 So, hey Charles. Hello Lauren. I wanted to get your thoughts about this exciting vote that happened in Denver yesterday, just an hour from where I'm sitting right now. Tell me about the vote. Yeah, tons of people are already aware of this, but for a little background, yesterday Denver became the first city in the US to vote to decriminalize solicited mushrooms. And the vote was close. I think it was like 51 to 49%. And so they're not legal. What this does is it basically prohibits the city government from using their resources to penalize adults over 21. For personal use or possession of psilocybin. And for a long time, this has been a schedule one drug, but more and more it's being pushed to be moved down to lower schedule or decriminalized or legalized. Right. So, you know, a lot of people think of, you know, decriminalizing as the first step toward broader legalization. I was just looking and in 2005, Denver was the first city in America to legalize. Or to decriminalize marijuana. And then like five, seven years later, now it's fully legal for recreational use and everything. So before I ask anything more specific, I'll just ask what you think about this. Actually, I'm only half joking. I think that the. Evolution that. The use of psilocybin mushrooms can be part of. I'm not saying that they necessarily are going to revolutionize your life or change your consciousness. But they are part of a healing process that changes the. Condition of the atoms of society, you know, the, the, the human beings that make up society. So I think it will have a bigger effect than just, you know, another way for people to have fun or something like that. The psilocybin mushrooms. You know, they're known for, I mean, I mean, there's a lot of reasons to take them off schedule one. Schedule one is for substances that have. No. Therapeutic. Use, which is pretty absurd for psilocybin mushrooms, because they can really help people heal from trauma. Get people off addiction. Help them with depression. I can't even remember all the, all the uses that they, they have therapeutically. And beyond that, you know, beyond. Treating people who are, are, you know, sick in some way. They're known to expand consciousness. Which is a term that I'm a little bit suspicious of. It's as if some people are more conscious than others because theirs has been expanded and other people's haven't. What I prefer to, to say is that they. Open up consciousness to things that most people in our society are not conscious of already. So there, they are kind of a therapy for the blind spots and like the, the conceptual and perceptual blind spots. That people in our society generally have. And it's not just a mental thing. It's also these blind spots correspond to states of being. That are often quite alien to our society. So it's a question of what do they help you become conscious of. And it could be conscious of the livingness of all things, the aliveness of the world, the play of synchronicity that, that touches our lives. That's ordinarily invisible. And that we become more aware of under the influence of these medicines. And so these. Therapeutic effects are bound to change society as we know it. Because society as we know it depends on a more limited state of consciousness and perception. That is the norm today. Yeah, what do you think the deeper indication for society is then for mushrooms being decriminalized? Or maybe what is it a signal of in society even? Yeah, it's a signal of society's readiness for these kinds of healing and these states of consciousness to, to come into the mainstream or for the mainstream to move to them. In a way, the drug warriors of past times, they were kind of right in a way that this would destroy society as we know it because they were so foreign to what society was. And now that that's really changed, I think that, that because maybe of decades of illicit psychedelic work, but also all of the other, all of the other things that are happening in the consciousness movement and, and the healing that people are going through, it's made society more ready for these things. So that so legalization or whatever decriminal, decriminalization. It's a signal that society as a whole is no longer holding these medicines and the transformations and states of being that accompany them in the realm of the abnormal. It's not excluding them anymore. It's not attempting to keep them out of reality anymore. So that's a significant barometer of a social change. It makes me part of why I wanted to ask you about it is because I feel like for a lot of people, mushrooms can give them like a direct experience of interbeing, which you talk about a lot and and you've mentioned like part of why you're able to write what you do about this new story is because you think it means that people are ready for it. Yeah. Yes, the story of interbeing. Yeah, mushrooms definitely can. Not saying that they always will. But for certain people who are are ready and at a point in their lives where where this transition is ripe. A powerful psychedelic experience will shift their perception of who they are. What a self is who am I and how do I relate to the other. The change can go that deep. And so it does. Catalyze transition out of the story of separation. I've been saying pretty much the same thing for a long time. And obviously I'm not the only one who's saying this kind of thing. But something's changed in the last few years were what I'm saying no longer seems so crazy. And it's no longer so marginal. Although at least on some days, I think that on other days, I feel like totally like an alien, you know, on the wrong planet. But I do think that there's more receptivity to the kinds of things I'm speaking to and speaking about. And it's related to the realizations that people have with psychedelic medicines. And my own work is informed by them to some extent. I can't say that that I'm, you know, a dedicated psychonaut. Or that I've been profoundly healed by them. But they are medicines and beings to whom I feel great gratitude. And reference. Yeah. Is there any particular direct experience you've had of mushrooms that you feel like sharing? Actually, I haven't had really super powerful experiences on mushrooms. It's not really my medicine. And I think that maybe someday we'll have a deeper understanding of which medicines are right for which people and which conditions of the soul they can be used to address to heal. And