Exploring Ayahuasca: Spiritual Growth, Healing, and Safety

Will: [00:00:00] Hey, everyone. Today, Karen and I welcome a truly special guest to the show. Ever wondered about ayahuasca and its impact on mental health? Are you curious about how these practices can actually foster spiritual growth? Well, you, my friend, are in the right place. Get ready to dive deep because we are talking to a guru in expanded states like meditation, breathwork, and psychedelic experiences.

And he's here to share his wealth of knowledge in all things ayahuasca, including its benefits for healing mental health issues. and promoting spiritual development. Now we'll dive into the practicalities and safety protocols of ayahuasca retreats, the importance of having proper guidance and why thorough preparation and integration are key.

And we're also going to explore different perspectives on both physical and emotional healing, how to deal with past traumas, and the potential risks of attending unqualified retreat centers. our guest is aiming to demystify the ayahuasca [00:01:00] experience, proving it's not just a trend, but actually a transformative process when done correctly.

So, stay tuned, get comfortable. This is gonna be an enlightening and transformative conversation. The Skeptic Metaphysician starts now.

My name is Will, and I'm Karen, and unlike Mulder and Scully, we both want to believe. So we've embarked on a journey of discovery. We've talked to people deeply entrenched in the spiritual and metaphysical world. We've thrown ourselves into weird and wonderful experiences. I even joined a coven of witches.

And, wait, you joined a coven? Yep, all in the

interest of finding something, anything, that will prove that there's

something beyond this physical, three dimensional world we all live in. This is The Skeptic Metaphysicians.

Karen & Will: All right. We are excited because we've got someone on the show today that is an expert in expanded states.

And how expanded States can actually help [00:02:00] with mental health and all kinds of really amazing things that we're excited to talk to him about today. His name is Michael Tiernone we could not be more thrilled to have him with us today. So Michael, welcome to the show.

Michael: Well, thank you for having me. It's a real honor to be here.

Karen & Will: it's a pleasure to have you,

we are going to talk to you about all things expanded states and specifically you do an ayahuasca retreat in Peru. So you've got a lot of experience with this kinds of things but let's, define expanded states methodologies just to make sure that we are on the same page first and foremost.

Michael: I think the expanded States is anything that brings us out of our regular state. this could be deep states of meditation. that's most fundamental. It could be breath work is a powerful way to, you know, hyperventilation like a holotropic breath work. And then of course, All of the medicines that we can use that are becoming so popular and well recognized now and the FDA is looking into them and there's all kinds of studies like psilocybin and the MDMA, ketamine, and, and a [00:03:00] whole host of other, other ones, LSD, which isn't being looked at that much right now because of how long it takes.

anything that kind of brings you out of your regular, sense of. Normality can be an expanded state can even be going to a dance club and listening to music real loud and you get that feeling of a rush and like the crowd and stuff. I consider that to be an expanded state.

So just it's more levels of degree rather than kind, because expanded states is just anything in my sort of vocabulary to encapsulate. Everything is anything that is outside of the regular you or I would consider like a regular state of being,

Karen & Will: So how does being in an expanded state, how does that, how can that be helpful?

Michael: the most simple way to describe how it can be Helpful and why it's helpful for so many things is because it gives you a different perspective, just think about any time you have a different perspective. So we're always looking through the lens of our experience and our worldview.

And whenever you're in an expanded States whenever you can be in an expanded States, it gives you an opportunity to look at the same thing from a different perspective. You know, classically, some examples [00:04:00] are one that I like to use is thinking about our parents.

Lots of times people have a lot of anger towards their parents or they could have done better or whatnot. one of the things that I've witnessed many, many times is a realization of seeing things through their parents eyes, not literally, but recognizing, as if I was a 40 year old person and realizing how my dad was only 30 when he had me and he was like younger and I'm struggling hard.

When we think our parents are like, just can do it all. And we put them on this pedestal and then recognizing that they were people to doing the parenting thing for the first time with their own list of, struggles and baggage and trauma and all that kind of stuff. A lot of times seeing that perspective Whereas always blaming them for not doing things the way you wish they had been done and saying wow, they were really trying to do their best and recognize that from a deep, you know, primordial place.

That's a different perspective and it can be for anything.

Karen & Will: I should mention that our mothers are watching this right now. Are they though? Be careful. I mean, hopefully. No, no. So everything you said a hundred percent But you know, you think [00:05:00] about, and I have thought about like situations where my, my family, you know, they're, my parents did their best. But I guess I never really thought of it with the grace I've given myself Oh, I've never done this before.

Well, they had never done it before either. So yeah, when you put it in that perspective, I'm like, okay, maybe, you know, things are different than I thought. And that's the thing, right? When people think about expanded states, ayahuasca, psilocybin, all that kind of things it's a drug, right? It's a, it's something that, that makes your mind think in different way.

And because of all the stuff that's happening, happened in the sixties and seventies, I got a bad rap, but there are, to Michael's point, there are a lot of studies right now. We talked to Jonathan Robinson, who talked about MDMA that helped PTSD tremendously. But I loved The fact that you, you called out so many other things other than just ayahuasca, psilocybin, MDMA, and LSD.

You actually talked about breath work. You talked about dancing. I mean, it is like any kind of shamans, right? Native Americans use drum circles and dancing to get themselves in a, in a different mindset. So [00:06:00] I love that we're expanding the conversation. This is not just about ayahuasca and drugs. It's actually about.

Finding a way to alter your state of thinking so that you can allow alternate methodologies to come in.

Michael: Yeah. Alternate perspectives is how I like to phrase it.

Karen & Will: That's great. So when you're doing, when, when you're dancing or, you know, listening to the, the trance music, how do you, and can you get in this state? And then when you really want to start thinking about things later, like once that music's gone, how do you stay in that state? So that you can really think about these things that you need to, to work on. That's when you use mushrooms. Well, because I understand because that stuff's still in your system, but once the music's gone, it's hard to keep, you know, in that flow.

