 Welcome to the social exchange podcast. We're here on town meeting TV in the studio in Burlington, Vermont I'm joined by my friend dr. Rick Barnett. How you doing Rick? Good Zach? Thanks for having me on your show again. You act supernat. That was take two and you act supernatural about that Well, we're gonna we want to talk about psychedelics and the psychedelic movement which you've had a huge part in Can you tell a little bit about your history because I know you're I know you as As somebody who well, of course practices clinical psychology and also your self-described adrenaline junkie and also You like to have your nose in the books learning new things Which by the way, I have a four-year-old daughter who the other day was saying to her teacher I know more things than my dad. I've been trying to teach her that it's not about how many things you know It's about how interested you are to learn new things which you seem very interested in So I'm curious about your background and you know, maybe I know a little bit too much curse of knowledge And if you could inform people then also I'm interested how you became so interested in this new topic You kind of dove in off the you know headfirst into psychedelic research. Yeah Yeah, so my my background is as a psychologist and You know that I've been deeply immersed in the world of addiction That's where I sort of earned my stripes somewhat so to say in the in the Professional world starting off as an addictions counselor in New York City and then going on to get a master's degree and a doctoral degree so that's where I that's where I spend most of my time in in the mental health clinical world and Outside of that, I guess I am an adrenaline junkie. I do like to do Fun daring things. So I'm somewhat of a risk-taker And psychedelics really yeah, they they came back into the into the foreground of my awareness very front and central back in 2019 I heard Michael Pollan speak at an American Psychological Association conference Because his book how to change your mind Sometimes called the pollen effect on the psychedelic world because many people have heard of the book how to change your mind, right? so I saw him speak and that really catalyzed a lot of things for me because I'd heard about the book hearing him speak and What I mean by catalyzed that for me is because I was aware back in I would say 1999-2000 I was teaching resident physicians about drug use addiction treatment Assessment that kind of thing and one of the things I would do and part of my presentation would would give a drug update And I learned that MDMA That's three four methylene dioxin methamphetamine that is ecstasy Mali was being studied for Post-traumatic stress disorder so that was part of my little presentation But that's just a little like a little nugget of my broader presentation It was really in 2018 2019 when it started to come into the foreground and it goes all the way back to my youth again being a risk-taker I Definitely developed a problem with alcohol and drugs when I was younger as part of that maybe novelty seeking sensation seeking personality and Got into recovery at age 20 I put aside all my drugs and alcohol at that time one of the drugs that I misused heavily was LSD But I could also say that if it wasn't for LSD I would say that I would not be a psychologist today I probably would not be in recovery from addiction today even though I misused the drug why is that massively Because you know LSD is one of those things that for me I think permanently changed my outlook on life. It just made me more open to different perspectives I can remember after my first LSD use at age 15. I thought I was really messed up forever I didn't think the effect was ever gonna wear off because I was looking at everything and interpreting the world Totally differently probably for months, you know, is this ever gonna go away? And it wasn't a bad thing It was just a curious thing. You were talking about your four-year-old daughter You know that idea of being perpetually curious about things I'm definitely always learning new things. I heard about this thing called brain-spotting recently which has been around forever But it's really interesting related to EMDR for post-traumatic stress disorder. So anyway came full circle had used psychedelics when I was a kid They deeply impacted my life positively and negatively and then here we are, you know Decades later with this huge psychedelic renaissance this this research flood of research on psychedelic compounds to treat so many different issues and It's just become really exciting When you when I said I guess I'm the one who said it but when you say you're immersed in psychedelic research What does that mean? What are you up to? Yeah? I'm not actually doing you up? Yeah? I'm not doing actual scientific research myself I am following the research very closely and I founded the Co-founded the psychedelic society of Vermont and as soon as I finished a year-long Training program was actually three years ago This month or last month that I was on the show and we were talking about psychedelic assisted psychotherapy At the onset of this year-long training program that I was about to embark on I was seeing you off You're about to fly away to start learning. Yes, exactly saying goodbye. Yeah, and then and then COVID happened And so it was all done online But I learned so much during that process and so at the end of that we founded the psychedelic society of Vermont And since then we've been meeting regularly a group of health care professionals Learning about the research learning about all the advocacy efforts around the country Going to conferences putting on webinars and putting on our own conferences. So we had one last June in Stowe and we have another conference coming up in September of this year called the soul Quinox event in Stowe and it's on the fall equinox and we have the leading researchers from Rick Doblin from maps, which is the multi disciplinary multi disciplinary association of psychedelic studies We have Julie Holland who's written many books on psychiatrists written many books and been a lead researcher for maps We have Rosalind Watts Who's a lead was a lead researcher on psilocybin in in the UK Ben Cessa We have Janice Phelps. We have so many really cool names and