wentworth. Now, if you'd like to ask me
Speaker 1: a question or suggest a guest or a topic to
Speaker 1: dig into, I'd love to hear from you, and there's
Speaker 1: a bunch of ways you can do it. You can
Speaker 1: text me or call me at three to three three
Speaker 1: six four six three five six, or you can email
Speaker 1: a voice memo right from your phone to Go Ask
Speaker 1: Gali podcast at gmail dot com. And you know what,
Speaker 1: if you leave a question, you just my year and
Speaker 1: go ask Alli. Go Ask Gali is a production of
Speaker 1: Shonda land Audio and partnership with I Heart Radio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit the I Heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.