Michael: Right. Well, with all expanded states, the reason they're, expanded and why they're not part of regular reality is because if you were in an expanded state all the time, you really couldn't function, right? Think of the con concept of ego, ego loss or ego death. It's a very powerful, powerful, powerful.

Powerful experience. But [00:07:00] without your ego, you wouldn't know where to put the spoon to your mouth, at least at the most like basic level, you need to know who you are to interact with the world at some fundamental level just to eat just just to Go about your day. So the important thing I think when we're going into any expanded state is to start off with an intention, And then let that intention go and let whatever, you know, your divine guide or whatever, you know, believe is that, that source that's behind the window of all the defenses and stuff to give you the answers that you're looking for so that you can live a better life. But the idea is to not, you don't want to be in an expanded state all the time.

You want to use it very judiciously, very consciously, and at least directed towards some sort of purpose or intention or aspiration.

Karen & Will: Right. So it's, so it's less about being in the expanded state all the time and rather learning the lessons that you learned when you were in the expanded state and bringing that into your regular life.

Michael: Absolutely. And that's what guides and in this work they call integration. you go in to get the downloads, the information, [00:08:00] and then. The ceremony starts actually when the ceremony is over. There's a lot of ceremony junkies that go do ayahuasca three times a month or something like that.

And they come with the same problems and they get the same messages and they're like, Oh, I just, the solution is to do more ayahuasca. And I'm totally like, that's fine for them. But I don't think that that's how we want to be living our life. What we want to be living our life is learn how to be better people.

You know, look at things from a different perspective. Don't be so entrenched in your own perspective and then implement those Those downloads into your life so that you can, you can implement them and live more satisfying life.

Karen & Will: a very, very basic question. I have zero experience with ayahuasca or psilocybin or any of that. I, we drink and I know that you can, I know that when you, when you drink a lot, you can forget. So do do you remember everything when you're, when you're using these other um, Substances?

Substances. Yes. Thank you.

Michael: Absolutely not. I mean, one of the many benefits of sitting with a guide rather than doing this on your own is because you do forget a lot of, A lot of the entire [00:09:00] experience that's, fundamental to every experience in life. if I told you to recount your day today, you would forget a whole bunch of stuff.

So just like those things, just, just the experiences just happened to be more profound, but I think the key takeaways in general, people will hold onto them and we'll say Oh, I really got to make amends with this person. I really have to stop drinking, or I really have to, you know, cut down on my marijuana use or whatever.

I have to make amends. You know, talk to my partner about this, that, or the other thing to reconcile the situation that we've been struggling with or whatever these things are. So those main takeaways will come, but with the help of a guide, the guide can help you, the guide shouldn't be directing the experience, but they should be holding the container for the experience, writing down notes.

I always tell people like, if there's anything that you want me to write down, that's important. Just say, Can you write this down? It doesn't even have to be the full thing, but just a memory trigger so that they can come back to what it was that they were thinking at the time. And then there's other, strategies you can use.

For example, you can record a session and transcribe it, which is a technology that I'm at the forefront of. And there's all kinds of things you can do. But you're absolutely right. You're [00:10:00] not going to remember everything. there's more actual experience, you know, moment to moment, and some of these more intense expanded states than your experience right now, that's one of the things that changed my whole metaphysics is the recognition of, how much more there is than what we're experiencing in moment to moment basis.

Usually

Karen & Will: right. Right. And it totally does. And actually my, my first experience with anything that's mind altering or expanding state expansion was the Carlos Castaneda books, He talked a lot about those types of things. He used that medicine to help him expand and my mother had those books and I first stumbled on them, she was, you Like panic, Oh my God, you can't read those. You're too young. You're not ready for that kind of thing. So of course, the first thing I did as soon as I got old enough was I bought all the entire thing and read the whole series.

No, you snuck in and read them right after she told you not to. Did I mention my mom was watching? Oh, nevermind. I was cheating. But, but that was my first intro into anything expanded States. And then after that was the movie with William Hurt altered States, which freaked the living crap out of me.

[00:11:00] But, and that was just sensory deprivation chamber, right? That cause all that kind of thing. So, when you're talking about mind expansion or state expansion is probably a better way of saying it. there's two camps, right? There's, there's a camp that uses it strictly for spiritual enlightenment and things like that.

There's another camp that use it for mental health, PTSD and all that kind of stuff. And I know that you do a lot of work with that as well. I appreciate that. so much for having me. for having me. This question is so important to me. There are people out there who believe that utilizing these types of substances or these types of, whether it's breath work or whatever it is, or expanded states is kind of a crutch to reach that enlightenment or whatever they're looking for.

What do you say to people that, feel that way? Do you feel that way?

Michael: you could say the same thing about meditation as a crutch. I could do nothing, or I could do something.

Karen & Will: Right.

Michael: I could do nothing. I could do something. If I do anything aside from my regular way of being, then I'm, then it's a crutch. This is just a faster way to have an experience that might take 30 years on, you know, deep entrenched [00:12:00] meditation retreats, possibly retreats, you know, darkness retreats all of those things.

let me just tell you real quickly, cause you mentioned, trauma, PTSD, and then also spirituality, the way I, Like to work is the first stage is called empty the vessel and they're not orthogonal necessarily, but usually we can't get to those spiritual states really until we've done the interior healing and the recognition of the traumas that we've had, the triggers we have basically.

Bringing us closer towards as high a level of self awareness as we can potentially even have and that's emptying the vessels like the first step and like how I think about these things is recognizing these factors in life, whether it be past or present or. People outside that cause you to react rather than respond in life, Work through those things. And then once the vessel is empty, I like to find out who you really are. That's where you get into the more spirituality thing. I think when people jump into the whole spirituality thing without emptying the vessel and, taking charge of what is no longer serving them, you know, like ego mechanisms that came up [00:13:00] through childhood and through life Are no longer adequate strategies for living a life and they just go straight to the spirituality.