maybe there are people out there who really have these fine distinctions already in development. But I personally am no expert on it. All I know is that it's really not my medicine. But it's a beautiful medicine. And I can, I can recognize that. Sure. I haven't done this research myself, but I saw a Paul Stamets speak recently. And he said, We've never seen a drug with such profound therapeutic and medicinal benefits. For things like anxiety, depression and lots of other things that I'm not aware of or that we haven't researched yet. I mean, It's like supposedly zero chance of addiction and zero adverse effects. Yeah. It's pretty darn safe, you know, I mean, compared to say alcohol. Right. And they can't really overdose on it, you know. Right. How can something like that have be kept illegal and, and why do you think they were made illegal in the first place? Yeah. Well, obviously, obviously they're not kept illegal because they're actually dangerous. They're not actually dangerous. Except they are dangerous if you want to maintain a society based on scarcity, competition, exploitation, extraction and endless growth. If that is your premise that this kind of society is the right kind of society, then the states of consciousness that open, open up through psychedelics are, are anathema. They are incompatible with the maintenance of that system. So there's a very good reason that they were made illegal. The powers that be or that were intuitively recognized these things as a threat. So whatever addiction, you know, they conjured up various bug bears in order to justify the criminalization of these medicines. But obviously, like it doesn't take much research to understand that. That's not true. And, and, and they are powerful and not very dangerous. I mean, I think that they can be abused, you know, like any medicines can. But even if they're abused compared to, you know, opiates or, or amphetamines or alcohol, they're really not that damaging. Possibly even pharmaceutical medications. Right. Or pharmaceutical medications. And that's another reason, another way that they don't really fit into the, the matrix because even though that they're, they're powerfully therapeutic, there's very little money to be made in them compared to pharmaceuticals, which you can patent and, and. You know, you could make, you know, medicinal preparations out of, out of mushroom extracts and stuff like that. But, but the profit potential is not anything like they, it is for pharmaceuticals. So the drug companies, it's not that they're evil necessarily. Although sometimes I think they are. It's not that they're, they're evil and trying, and neglecting them. Normal, generally speaking, it's just like there's just no incentive for them to, to do the research. You know, and luckily there are, there are many idealistic people who really care about healing and who have done this research for years and decades, barely making, making a living. I mean, you know, financing the research at their own expense. Finally today, there's, there's, there's, there's no incentive for them to do the research. You know, to do the research. But basically they're using the medical support, the medical living. I mean, you know, Financing the research at their own expense. Finally today, they're starting to be recognized and received institutional support. And as that happens, and this is another, another aspect of the. Migration of these medicines to a mainstream or to a society that's ready for them. Now they're receiving institutional support and, and we're seeing. Evidence, scientifically verified evidence that. medicines. Oh yeah, and it's like just begun, like wildly behind times on researching these things. Yeah, I hope I hope it'll increase the amount of research that can be done, keep criminalizing it. Yeah, so you can't patent nature most of the time, although some companies try to. But apparently, you can criminalize it. Which I find curious, like, what do you think about this criminalization of nature in general? It's very arrogant. I mean, to say of a plant that you are illegal, or a fungus that you are illegal, get all part of nature illegal to subsume a greater into a lesser, like law is less than natural in nature. And we're trying to picture these these puny human constructs. It's it's really arrogant. Yeah, it's the audacity to even do that is also a sign of a certain mindset, the mindset of domination, and, and human exclusion from nature. And I'm glad that people are starting to wake up to the folly and arrogance of that. Mm hmm. And mushrooms in general, I mean, criminalizing nature in general, is a strange idea to me. But listening to people like Paul Stamets and Terrence McKenna, it seems more and more like mushrooms are super intelligent. Beyond what we might currently know. Like, I think he said six miles of mycelium are contained in like one inch of soil. Yeah, healthy soil is more complex than brain tissue, and uses a lot of the same signaling molecules. I think most if not all of the neurotransmitters are present in the mycelium that looks of soil. So it's not a poetic metaphor, or new age division, to think that these beings might actually be intelligent, or that soil might actually have consciousness. It's, it's, I mean, you can't prove it through by by saying, well, you know, the neurotransmitters are there, the complexities there, the, the nonlinear feedback, and so forth, you can't prove it that way. But it's not a rant delusion to think that it could be true. We just don't know. And I think it would be a good start to say we don't know. Rather than to say, Oh, yeah, we know we're the we're the soul consciousness around here. When people are experiencing the medicines, they often have an experience of interfacing with an intelligent being with a mysterious, grand magnificent being. It's a as much of a felt experience as the experience of, of interacting with a human being. And, and that moment where you realize that I'm not the only self here. It's only a psychopath who sees other beings as props in his own play, and has no conception of the beingness of others. So you could say that the dominant society, the dominant culture on earth is in that sense psychopathic by diminishing or negating the beingness of our relations that surround us on this earth. So the legalization or decriminalization of mushrooms, cannabis and, and hopefully more and more psychedelic plants and fungi. That