people coming to this event So that's what the psychedelic society of Vermont has been up to that's what I've been up to deeply deeply immersed in learning as much as I can about psychedelic research psychedelic therapy also to some extent harm reduction because Psychedelics have become such a buzz buzzword and such a well known thing these days that a lot of people are For whatever reason, however, they're doing it. They're getting access to Mushrooms and lsd and mdma and they're using it, you know, their personal use And it's really helpful. I think to have people like me health care professionals who are informed about drug-drug interactions About how does one use psychedelics in the safest possible way? Optimizing their effects because it's so much not only about the drug itself But about the what they call set and setting in which the drug use takes place So you can help inform You don't have to do anything with policy shift or paradigm shifts and therapeutic practice or anything to Provide information to the public who's already using these drugs. Yes Are you saying do you think people have more access to them now since there's been a buzz than before? Are you just saying people generally have access to them and they're interested now? I think that's a really good question because i'm going back to What 30 plus years ago and for some reason I had plenty of access to psychedelics back then and that was that, you know The height of the drug war and then, you know, just say no movement So is there more access now? I would say it seems as though. I mean, maybe people would argue is that I can't find any Where do I get this stuff? You know, and I can't help anybody with that I took my question, right? All right, end of interview But I I do think because it's become so popular, you know mushrooms for example They're very easy to grow. You have to follow a certain protocol. You can buy actually spores I think legally online and you can set up your own little closet situation I don't recommend it because you're you're guessing my questions. Do you recommend the way to do that? I don't I don't recommend it. I think that it can go wrong. You can grow mold or I think if you don't have the right System set up so it's not like super easy to do but it's it's pretty basic And so I do think people are experimenting growing their own mushrooms just as as an example In terms of more access, you know, you know people are actually buying Lots of psychedelics online You can get it in in chocolate like psilocybin chocolates. Again, these aren't legal ways to do it Sometimes it's just blatantly sold online. Sometimes you have to go and hidden places to find it right you didn't influence this But it's happening. It's happening. Yeah. Yeah, maybe people are more out about it now Yeah, there's buzz about it being an effective way of doing one thing or another Yeah, and people are actually so bold that they're setting up actual storefront windows In the united states or in canada where it's not quite fully legal yet Maybe just decriminalized and they're still getting arrested for doing that because if they're not legal drugs But people are so Convinced that this is the right thing to do that they're willing to stick their neck out and just open up a storefront and sell Mushrooms or you know, there are people doing work underground. It's called underground. It's not legal But they believe that it's helping people and they want to be able to try to help people I joke sometimes that I work with people with addictions because I enjoy Having employment and that's not something we're going to solve ever Um, do you feel that way about this or is there some goal in other words? What are you hoping to accomplish with what you're doing now in the realm of psychedelics? What what I think is really important in the realm of psychedelics is to just to try to prevent too much dichotomous Thinking or to try to prevent infighting because there's a lot of people who are have a lot of diverse interests in psychedelics It could be corporate corporate structures capitalistic structures that want to extract the value out of Patting and selling psychedelics pharma companies. So they have a vested interest in it You have indigenous cultures who have a vested interest in protecting their lineage and not having it be pillaged like everything else has been pillaged by Western societies you have Advocacy groups that simply want it to be decriminalized or legalized for personal use And you have the medical model and it's all about going down that research Track and just getting it FDA approved so we can offer it Medically in medical settings and reimbursed by insurance companies So you have all these people and all these vested interests Sort of trying to do their land grab or put their you know flag in the ground and say this is this is what we stand for And what I like to do is I like to bring the strengths and weaknesses of all the approaches together and say Hey look no one's got the corner of the market here. We all have something to offer There's no need to throw shade on this this side or that side It happens all the time and maybe some of that's necessary So you can't stop that from happening But what I'd like to do is try to give voice to all sides and try to keep it Positive on the up and up so that we can bring it forward in the healthiest way possible Otherwise we run the risk of you know stepping on each other's toes or going sideways like it went in the 60s And shutting everything down again, and we just don't want that to happen Am I extracting out of that that you want? Psychedelics exist people use them with greater or less utility You would like to see people get value out of them one way or another and and you think you can make that happen You think you could Encourage that and guide that along in some way and this entire group anyone who has a stakeholder in this In the psychedelic movement could also help guide it and you're trying to prevent What did you say dichotomous thinking from thwarting that effort? Yeah too much um infighting or Uh Being too rigid around one particular model or perspective and that's what we tend to do as human beings We we identify with a particular group and then that becomes our tribe and then everybody else is You know wrong or