You have that's basically what they call spiritual bypassing. I think it's very important to recognize that all of these things are possible with these things. And if it works for somebody and you're and the other thing is if it's working for people and giving them greater peace. Greater equanimity getting them more in touch with their interior cells and making them better people to other people, having them filled with more gratitude, more compassion for others, and just being more satisfied with life.

Who cares if it's a crutch or not? It works. Like it'd be like, Oh, you could suck it up and your leg is broken, but we're not going to give you Advil. You wimp, you know, because that's a crutch. You should just be able to suck it up. And, and I think where it becomes a to the going to whatever sort of modality.

And it doesn't just have to be psychedelics or expanded states, but just go for whatever modality just to say that they're doing something or because they're, they're enthralled by the modality itself. And then that, that's where it could become a [00:14:00] problem, especially psilocybin, absolutely not addictive.

And, you know, those people are not racing every day to have a psilocybin journey.

Karen & Will: And I know I put you on the spot, so I apologize, Michael, but that was a perfect answer. And it has nothing to do with the fact that I actually do have a broken leg right now and I'm using crutches

Michael: My son broke his leg in

Karen & Will: the Tylenol. Right. You said something about a darkness retreat. That

Michael: Oh yeah, I haven't, I

Karen & Will: to me. So what is that?

Michael: yeah. So it's they're becoming more popular. So, they're basically, you go and in total isolation, they have a very basic room, no media, no books, no music, nothing, but yourself. And then it's pitch, pitch, pitch, like cave darkness for four days.

They

Karen & Will: know.

Michael: basically, there's like a, like an airlock kind of situation where they will slide the food in there so that you eat, but you're in perfect darkness for

Karen & Will: They're like a little port a potty. You

Michael: Yeah, there's a bathroom, like what you need for the, your toothbrush and stuff. And, but I have not done it yet, but it's something

Karen & Will: Okay. And you come out like a Morlock. No, that sounds a lot [00:15:00] better than what I was thinking. It's like darkness, like I'm thinking like spiritual darkness and demons. I'm like, Oh my God, I don't want to do that for a weekend. To Michael's point, before you do anything like this, you have to do your own shadow work.

So there is some, shadow work that goes along with these shadow Retreats, right? Yes.

Michael: Well, that was actually the darkness situation. Like you talk about people going into a cave. You always think, oh, that the, the guru went to the cave for, for 30 days, like oftentimes that was in total darkness because what happens I don't know what the physiological reasons for this is, but after a certain amount of time, it's a full blown this is my understanding.

You get a full blown expanded state experiences, you know, as powerful or nearly as powerful as using one of these exogenous substances. Yeah.

Karen & Will: I could imagine it'd be a full full blown psychotic experience. I mean, I'm hoping the walls will padded up or something. I mean, you've heard about the, like people being tortured that way, like putting in a little cell where there's no light and you're totally by yourself. And I mean, not even that, I think, I don't know.

I

Michael: to anybody without their consent, you

Karen & Will: Well, yeah.

Michael: [00:16:00] but

Karen & Will: That's true. All right, kid. You're bugging me. I think you would just break down and just, you know,

Michael: well, that's the

Karen & Will: That's the point, right?

Michael: All of these things are at its most like. in some ways people are really ego resistant. They have these structures. Sometimes there is a point of breaking down where they just, the ego structure can't hold on anymore and they get past it and then they work past it and they realize why it was there in the first place and then they're like, Oh, realize it's no longer serving them.

And then they, sometimes it's as quick as that. There's a lot of people who just recognize how some behaviors are not working on their life and they just will never take, take action. some substance that they're abusing for the rest of their life after one of these experiences, it's been known to happen and there's, it's usually not a painless process, there's no growth without pain usually.

Karen & Will: And that's where I was going to take it because for those of you who are watching or listening to this, this is not a, so it's become a real fad, right? The ayahuasca trip is like a big thing now in spiritual circles and no, I've got, I got to do this. It, and people come out of there, it [00:17:00] was sometimes really traumatized in large extent to your point, they have maybe not have done their shadow work before they got out there and they see things that really scare them or something along those lines.

And this is not an easy fix. This is not like you take a pill and you're good. This, there is a lot of work that goes along with it, including, and especially the fact that you are Emptying yourself and, facing the parts of yourself that need the most help. it is not an easy little fun weekend trip.

This is, this is work that you're putting

Michael: Yeah. And I would say to that point also that I don't have a good number to say it. I mean, a good number, like a specific empirical value to give you. But most of the time that people go to an ayahuasca retreat and have come back traumatized is because they went to a place that didn't know what they were doing.

Like quite honestly, there's, there's places all over. There's a lot of places that are just like, Oh, let the medicine do its healing magic and whatnot. And it's

Karen & Will: in that voice too, right?

Michael: yeah, and they don't have a, they don't have a support that the retreat center doesn't have a support [00:18:00] structure. They don't have knowledgeable, retreat facilitators who know how to work with people both during and after the experience, And they're most retreats. I'm going to say 75 percent of retreats, basically. you have your experience and you're sitting in a hammock for the days that you're not, there's there's a little bit of interaction, but it's not like a real thoughtful, approach towards integration and in the actual experiences themselves, they'll just let you go through it like at Heart Sanctuary, the one that I participated in.

co founded we have a process. Someone's having a hard time. They say, help, only one of the facilitators will, check in on them if they need to go outside for some air and have a conversation and change of place. not going to be just left in the dark room to work out their demons.

we've never had anybody. say anything, but this was the best experience of our life. And I think it's because, we're not of the, just let the medicine do what the medicine does thing. And the people we have working down there are, are super high integrity. And I could say that for a lot of other places, but It's not the case that a hundred percent of ayahuasca retreat centers and ayahuasca facilitators really know what they're doing.

Karen & Will: Right. [00:19:00] So,

Michael: and there's different levels. There's ones that are medicalized where they have a team of doctors and psychologists for you know, for like heavy duty issues that people are struggling with let's say heroin or meth addiction and stuff like that.

there's levels of. trauma and life anguish or whatever that, you know, we would refer somebody to a different retreat center because we're kind of like, you know, the 75 percent of trauma, you know

Karen & Will: sure.

Michael: what I mean?

Karen & Will: Sure. Sure. Yeah. So as with everything in anything, you have to have discernment, you have to know, you have to go to the reputable places, you have to know, do your homework and find a place that makes the most sense for you because not not everyone is on the, on the same path. Let's put it that way.

Michael: Yeah. And some people are shopping on price. Oh, I got an ayahuasca retreat for 300 for five days. Like, why are you guys charging this much money? It's well, I went to, I went to the, I went to the fast food chain and they only charged me 9. Why can't I go to, you know, you know, French laundry. Why is it, why is the French laundry so much more expensive? It's not. Perfect analogy, but that's what I mean. Sometimes you get what you pay for. You have to [00:20:00] expect to pay a minimum amount to, to have somebody who cares enough and is qualified enough to offer the support that people need.

Karen & Will: And that's the key that's qualified enough so how does this work like legally? I mean, is that I have no idea about this stuff. Is, is ayahuasca legal? Is it

Michael: It's not legal in the United States and it's technically not legal in Peru either. Unless you are somebody who has a special certificate somebody that I'm. You know, connected with down there actually has a certificate from the ministry of culture as a keeper of the medicine, showing that they know the indigenous ways, they're, they're indigenous to people and that they actually are like vetted to be like an authority on that way of serving the medicine.

And it also has a, from the ministry of tourism that also vetted, vetted this, this man. And So it's decriminalized, but they also, Peruvian government, it's like marijuana was in the Netherlands, 10 years ago, decriminalized, but you go to any coffee shop in Amsterdam, you could get as much marijuana as you like.

So it's it's that, that's the, that's a legal status. The last time I checked in Peru and the [00:21:00] United States The ayahuasca vine compound, which is a harming and harming alkaloids that come out of there. Those are legal in the United States. What's not legal is the secondary component of ayahuasca, which is the chacruna or the NNDMT component, which is the part that's more responsible for the visionary state part of

Karen & Will: Right,

Michael: But they both, they both have you know, visionary components. And You know, opening components to them both, both plants.

Karen & Will: I'm glad that you mentioned the indigenous because there has been some reports of late that the indigenous peoples in some of those places are really not happy with what is happening now with the ayahuasca resort. Industry because it is a very sacred medicine that they've used for so, so many years.

And for someone to come up and put up a hammock and do, you know, drink to Marihuasca and hang out in a hammock it's not really what it's about, right? So the, the fact that you're working with indigenous peoples to help bring this to the folks that actually truly want to use it for.

the right reasons. I applaud you for that.

Michael: [00:22:00] Yeah. So I'll, I'll speak a little bit more of that just to be clear, make sure I'm not misrepresenting the quote unquote shaman. And I don't like to use the word shaman for a lengthier conversation. But the person who serves the medicine was trained by people and has been like, okay. They've said, you're good to go.

But he is not Shapibo he's from Chile. COVID stopped the retreat center I was affiliated with before and like we've rebooted the place that we're going to try and make it even more in alignment for with exactly what myself and the other two co creators that started this would have envisioned for our retreat center.

experiences. so there's a, there's a plan for us to actually contribute to some of the indigenous down there, you know, because we don't want to just hold onto that. And another, what we do do is we do have a large component of our curriculum at the retreat is, is teaching about the Andean Cosmovision.

So explaining A lot. There's a lot of workshops that we do in there that actually explain, put like some, some cultural context to what the experience [00:23:00] is what the, where the experience comes from without, with, you know, trying our best not to appropriate it because in full recognition that, you know, we didn't come up with these technologies and

Karen & Will: Okay. Well, that's, I mean, it's, it sounds, it sounds like you're doing, going about it all the right way. So

Michael: trying to,

Karen & Will: how long, how long does it take? Like when someone, when you start the ceremony, like how long is the process?

Michael: So what, just to be clear, I do not serve, serve it. I'm there as like I, and the team of people who are working there that are on site. 24 hours a day during the entire retreat, the three or four of us that are there in that capacity, do not serve. We sit and we drink in the, in the, in the Maloko of the temple, right?

But we don't serve it ourselves. The person who serves it is the, is Nacho and his team, he brings an additional three to five people in there. And he is primarily responsible for, how he runs the ceremony. So what do you expect? You're going to expect a talk at the beginning about what the boundaries are, what the [00:24:00] situations are, is what you can and cannot do.

we don't during the ceremony, for example, participants are not to interact with other participants. Someone might be having an experience and someone is having a different experience and someone's working through something and then their next door neighbor says, Hey, I just had this crazy experience and brings them out of it.

Right. So there's two tiers of support, first nachos team and then secondary myself and the other people who would be there on a 24 hour basis at the retreat center itself, doing the workshops and such. So you get a primer on what the rules are of engagement there. And we are very strict about those rules because we don't want anybody to we want the best experience for everybody.

And you have to set those boundaries. And then basically with, In the procedure that we have, you, everybody goes up, they sit and they will take the first cup of the brew, pretty bitter. It's not pleasant tasting. Tastes like a little bit like acrid prune juice, I would say. And then, and then there's then you go back to your mat and you you're encouraged to sit up, but you can lay down if you like, And during this part, when everybody has drunk and sit together, [00:25:00] it's quiet. So there's no, no sound. As soon as the medicine starts to come up as determined by Nacho this is pretty much the standard sort of protocol for most, most ceremonies. As soon as the medicine starts coming up, he will start to sing and Nacho in our case, Nacho plays I don't know, 20 or 30 instruments and his whole team plays instruments.

So it's a, it's quite an experience. I've been, I've sat with nine different people who serve, whatever you want to call it. I don't like to use the word shaman. So I've sat with, but I'll use it right now. I've sat with nine different of them, super, super, super high quality.