whatever Just to give an example of that there is a bill There are two bills in the state of vermont. This is town meeting tv And we're still in the middle of a legislative session here There's a senate bill 114 and there's a house bill 371 i believe and they're both bills that Effectively remove psilocybin from the list of illegal drugs in the state So effectively make psilocybin mushrooms legal For any purpose selling using possession It's just remove psilocybin from the list and also sets up a psilocybin psychotherapy advisory group So a list of stakeholders or a list list of board members are suggested to serve on this working group to go ahead and put forth a report to the legislature saying You know if there is to be psilocybin assisted psychotherapy in the state of vermont This is how we think it should look based on other models and stuff like that And so I was involved trying to get with the lead sponsor representative chip triano Engaged on this subject back in the spring And explicitly had conversations about the medical model versus like a decriminalization model And where I really landed in terms of at least getting this off the ground is like Let's just look at psilocybin Alone as a psychedelic. Let's not look at ls lsd. Oh, I see. Yeah without considering lsd or dmt or all the other drugs Just look at psilocybin And we know that it's on a track towards medicalization. It will be likely fda approved for treatment for various conditions in 2025 2026 2027 that's on track in the meantime There's enough evidence already in the research to show that it is safe That is effective and that it can be used personally It can be used ceremonially in safe ways. So is there a way to put forth a bill that allows for Legal or decriminalized use Without the fear of these massive penalties so that people who are doing the work or want to do the work Aren't quite as scared to do so because of the The legal status of the drug it seems like the those two views in some ways I can imagine a stereo where they're not compatible in terms of medicalization on one hand Legalization decriminalization on the other So is it um I mean is that ever at odds so you would like to see things Don't let me put words in your mouth. I think I would like to see things happen where Access to psilocybin opens up access to drugs in general. That's my take I don't know. I'm a rebel open up so that then whatever happens with them can exist You know can exist sort of in a natural trajectory That maybe doesn't coexist with somebody who says I'm worried about the legalization of drugs And so I think a medical model would be a good first pass at trying to do something with them So don't you think there's some natural disconnect there? And how do how do you are you getting people to coexist in that in that line of thinking? Right and I think it's just a matter of trying to hold both perspectives as Each independent of each other and valid approaches to access So if the main issue is access Then a medical model approach is one avenue for that and it's a valid one So we should support that we should get behind that actually if it wasn't for all the research In this area that's under the umbrella of medical research. We would not be where we are today So I think we owe a debt of gratitude to science and the research that is being done So that we are on this pathway towards Legal medical access to these compounds in a safe and effective way the the one way and it sounds sort of lame, but The one way in which they may be across purposes is that those people who Believe it should be a medical model only will say that that using Getting access to psilocybin out there in the natural world somehow by unscrupulous Dealers It's it's dangerous and you're going to get psilocybin laced with fentanyl And there's going to be all kinds of chaos that's going to unfold because it's this unregulated You know legal access, you know, anybody can grow it and use it on their own It's going to be terrible for people. That's why we need the medical model and we need the fda approval process because that way We can keep it safe and effective in that way And then the people who are on the side of legalization or decriminalization personal use that side of things They will say that it's all just corporate greed big pharma the medical Industrial complex is just trying to sort of commandeer this natural compound that nobody should own per se Nobody should regulate it should be just available to everybody And so you could see how both sides have their strengths and weaknesses And I just I just tend to lean on the side of like let's get like you like let's get access to these drugs Let's let's raise awareness have have sessions like this, you know interviews like this Do webinars offer programs to train people to raise their awareness about how to use these drugs Safely what what other drugs do they interact with so you're not messing around too much with your internal biochemistry? You know that you're improving community life and social life and you know, you're you're just handling it in a thoughtful way It is possible to do that. There's always going to be unscrupulous players Whether it's on the medical side or it's in the in the natural world, you know, it just happens But we shouldn't like throw stones at each other across the across the different models because one model is better than the other It just doesn't serve anybody. So where is your stance on legalization of drugs in general now? I remember we sat here God, I I don't know how many years ago and we were talking about heroin assisted therapy or heroin assisted treatment or heroin assisted places You didn't disagree with it, but you were hesitant to sign on the dotted line for something like that Has that evolved at all or are you still kind of there like some psychedelics and some drugs? I mean gung-ho, let's make sure the axis is available something like heroin not so much Well, no, I think I remember that conversation well because it was around the time that There was a lot of it was in the late 2018 early 2000 2019 Where I think you and I were on the same page there was a there's has been a lot of emphasis on the opioid epidemic around medication assisted treatment and easy access to things like suboxone buprenorphine or methadone and you