But in terms of like the, Beauty of the ceremony have not seen or heard anybody who even compares to the music and the, the fun that happens throughout and the, the technical prowess of, of the engagement with the medicine itself and music as medicine.

Karen & Will: Now you know that those, those nine shaman that he work with are not thinking, is it me? Am I one? I'm one of the three. One three . Are you one of three? They're all thinking. I'm one of the three. So they're happy. Sorry guys.

Michael: know that they're not one of the three, I'm sure. Um, Then [00:26:00] basically what happens is you start feeling, a little bit. out of time and place, you might see like explosions of colors with their eyes open or close, there's thoughts and like sometimes great awarenesses that just come up it's hard to say cause it's different for everybody.

But in generally there's a light show part about two hours after, the beginning. The light show diminishes and in my experience, most of the downloads and realizations come in that second two hour period, they could come at the first part as well.

But the first part is more intense, more disorienting. And then the other thing that people ask a lot about is the purga or the purge, which is

Karen & Will: the vomiting.

Michael: the vomiting. Yeah. It's crazy because we have that one word for it is vomiting. before I got invested in this, work and working with ayahuasca and such, I imagine being drunk at a party and having had too much to drink or being sick from some virus or some bacteria and then throwing up with nausea and all that kind of stuff.

Not to say there couldn't be nausea. Anything is up for grabs, but typically it's something else that is coming up in an [00:27:00] energetic way. That seems it just seems like I'm there's like an association with something. So the best way I can explain is to give you an example.

If you're cool with that. So, I was doing a ceremony, I don't know, some point in time as a participant and it was during the time of all those school shootings. I don't know if you remember. It was probably like before covid like 6 years ago. There was like every week for a 2 month period.

it was like, bam, bam, bam, like every week. And as a person who has no power or a solution for that, you know, I had unknowingly been harboring this deep sadness about hearing about these children and their families and all this kind of stuff.

And it was just kind of like hearing it and kind of like. Not really knowing how to what to do with it. Right. We're just hearing it and hearing it, hearing it. And so my purge that night was basically a real realization, a, that I wasn't doing a good job of defending against the sadness that was coming into me.

I was just not recognizing it. So the sadness was coming in and I wasn't dealing with it or recognizing it or [00:28:00] giving it its proper attention. And then all of a sudden, once I like fully realized this, I felt like. This tingling sensation coming in from all sides and then all of a sudden right into the bucket.

the experience, it was of purging out sadness, all the sadness connected to all that. And I felt light after that was like, Ooh, didn't even know that was in there. Pay attention, Mike. Because when the news gets, you know, hairy like that. Notice if you're feeling that sadness, it is affecting you or not.

So there was the awareness of how I might process future news events. And there was also the recognition and the release of the sadness that I've been holding. Right? Does that make sense? The other thing is, the purge itself does not look like purging. normal food vomit. So you can imagine 30 people.

This is one of the questions that I've asked a bunch of people. No one's been able to give me the answer. It's why doesn't it smell in there like a bunch of people vomiting? Cause it does not

Karen & Will: It doesn't.

Michael: at all. Does not. And I've, you know, asked a couple and they're like, I don't really know.

You know, that's, you know, that's just the way it is. So it does not smell at all like a whole bunch of people vomiting. [00:29:00] So what comes up also, it doesn't look like that. Vomit. It's usually like black and sticky, it's kind of a a weird thing. I, I, I've not heard of anybody studying the, component processes of, of the components of the ayahuasca purge.

But it's just not the same thing.

Karen & Will: yeah. I can only imagine people not wanting to study the purge vomit stuff. So, I mean, you, you make it sound so much better, right? Because you, you hear about it all the time. In fact, we know someone that went to a retreat and she spent the entire time purging. It was a terrible experience for her because she did the entire time was purging.

And then I think it was the second time she went, it just sounds terrible. you mentioned When you're drinking, you are poisoning yourself. So your body is like expelling all the poison. So in a way, you're expelling the poison inside of your soul.

And that when you think of it that way, that's a beautiful way of thinking about it. I not sure if I want to do it still, but. It sounds way better than, vomiting up what you just ate the day before.

Michael: It does

Karen & Will: So how, how [00:30:00] aware are you during all of this? Because so I saw the movie, the doors, maybe that might've been peyote.

I don't know. But he was like, Ooh, out of it. But you're telling me that you can know not to talk to your neighbor and know to grab the bucket. You're not just like a hot mess going through all this because that's what I imagined. I just,

Michael: Mm-Hmm, . Yeah. You, you're,

Karen & Will: it to us makes it sound like you're just out of it.

Right. Right.

Michael: Well, there's different degrees. Like I've done it enough times there's a way of finding yourself in the space in that, expanded state that's how, you know, Nacho, he drinks 150 times year, Cause he's running all these retreats and diet and diet does all this kind of stuff. And he's playing literally, I've seen him play, a flute with one hand, sing, go back and forth from the flute and playing tablas with the other hand and shaking a uh, a tambourine with his foot simultaneously.

between he and I know that he actually drinks more than the participants, but he's just used to be able to operate in that space. in anything, as you do it more, you're just more attentive to what's going on uh, and able to experience it. I have a, a challenge out [00:31:00] there for like real Iowas, people who consider themselves Iowaska connoisseurs, and it's only for them. cause I'm part of this guide network, this guild of guides. And I said, if anybody wants to go down there and And to check it out. Cause I'm looking for them to refer clients to that retreat center.

I say, you go down there. And if it's not in the top 5 percent of your experiences, I'll give you your money back, like straight up. Cause I know it will be. And and the reason I can only tell that to. People who have a lot of experiences is because someone who's gone for the first time doesn't know what is going on and they're kind of lost in the sauce and, and they don't realize what is actually going on.

But someone who's comfortable in the medicine space, they can see like, I know what's going on. I understand what the facilitators and what the shaman are doing and like, damn, this is next level. So that's my challenge to the green girl connoisseurs of, of the world.

Karen & Will: the sommeliers of the, of the ayahuascan world.

Michael: self self proclaimed

Karen & Will: Right. The, like [00:32:00] what foodies? The ayahuascoodies. Ayahuascoodies. Uh, well, cool. I mean, it sounds like a, incredible place. It also sounds like you don't want to be in a room when it's all first timers. Right.

Michael: people handle themselves quite well because you're not going to be walking around. You're on a mat, you're comfortable. And there's a lot of people, at least at our place, there's a lot of people looking out for you. And you have, you can always remember to say help if you, that, and someone will attend to you within, you know, 30 seconds, someone will be at your side.

what's the matter? It says, I can't find my water bottle. Oh, okay. Well, here's your water bottle sometimes. you're not as lost in the sauce as you might think. And it also, ayahuasca in particular comes in and out.

Like it'll come up super intense and it drops down a little bit and then it comes up and down. It's got just caught like a snake pattern on the

Karen & Will: Mm.

Michael: up and down. So that's just metaphorically.

Karen & Will: Gotcha. All right. So you've got some self awareness. All right. So, how long does the full trip take?

Michael: the peak hits from the, you drink at T equals zero, right? At T equals 30 to 45 [00:33:00] minutes into it. So you start to feel the effects about an hour to an hour and 15 minutes later is the peak. And then it comes down in a wavy pattern until it's complete at, you know, by four hours, you're pretty much, you know, Done in five hours.

Almost everybody's done. If people have chosen to drink more cups, they might go into the six hour mark. because you can throughout the ceremony, you have the opportunity to drink more. You will open the window and say, does anybody want some more? And you go up there and they'll give you another cup, two, three, all you can drink.

Karen & Will: I'm a one hit wonder. I would take like sip of the cup and I'm good. I think I'd be like tripping for five hours a day, you know, just that one little thing. I don't, I don't think

Michael: Are you sensitive to other medications like anesthesia and stuff?

Karen & Will: very much so.

Michael: Yeah, so that that was something that would be something that we would or nacho would consider. Because we have an intake forms. It's like people say I'm very sensitive to stuff. The first night is the opening. it's a smaller.

Amount for everybody so you can get your bearings and then if you want more, you can drink five cups if you want the first night, but the first [00:34:00] start to see how everybody does their first time is a little bit less and you'll be surprised. A lot of people will come up for a second, third cup on the first night who have never done it before because they're enjoying the experience and they're feeling so much profound healing.

And,

Karen & Will: Do you purge every time? Even just like a little bit? The

Michael: um, I would say about for me personally, it's about 75 percent of the time. Oh, purge. And they say the purge is other things too. It could be crying, it could be sweating, it could be shaking as a, you know, that's very common. It's people shaking out trauma and I believe it's related to our, evolutionary patterns of how we would release trauma in the wild.

We've lost that capacity, but the body naturally can do that and can find its way to that trauma releasing mechanism. in this expanded state.

Karen & Will: is there too much? Can you overdo it? I

Michael: Can you

Karen & Will: I know you guys wouldn't let someone, but if someone's taken, you know, could someone theoretically, yeah, just drink too

Michael: Well, like anything you could overdo it, I suppose. But at some point in time, you're just going to be so, lost in the sauce you can't have anymore. But I can speak to mushrooms uh, or psilocybin. [00:35:00] There's been no ld 50 or lethal dose, 50 percent found for psilocybin.

and same thing with LSD. There's studies, people taking thousand hits of acid, they're gone at the emergency room, and they come back in there, no physical ramifications

Karen & Will: Good God. I can't even imagine two tabs of acid. Imagine thousand. Oh my God. Can't imagine one.

Michael: Yeah, there was a case I think in San Francisco where, you know, LSD is, served that I think it's the millionth of a dose or something. Anyway, they screwed up what they were putting in so that, well, people thought they were taking one dose. They were actually taking a thousand. And so there was a group of people that ended up in the emergency room.

All of them had no physical effects. But they're obviously incapacitated completely, but what's interesting in that story, you could look it up based on those keywords that I just gave. Some of them had traumas and they were healed afterwards. So we don't know what happened to those people.

They don't really, I mean, from the articles I read about this, didn't really keep great records, but they followed up with these people. And even though they were lost in the sauce for three, [00:36:00] four days because they had taken so much LSD when they came back, like months later, they were actually had lost a bunch of.

challenges that they had been facing. Yeah. Some baggages got lost in the trip.

Karen & Will: They got it put on a different plane. That, now that kind of luggage, I'm ready to let go of. Right. Thank you. as you take more cups, does it just make the experience longer or does it make it more intense or both?

Michael: Well, the time is a factor here. So if you take four cups it will be extended by a little bit. I mean, that's my understanding. It's, it would extend a little bit, but not so much more. It's still that peak. But if you're taking a cup now, a cup, an hour from now in a cup, an hour from now, it's going to also extend the duration and probably keep the peak going for a little bit longer.

So how I would, that's what I would predict anyway. Sure.

Karen & Will: All right. So then to piggyback off of that kind of question you say you've got people there that help you, if you need help, if I am having a really bad experience, I don't want to say trip because it's, it's, irrespective. Respect.

Michael: Having an intense experience. Yeah,

Karen & Will: Yes.

if I say help, because I'm losing my [00:37:00] mind because I'm so lost in sauce. What can you do to help? I mean, is there anything that you, that people can do to help you like come down off of a bad, experience?

Michael: absolutely. There's a whole bunch of stuff to do and that's why these things should not be ever taken.

Karen & Will: by yourself.

Michael: Especially if you don't have experience with them, but it could be as simple as holding of the person's hand that tethers them to like, Oh, I'm not actually dead.

Or whatever they're, they're going through tethers them back and actually distracts them from what was going on before taking them out of the, of the setting. So. helping them out to the outdoors, which is right outside the temple, for example, there so they get the fresh air and all of a sudden they can ground themselves and like, Oh, okay, it's just a matter of interrupting the cycle of thinking or experience that was happening at that.