know, you and I were like, hey, that's great People should have access to these things. But is that really solving the issue here? and the The region of burlington recently shot down Measure or some ballot initiative or something to open a safe use site So people can go to a location and use heroin safely without fear of being Rested or anything like that and you and I were both on the same page about that that should be that should be Initiated somewhere in vermont. I think there is there's still ongoing efforts to do that. I believe that is a viable model I've always believed in what's called safe consumption sites or safe injection sites safe use Areas safe spaces to use drugs and I'm a firm believer in that just like I believe in heroin assisted treatment in a medical model So to extrapolate from that to go into full-blown Just let's just legalize all drugs so that there's a regulated market for heroin so that you and your Partner can go down to the pharmacy And over the counter order, you know 10 grams of heroin. Let's say for example for your whatever supply or A certain amount of cocaine You know, that's that's a model that I still would support It just I think that I don't know if society is ready for that You know and that would be a tricky A tricky thing to to implement just I think because of the lineage of the drug war and everything It's just a really, you know, we know that like Heroin containing products and cocaine containing products were widely available in the late 1800s early 1900s So there's no reason why we couldn't eventually get back to something like that But I think it would be a it's a heavy lift. So it's not that I disagree with that It's just like how would that happen? I could see Decriminalization as a pathway towards that decriminalizing all drugs Adults everywhere are sort of ready for that. I mean not everywhere adults You can find adults in given places who are right now using illicit drugs and feel like they do them with Virtually no impunity, you know, they're they're living their lives But you may be right. Maybe society's not ready for it. It's certainly it's like That's what I believe and I don't mind being vocal and still I mean, I'm here It's just me and you and I feel weird about even saying it like oh my god Where's this kind of conversation going to go? But I think it's a misunderstanding in large part of what addiction is which I'm like So distracted by I don't know if it's distracted or hyper vigilant about in terms of what it means What addiction means because people think There are better and worse drugs some things addict you more There's some ineluctable draw of a drug that gets you hooked on it and I don't buy it any of it That leads me into thinking about psychedelics and we had this conversation before where Um What would a carl heart call it? Anyway, he psychedelic exceptional right a psychedelic exceptionalism drug drug exceptionalism well the the My drug is better than your fallacy right that I'm I'm a proponent of this drug and that's because this one's not addictive and that one is and it's just It's a bad argument. I think and so I imagine that there's In fighting or misinformation or just different opinions within The movement that you're trying to help guide How do you think about that and are there those conversations going on? Yeah, I mean so psychedelics, uh, if you look at and I don't know if it's I'd be curious to see what Dr. Carl Hart has to say about this But there are charts out there that show a couple a couple of different charts one will show um in terms of like the the uh the Incidents or the likely the the harms or the addictive potential of Various drugs. I think maybe the harms that come from This harms there's a chart that shows the harms of various drugs using various drugs and like alcohol and cigarettes Are like at the top of the list and then underneath that we got heroin Cocaine and you go down the line and you get all the way down to like psilocybin, which is like Basically zero harm, you know lsd basically like zero harm So you get to the psychedelics and you're like, well, there's hardly any harm that comes from them So I think that's in part where the psychedelic exceptionalism comes in It's like look look at this chart hardly any harm comes from this But these other ones namely two of the top top ones are legal drugs So, you know, the whole that whole argument is really weird because you've got legal drugs that are devastating You've got illegal drugs that are anyway It's it's confusing the other thing that I would wonder what researchers think about and this is from herb cleaver Who used to be at columbia university passed away several years ago? great researcher great guy and he used to always talk about the The conversion rate from First use of a drug to becoming addicted to the drug or ever having had a problem with the drug over the course of a lifetime So if you look at the number of people who have ever tried alcohol Who've ever tried nicotine who've ever tried cocaine and then you look at the number of people who Through recent data or whatever have developed a problem with it a diagnosed Substance use disorder with it You have a conversion rate of like basically addictive Propensity for drugs and you have nicotine at the top of the list Like one in three people who ever tried nicotine apparently go on to develop a problem with it And then you have something like opioids and this is debatable been debated a lot in the Opioid epidemic era that we're living through Something like one in four one in five one in six people who ever try opioids will go on to become develop a problem with it Something like one in six one in seven for cocaine And and the list goes on and on and on and again I don't know like what that is supposed to mean But I think it builds this narrative that some drugs are more addictive than other drugs It's a bad category. First of all the one in four thing with opioids. It's just not right. It's terrible It's it's not the right and I don't know those other statistics you listed off Maybe I'm naive about I probably aren't quite right either. I don't know But yeah, I understand what you're saying. It's a narrative that's built around that kind of that kind of data I understand what you mean. So the larger point is that What you really want to do with things that people may or may not have access to but want Is to try to allow people to get it and understand how to use the things safely Yeah, that's pretty libertarian stance. I don't know. I don't know where you fall politically, but we won't talk about it Well, I think it's also just related to this idea of you know, our psychedelic drugs addictive, right that that That question is an interesting one because I'm somebody I think like you that we as human beings some of us may or may be more or less predisposed to Engaging in certain behaviors or using certain substances in a way that may not be healthy If you're asking is it something you can become preoccupied with yeah to some kind of devastation, you know, more or less Wouldn't then then the answer is sort of obvious Yeah, yeah people become obsessed with psychedelics and they want to use them all the time You know, whether they're physiologically addictive is sort of irrelevant. It's just like it's it's an experience You know if if psychedelics are anything they offer an individual an experience right the jimmy hendrix experience You know it's you go on a trip you go on a journey And so can people get addicted to that process? Well a lot of people say no because some of those journeys the trips that people go on are Terrifying, you know, you either see god or the devil or snakes or you know entities or whatever and it's terrifying And it can jar your your psyche and your soul for for weeks Afterwards who could ever get addicted to that Fuck excuse me. Some people some people love that, you know, some people actually love the challenge of going through these Difficult things and they want to do it every day. I had a patient come to me About a year ago and he was using two highly potent Psychedelic drugs dmt and 5 me o dmt Several times a day for months straight that that's just not a healthy amount of using these very highly potent Now he did so in such a way that it actually relieved him of his alcohol use His liver was failing and he was looking desperately to find ways to stop drinking And somehow he found the research on psychedelics in the treatment of alcohol use disorder And he somehow stumbled across some of these drugs Dmt and started using them regularly. So great. He he did stop using alcohol his liver healed And he was using what I would call Psychedelic drugs a bit a bit excessively and I and I let him know that But you know, is it better than? Like having his liver fail and you know dying from alcohol poisoning I would say arguably it's probably a better route for the guy I understand it as a clinician that you go that route It's like whatever goofy method you come up with of making your life better or doing what you want to do You'll land there. Maybe you'll give some suggestions. Like, you know, if I were your parent I probably wouldn't say do this. This is the best way to get off it, but I'm not you And so right there there are more or less harmful ways to do anything in the world And I guess that's a moot argument. I want to get let's get away from the negativity bias Explaining away negativity biases. Um, and can we get existential? This is uh, is it too obvious of a question to ask what's going on when people are enjoying psychedelics in terms of therapeutically, so when somebody is Taking a psychedelic and that opens some sort of mindset for them that they're able to move on or go Somewhere positive Explain what you think is going on there and not too many Right, well, I mean, I think it's it's uh, really where a lot of the research comes from actually There's this thing called the mystical experience, right? And there's a mystical experience questionnaire that in the research that you can sort of measure how mystical was your experience with this But we know what what we do find and i'm borrowing this from rolling Griffiths Who's the you know, probably the one of the the most important figures in the psychedelic renaissance You know, he he says and repeatedly in all of his talks that in those early studies and still today What they find is that people who have Robust psychedelic experiences will rate that experience In the same area as the birth of their child as the loss of a loved one Of any other sort of significant life life event that is life changing. So to actually take a drug One time and to have it rank as one of the most important top five most important experiences of your life Is pretty significant And so that's what people report when you have an optimal psychedelic experience and they're using the right Mindset in the right setting with the right support systems You can really produce a profound life changing experience where someone is all of a sudden opened up to all kinds of new perspectives And a willingness to be more curious about their life about their death to face death more peacefully To face their troubles more peacefully to to learn to look at their alcohol use or drug use differently So that maybe it seems less appealing because they had this Really deep profound philosophical mystical mystical experience under the influence of psychedelics So that that's the ballpark of what people are saying is so therapeutic or or potentially life Positively life changing about these experiences. It's like having that sort of that new perspective opened up You're being disrupted from your usual Ruminative, you know habit loops and your thinking and your behaviors and that's blown out of the water and all of a sudden You come back and you're like wow I feel different. I'm thinking about myself and the world differently. It's very significant I'm going to break the fourth wall for a second Kevin We I blew it and went over time already So we just extend it and relax or is it to can we wrap up? Okay, or if we're going to extend I'm gonna we're gonna kick back and talk about this for a second. Um That so the way you describe it. It's easy to mistake that for something mystical happening It's something awe inspiring that's happening. But um, the way I think about psychedelics and um, I've experimented And that benefit that you get from it It's not different to me Rationally than something like a cognitive behavioral therapy or some way of thinking about a problem or situation or an experience differently than I would have