It's as simple as that. If it's on a one on one session with. psilocybin, for example, you could just tell them, okay, I want you to breathe a certain way. And then there's certain breath patternings that you could do with a longer exhale and just distracting them and telling them to think about their breath, put their attention on the breath, could be enough to interrupt the cycle.

So I [00:38:00] think there's a misunderstanding that people will have a bad or an intense experience or, or you're calling a bad trip, Unable to extract yourself from that. But in my experience, with, proper people who know what they're doing. I've never seen him not be able to extract somebody out of something where they're asking for help with. But oftentimes at the same time, those challenging experience or the experiences that you actually need to go through in order to do the healing. So it's best not to intervene, unless the person's actually asking for help and intervene minimally so that Enough, but minimally so, so that they can get what they need from that.

Karen & Will: Yeah. Are there any sort of prolonged side effects like flashbacks or anything like that?

Michael: Now, as far as I know the only psychedelic that I've heard of that actually has like legit flashbacks is the five MEO DMT, which is the, the toad,

Karen & Will: yeah. Oh,

Michael: So that's, that's known to like regularly though. If you do that, they will tell you to expect flashbacks, but the flashbacks aren't like full blown.

So just a little bit of a sensation of an [00:39:00] opening feeling. that's my understanding. I'm not really well versed in five MEO

Karen & Will: How does this help? I mean, I assume rewires the brain some way so because I know that you will use this to help with mental health challenges, PTSD, that kind of stuff.

And we had the amazing Jonathan Robinson on a while back to talk about MDMA that they're testing right now for PTSD specifically, for example, but how does that work? How does taking. Ayahuasca, psilocybin, MDMA, anything like that. How does it change someone? Because we've heard it happens after even sometimes one dose or one

Michael: Oh yeah, absolutely. Happened as once can happen after one dose or one experience I should say. And it's also important to say that that's not always the case either. Sometimes You have to implement what you commit to after one of these sessions, the integration part how does it work?

That's a tricky question. I mean, the, indigenous will have tell you a completely different mechanism of action than somebody from from John Hopkins, for [00:40:00] example, and how it actually works is, I don't think people totally know. I mean, it, there's some stabs in the dark at how it actually might work, but I think it has to do, I mean, you're asking.

What I think so I couldn't tell you if this was right or wrong. But if you just think about the, known neuroplasticity and neurogenesis that happens after these things. So there's all kinds of new neural connections that happen. And just know that that's happening, right? So that does happen.

That's been, Known and studied across most of these definitely across the ayahuasca and the psilocybin LSD. So knowing that, and then using the analogy that's used in Michael Pollan's book about the ski slope, if you've skied before, like you go in the mountain, so we're going to say like when you're a child, the whole mountain is you get the freshies. There's nobody skied on the mountain They've groomed it. It's all nice. You can go anywhere you want, Because there's no tracks to pull your skis in a certain direction over life and through trauma and Whatever happens through the experience of living this life, now thinking about [00:41:00] going further into the ski day tracks start happening in the mountain. And like all these people have been skiing the same trail, all of a sudden it's harder to get out of that rut. So you're thinking about the same thing and that's leading to the same behaviors and the same emotions because you're kind of in this rut, which is like a ski track.

And so what happens oftentimes with these medicines, whether it's a function of the medicine itself, or it's the function of Grooming that mountain again, making all these tracks smooth for a bit and having the shift in perspective so that you're looking at the same problem from a different sort of frame of reference.

And together, those two things allow you to make new tracks a new way of being in the world. So make new tracks.

Karen & Will: I love that analogy. That makes so much perfect sense. a great way of looking at it. I really love it. And then also when you're over your skis, that makes more sense too.

So then what you have some experience, you have quite a bit of experience in this. What kind of things have you seen it help [00:42:00] with?

Michael: I've seen from physical things, like I used to get, I'll give you one example for the physical. It's just a super small seems not that important example, but it's. It's true. It's my experience and I wasn't expecting this.

I used to be prone to when I get stressed out with those fever blisters, those gnarly like canker sores or whatever that's on your mouth on your, on your lip. And I used to get them about once or sometimes twice a month if it was really, if I was dealing with some stressful stuff at work. And I didn't come in, this was not an intention for me at all.

I I just thought that this was my life, you know, this was just part of living and other people get them and you know, 90 percent of the people have that, oral thing. And during my first session, I heard a voice saying, this is going to hurt. And what I experienced was, cause I had one at the time on my first, cause I was nervous traveling by myself and all this kind of stuff.

So I actually had one of those fever blisters and it felt like someone was putting a Bic glider up to my lip. For about two minutes, and that was 10 years ago. And in that time, I've only had two in the last 10 [00:43:00] years. So that's an example of one of a physical one. I have more examples of physical healings.

People have healed, Greater things, but I think it's important to, you know, talk to your doctor and all that kind of stuff. Don't

Karen & Will: Oh, yeah,

Michael: this isn't a thing, but but I know that some physical healings can happen. And then just a lot of self awareness of like how you've been operating in the world in ways that are not sustainable and not Real for having a good life.

I'll give you another example for myself, because it's the easiest to conjure up since they're the ones that I've thought about. I realized when I when I first went to Peru, one of these days I recognized that there was like some kind of shame inside, this person, inside Michael Tierno, right.

that I wasn't quite aware of in a surface way, day to day. But it was there all the time anyway, operating on it from a child. I didn't even know what it was from. And I did a mental arithmetic of figuring out that it didn't seem to be any basis for carrying around the shame and let it go.

And I also made the connection of that. The shame was. Tied [00:44:00] in some way to drinking too much at parties and using the alcohol to overcome this internalized shame that I was experiencing on a base rate and not aware of. And then I, you know, I stopped drinking for Three years, not a single craving that actually happens a lot people giving up habits, either stopping completely or decreasing a lot of the things like, if your partner may be at odd, you don't have not such a great relationship sometimes.