before What do you think about that? Is there something more profound and powerful about a psychedelic experience? Or is it a different means to the same end as you might get by changing your thinking any other way? I would say that I strongly believe that it's a different means to the same ends In other words, I agree with you a hundred percent that um, you don't have to take a Psychedelic drug to have an experience whether instantaneous or over a longer period of time a series of smaller experiences That either gradually or suddenly have a produce a profound shift in your consciousness the way of thinking about yourself Others the world the future that kind of stuff. So cognitive behavioral therapy other types of therapies. There's a lot of um Consciousness changing or consciousness raising activities that people can do that don't involve drugs certain types of meditation There's something called holotropic breathwork or breathwork exercises Kundalini dancing some yoga other dance processes So many different things out there that can produce these profound mystical experiences life changing experiences So I do believe even though I would say I am a psychedelic enthusiast And I'm proponent of them being used in healthy ways and certainly following the research But they're ultimately just a tool. They're just a tool among many tools and we have a lot of tools I don't think one is necessarily better than the other psychedelics do have certain benefits over others and Maybe some drawbacks compared to others. Can we trade stories for a minute? I'll tell mine first so you can figure out something in the queue to do I'm gonna tell you the most practical experience of somebody completely changing their thinking And it involves addiction and you may have heard me say it before write this down before Because I try to draw it out of I work with dr. Stanton peel and we do a we have an addiction program called the life process program And one of the examples we use about a values change is his uncle ozzy oscar was his name and he was uh I'm not going to tell this part yet. He smoked every day for some number of years 30 years 40 years or something like that And I mean like two packs a day had every reason in the world that you might think of To quit, you know, it was before the surgeon general's warning But it was people knew at this time that it was probably not good for you to be huffing in smoking tobacco smoke all day long Kids Grandkids in the house. He's always smoking around them. Um, he you know developed a cough and all these things It was definitely impairing his life in some way, but he never considered. Maybe I should quit He just no log, you know, I'll start just smoking. I'll keep smoking two packs a day um, he got to a juncture where He was paying they raised the price of cigarettes when he used to get them out of those machines And someone teased him. They said, uh, you know, there's ozzy. He's a sucker for the big tobacco industry and he quit then he Except somebody said so you're gonna toss that bag of cigarettes like well waste You know 10 cents or whatever it was so he smoked that back and then he quit never smoked a cigarette again And uh at age 90 or something stanton my colleague asked him remember when you used to smoke You know I used to smoke, you know, he's getting old and couldn't even remember it life changing experience The reason was he's a big union guy. It's kind of kind of a commie So the idea that when somebody just brought it to the fore That man you're a sucker for this big company He's like that's it and probably he had this thought had been percolating For a long time in some respect, you know how well you're a clinical psychologist What am I explaining to you but you know just for the masses that you know those thoughts can be Just drumming around in there and you don't know how to exercise them exactly so Distance will take hold you'll try to convince yourself that you know, maybe I shouldn't do this Or maybe I am doing the right thing. I think eventually That caught up with him and that one big statement thought I'm seeing this totally differently now I mean it wasn't a problem I think he'd felt like crap for a few days and then he just stopped smoking the rest of his life So that's a super practical example of something that I hear similar stories Where people expedite the process by doing something like a psychedelic experience. So I'm curious. I'm sure you have Uh, something some some experience that you know somebody has had You could tell well either related to psychedelics or not I'm thinking about addiction or just I guess not doesn't have to be addiction. Yes related to psychedelics and a time That you've witnessed experience or heard about researched about that somebody has made a profound life change or or experience change or belief system change I know the husband of a colleague of mine three years ago Did five m e o d m t which is a very very powerful Probably the most powerful psychedelic there is on the planet as far as we know so far And he was he had a problem with alcohol for 40 some years. He was in his early sixties He did five m e o d m t which is again to be doing that at that age and being relatively naive to say Recommended was Not recommended, but he did it and he hasn't drank since He had a profound experience with the five m e o d m t and he just stopped what do you say about? I mean what He just really he just realized that it mean something something crystallized for him that he realized through that experience That he was killing himself with alcohol and that it had no place in his life anymore So that was that was like Amazing to hear a non-psychedelic experience just to relate to uncle ozzy I had a patient years ago Who had a problem with cannabis and he was actually seeing me for his cannabis use disorder Some people don't believe you can develop a problem with cannabis how we covered that Yeah, but I do believe people do develop an unhealthy relationship with cannabis And this guy certainly did he was coming to me for help for that And at some point, you know, we'd been in working together weekly for you know, four or five months And it was causing real problems with this in his marriage And at one point I just spontaneously said, you know, let me just propose a scenario to you Um because what he would do is he'd often sit around At home and he loved his home life He loved cooking dinner and he loved sitting watching a cnn and that kind of stuff and I said to him Let me just propose a scenario to you What would you what what do you see yourself? What would you prefer? Would you rather be alone in the woods By yourself no family no wife With a big bag of weed you could smoke as much cannabis as you want Or would you rather be home happy with your wife? And you know, he he he sat there for a second. He's like and he started crying He said, you know what honestly the first thing that came to my mind Was to be alone in the woods with a bag of weed And that thought was like mortifying to him and he just stopped smoking weed After that he was like, oh my god, I can't believe I actually that was my first thought That that's what I really want is to be alone with a bag of weed and not have my wife and family and stuff And so he stopped I mean that was just an existential moment kind of like a sucker for the unions He was like he felt like he was a sucker for the cannabis and he was just like I don't want to do this anymore and he stopped using cannabis That's an interesting question to pose, you know somebody giving them a temporal context Obviously if somebody is addicted to cannabis and they're doing it despite whatever negative things are happening They value it in some way. They value something that is giving them So the fact that that was immediately on his mind Well, he didn't say no brainer the weed man, you know, but um, that's a that's a cool way to open up people's thinking Yeah, for someone else that might not have to produce the same effect, but for some reason for him it did Sure. Yeah, that's interesting. So with psychedelic assisted therapy Do you see that as someone's having Mind opening perhaps experience or a different way of thinking about things and then therapeutically You can ask a question like that and maybe perhaps are more open to answering it in a in a In an open-minded way Well, it's interesting because um, I would say that through my learning about psychedelics and psychedelic assisted psychotherapy the kind of therapy that uh, it is that in practice is a very non-directive non-linear non-interventional approach so someone's someone There were the where the research is designed. They come into a Living room like setting. It's comfortable. They put eye shades on they put headphones on There's two people sitting there next to them. They've ingested the drug they wait for the drug to start affecting them and The people who are there as the therapist are really just sitting there in case anything comes up to soothe them or to gently Just be present physically present with them but not be like so remember We were talking about your trauma when you were three years old. You know, how's that feeling right now? That's funny you say that because in my mind I wasn't thinking at all that like one of the options would be while you're tripping your face You know, someone's talking to you. I wasn't thinking that but I guess that does I mean I don't know. I don't know how it does work. So so there's a way of doing it that someone's guiding you if you need it Yeah, and so so you might work safety. Yeah, you might take your eye shades off You might take your headphones off and be like, you know, I just keep seeing this image of this this dragon with this tail and You know, he seems to be smiling and I just don't you know, but I'm feeling sad I just feel like crying and you know as a therapist. You're just like suck it up I don't know why I can't be serious right now. No, you just sit there and you're just like, you know, that's That's good. Are you you know, how are you doing? Okay? Yeah, okay And just let them process it. You're just present. You don't really say or do much other than you know, just yeah Be present with them. And then if if there's too much Distress then you try to soothe them. There's usually some consents around any kind of therapeutic touch that would be consensual There's protocol a lot of preparation goes into this a lot of preparation So you sort of foresee any potential problems that could come up or someone is just like Super talkative and they're like take the eye shades off and no music and I just want to chit chat blah blah blah and so as a therapist you might want to Gently redirect them back to the sort of doing the inner work because one of the things That a lot of people don't realize when they think about psychedelics is a lot of people associate psychedelic use with Concerts or campfires and hanging out with your friends and you know lots of colors and strange things happening And that's a very externalized experience and I think that's a valuable experience and it's recreational and fun or can be It can be very disturbing too, but you know, that's what a lot of people think of as psychedelics So when you take a psychedelic and you're blocking out all sensory inputs, right? They're not being distracted It's all this stuff inwardly coming into your mind and you you can't see anything and all your hearing is A playlist that may or may not be sort of more or less ambient noise coming through this gently melodic It's a very different experience and people just don't really once I say it out loud You're like, oh, of course, but people don't register that. You know, they just think of like psychedelics Oh, yeah, you just go hang out with your friends and take some acid or take some mushrooms and start laughing or whatever Yeah, it's caricature associated with yeah, we used to somebody I know used to and festivals or places that we'd go if The group was using psychedelics would always be one person who wasn't we called that person the catty The catty someone who understood it right and so it would be able to kind of nurture the experience for people and not You know knew the right thing to say that wouldn't you know explode their mind Especially because of all the sensory input. Do you know, man, I don't know. Is it blowing up anyone's spot to ask Are the therapists who you know who are interested in providing psychedelic assisted therapy Are they in tune with that feeling of taking psychedelics and what that feels like? Yeah, I think that that's an important question and