And then you realize maybe your contribution. To that thing, you can come back and say, well, you know, I just had this change of reference and I kind of understand what you've been yelling at me for the last five years or whatever. You know, I'm just making things up now. The classic thing for PTSD is separating out the The, the chain of events that happened during a where they feel like they're actually re experiencing the event firecrackers go off and someone's can't help but just immediately shift into that zone is the capacity for the human being to separate those [00:45:00] different components and realize that they are no longer in the situation where the reaction is the required reaction to a loud noise, for example.

And over time. you know, using the ski slope analogy, they can release those sort of connections so that people can then, you know, alright, I'm not at war or I'm not being, you know, yelled at by my parents or whatever these things are that can lead to P ts d. those are just a few examples.

Karen & Will: right. Well, I like even more now that ski slope analogy, because you think about, you know, you can go to counseling and they could say, well, this, this, and this, but unless you kind of regroom or, you know, change your way, have that physical change of your way of thinking, it's up to you to decide whether you're going to implement or not.

And that can be really hard to do. So I guess it would help with that. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. So if someone wanted to, they're convinced they've listened to this now for the, for the last hour and they're convinced they want to experience it for themselves. First and foremost, they've worked on themselves.

They've worked, they've done their shadow work. Now they feel that they're ready to go. How does someone discern? How does someone decide who they go and do these ceremonies [00:46:00] with? What's the best way to pick somebody?

Michael: let me just tell you what the biggest problem is, don't go to friends and family necessarily as like we hear necessarily right.

Karen & Will: Well, the first thing

Michael: of tricky, right? Because most people have only experienced with one person. So they've gone to one place and they haven't experienced, 90 percent of the time it's going to be powerful and life, changing, So you go to this one person, they have experience with one shaman, let's say, and they think that this is the guy. Right. And they tell everybody that this is the guy. one of the things is to do a little bit more investigation as to what in terms of an ayahuasca retreat place look at what they're offering besides the medicine.

Look at what their approach is in terms of how they serve it, like what their philosophy is. Look at what their approach to safety protocols is. Do they have one? how do they handle difficult situations? If someone is having an intense experience, if their approach is to just let the medicine do the work and let them ride around as long as they want under the assumption that [00:47:00] they're getting what they need.

That would be a place that I would definitely just cross off my list right away. actually done. I'm thinking about it. That's actually what I would ask. Your friend that went to an ayahuasca experience and he only has that one this would be the question I asked.

And I just came up with it right now. How do they take care of people who are having a hard time and what are the rules of engagement in the ceremony and other integration activities do they offer? Besides the actual ceremonies, those would be the three questions. And if they say, well, they actually have a really good protocol that if someone you know, needs help, have an identified protocol to engage with people who are having a hard time.

That's a huge green flag. Okay. They know what they're doing and they're not just going to quote unquote, let the medicine do the work. If they're giving you integration activities more so than just a group integration where everybody just has to sit and discuss. But if they're giving you activities on the off days that are targeted towards the ceremonies that's another green flag.

and then what was their experience? How well did they feel [00:48:00] attended to and listened to and understood and held in the container of healing by the facilitators who are running the show, Did the people who are running it, were they really keen and interested in understanding what my experience is and working with me to help me sort through what could have been the most profound experience of my life?

Or they're kind of like they kept to themselves and they just let The thing run itself. Those would be some questions that I would ask for, for a retreat center.

Primarily.

Karen & Will: I feel way, way, way more educated on ayahuasca. You've cleared up a lot of myths that we've heard and if someone wanted to reach out to you specifically and wanted to work with you, what's the best way for someone to.

Michael: my personal website is Michael Tierno guide. com that has everything on there, but you know, there's a lot of information there. There's a whole bunch of essays I've written. There's a whole bunch of content there.

Then if you want to go to Peru and have what I think, at least in my mind is in the top 5 percent of ayahuasca experiences that a person could have that's [00:49:00] heart. Sanctuaryretreats. com Heart Sanctuary Retreats. com And then if there's men out there that are interested in something that at the moment is focused on men, we have something happening in the United States a few times a year and that's called men of integrity and that's M O I dot community.

M O I dot community. And we will have some events for women that will be run by women in our broader community. But that's, for the futures. Yeah.

Karen & Will: Awesome. We're going to add those links to our show notes. So if you missed anything don't worry at all. Just go to skepticmaniposition. com. go to his episodes and you'll see all the links laid in there. So you can reach out to him. One link contact. So we work around here. We want to connect them with, with great peoples.

Michael, this has been absolutely wonderful. Thank you for sharing your expertise with us. We've talked to people before that have done ayahuasca and never, Published it because they were a mess. So, it's nice to, it's, it's really nice to have a conversation with someone that's actually really looking at it from the perspective that [00:50:00] you are.

And that's really to help people and not about going out and having fun, right? Cause that's what this is about. So thank you very much for coming.

Michael: Well, thank you both. I really enjoyed speaking about this stuff great questions. I mean, I really appreciated you guys and and appreciate you all. And I'm glad to have had this conversation with you.

Karen & Will: well, thank you, Michael. It's been a pleasure to have you as well.

Will: And a huge thank you to you If you like the show and the guests that we bring on, then you definitely

Want to be a part of our inner circle..

Will: See, the Inner Circle is absolutely free to join, and it gives you an opportunity to not only interact with Karen and I, but you'll also be able to engage with fellow listeners like yourself.

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We're also going to be doing a lot of great giveaways, like free sessions from some of our guests. You can gain access to behind the scenes videos, even get the chance to be on the show with us. All the while you'll be helping the show grow by letting people know about us. Did we mention it's a [00:51:00] hundred percent free, check out our show notes for the link to our inner circle and join today and then drop in and say hello and tell us what episode you heard this on. We might just give you a shout out on the show. well, that's all for now, but we'll see you on the next episode of The Skeptic Metaphysicians. Until then, take care.