actually that has been research There was a paper that came out recently There's been a lot of discussion around that in terms of all these training programs that are popping up all over the place Right, there's a lot of psychedelic assisted therapy training programs And that's one of the questions is like, how do you really? Assist people in psychedelic assisted therapy if you really don't know what that psychedelic experience is like and I think that really the the jury's still out on that largely I think there's consensus that to be truly empathic and to be Really present with people and to know the the territory that you're working in to have a psychedelic experience One or more is a good tool to have in your toolkit to be of real value and assistance But like we were saying before there's so many different ways to have non-ordinary states of consciousness Produced so, you know, it's not as though People who have never used a psychedelic but have had deep profound consciousness changing experiences through a near-death experience through Sweat lodge through breath work They know the landscape pretty well too and they can be present for people. So is it required? I don't think it's required There's consensus that it's a it's a valuable tool to have and certainly if we take ketamine as a model We haven't talked about ketamine at all but ketamine is a a legal psychedelic like drug It's a shorter acting kind of experience. It does produce changes of consciousness significant and a lot of the training programs employ an experiential component where someone has ketamine lozenge Experience or or an IM or IV ketamine experience as part of their training Um, I changed your thoughtfully worded title to a clickbaity one where it said, you know, psychedelic therapy coming to vermont big bold I guess I should ask then to to Make it actually work When is this coming to vermont? You know, when can we expect that we'll see something practical The practical use of psychedelics in vermont and if you were to make a guess Sorry for my compound questions, but if you were going to guess what will come first So we have legal ketamine and that seems to be increasing in its use For better for worse in different ways legal ketamine. I mean legal medicinally or legal legal medicinally Yeah, and also just there's like people prescribe ketamine online and you get a Ketamine delivered to your home and you take it at home. So it's it's pretty widespread access I'm more of a person who believes in the the therapeutic model of ketamine use So you're doing it in the context of psychotherapy not just dosing at home and you know Maybe talking to your therapist about it or not if you have one But so ketamine is legal. That's happening Uh, and the next up is mdma molly ecstasy mdma will be FDA approved and ready for prime time legal access I would say probably mid to late 2024 And do you think that one will be next because it's so much fun? I know I feel like I'm only half kidding. I mean there's like the the idea of mdma is um I think people think happiness, right? I mean, I don't know. I know that there I know that there's a societal understanding and like a legal conversation to be had If you were going to guess why in my experience, which is anecdotal People aren't scared like drug war scared of something like mdma Although I know that it's been part of the drug war and people. Yeah, I think mdma actually got a short shrift Back in the day in the in the late 90 late 80s I had a man I keep interrupting but I've had Emmanuel Sferios on the podcast before to who who went on From dance safe who started dance safe and he talked about how he went on 60 minutes and people were just it was just straw man after straw man just the segment He thought was supposed to be reporting harm reduction and what is mdma and why could people use it safely? It was why are you wrong, you know So so yeah, I know I know that it's it's been short changed to it's been short changed And and it is I do think the reason why it is first up in the queue is because a lot of work done by this organization called maps going back to the It's founded in 1986 And starting research in the late 90s or at least trying to get research going and then there's there's been a preponderance of research there at the end of their phase three Second phase three clinical trials, which have been the results have been released They haven't been published yet in a peer review journal But it's just the furthest along in the research process, which is a long arduous process and so they're right on the cusp of fda approval By the end of 2023 Early 2024 and then there's like a 90 day Lag of dea has to review the drug enforcement agency has to review a few things and give their stamp on it So I think it's not because it's so much fun Although mdma is considered to be the love drug and a very empathy producing Drug I've I've used plenty of it back in the day And and it does have that reputation But as a legal as a medicinal legal Drug to help treat post-traumatic stress disorder the results have been pretty significant And so that's why it's been fast-tracked and that's why we're going to see that one next and after that Well, like I said earlier it would be psilocybin But probably not till 2025 2026 at the earliest. Okay. Yeah, I can wait. Yeah, but Thank you so much for everything today. How can people find you do podcasts all the times? How can people find You talking about this stuff maybe in longer form than this and I know that because of the psychedelic society of vermont That's that's what it's called. Yeah, um, there are resources there and I know you have offered a summit before last year And I don't know if you'll be doing that again. Yeah, I said at the beginning. We're going to do a conference Yep, September 21st or 23rd in stowe. And yeah, you can find me on twitter You know, that's where we met many many many years ago place to meet. Yep. And uh, so I'm pretty active on twitter and The website this vermontpsychedelic.org And uh, yeah, you can google my name and find me and reach out and I'm happy to answer questions Cool rick. Thank you so much for being on. Yeah, it's good to be here. Thanks. Yeah, it's great Thanks for joining. We were talking to dr. Rick Barnett about psychedelic assisted therapy in vermont