is an indication that maybe we are stepping out of that psychopathic relationship to nature. Because it is, yeah, it's a step toward accepting our role as participants rather than dominators on this earth. Yeah. Paul famous has so many amazing things to say about it that almost suggests like that mushrooms, it's almost like they connect almost the entire planet earth, the mycelial network. Yeah. And the function mimics the brain. And even our direct descendants apparently, which I didn't know and didn't learn in school. Yeah, and imagine what happens when you when you fracture the the this connected continent with roads. The entire, I mean, I don't know, I might be exaggerating a little bit, but as far as I know, the entire continent east of the Mississippi was one mycelial mat. Or, you know, not many, like these are vast beings. And you could, yeah, say that the whole continent and to some extent the whole world, you know, these communications happen not only through mycelia, but also through aromatic chemicals, through the through bird songs, through whale songs, through electric electrical signals that go through plankton and stuff. I mean, there's all kinds of stuff that that leads me to think that this world is one gigantic connected brain. And now, and when we chop it up with roads, and mess up the electromagnetic communication with cell phone towers and other kinds of electromagnetic radiation. And when we destroy the the wildlife and the birds and the whales, then the planet becomes less able to communicate with itself. It's like its consciousness degrades. And then one result of that is going to be climate change. Because you can't maintain coherence anymore. This is something that's that's not really recognized in the dominant narrative of climate change, which is all of this, all about greenhouse gases. And the idea that we can continue our ways, as long as we go switch to a carbon neutral energy source, that just is, to me, it's just delusional. It ignores really the livingness of the planet and treats it as if it were just a machine. When we when we encompass the the complexity and the what looks to me like the consciousness of this earth, then we realize that the changes have to go a lot deeper than switching to a different fuel source. Yeah, that makes me think of a couple of the concerns that have come to mind since seeing this decriminalization. I'm curious if you're concerned at all about people taking a sacred magical plant medicine and turning it into an industrial, industrially produced commercial recreational drug. Yeah, I am a little concerned about that. That's happened with cannabis, you know, although that predates decriminalization. I mean, the indoor hydroponics grow operations have been going on for a while, you know, in fact, they were developed in the context of criminalization. So yeah, this is not to decriminalize mushrooms. That's just one step toward relating to earth in a sacred way. The mushrooms should be grown reverentially and and hopefully by many, many individual people in their own, you know, their own backyards. I mean, a lot of them grow wild anyway. And they should be harvested respectfully and, you know, not over harvested, and they should be grown and harvested in a way that is consistent with the message that they are bringing, which is the message of interbeing and the message that these are beings, you know, you don't just like grab them and use them indiscriminately. So maybe we still have. Yeah, so I think it is a concern that should be talked about so that we can connect the dots. So that so that the one dot of wow, it's all alive. I'm part of everything. The universe is sacred. That dot is connected to where did this medicine come from? How was it produced? How was it harvested? So yeah, it's an important conversation. Do you have any thoughts on how we can maintain the reverence for mushrooms as they become legalized as we become mainstream? I think those who understand that need to speak out and, and frame the beings, the mushrooms, in a way that helps people realize that. And to do that in a respectful way, not a condemnatory way. But it's a natural understanding that people I think are ready to step into. Yeah, I was wondering about it. My roommate and I were talking about it, because of course, here in Colorado, marijuana is totally legal. And it's weird, it's become difficult to even figure out like who grew this and how did they grow it and is it organic? And did the person grow it with love? Or is it just some like disgruntled person trying to make a living? Well, I mean, so this brings up the issue that gets obscured in a polarized debate, which is one of the main themes I've been talking about recently. In the case of cannabis, the what's being obscured is the issue of industrial agriculture versus ecological place based local agriculture. So anything grown industrially, whether it's beef in in feedlots or soybeans in gigantic monocultures, or cannabis in indoor hydroponic grow labs, like this is all an abuse of the earth. And I feel like it comes out in the in the medicine itself, when it's not treated well. You know, cannabis is very forgiving. It's a very loving plant, if you'll allow me to anthropomorphize cannabis. It's a very loving plant. It's called the kind herb right kind bud. So I think it's quite tolerant of the abuse we're putting on it. But I'm sure that that if you grow it in your garden and really take good care of it and do ceremonies around it, etc, etc, I bet you're going to have a much more potent, not necessarily in terms of how much THC it has, but you're going to have a much more helpful medicine. So yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah, is there a substance that you hope is next? In the domino seems like maybe we have a domino effect. That's begun. Yeah, it's not only natural substances, also some of the synthetic ones, like LSD, MDMA, they have powerful therapeutic uses as well. And, and their own particular flavor, their own particular way of shifting consciousness. So ultimately, you know, all of them should be and some of them maybe are more dangerous than others require more caution. There needs to be a culture of understanding around them and a culture of people, you know, who are are skilled at administering and facilitating the experiences so that the medicines can really reach their potential as aids to human development. You know, I'm not so I'm not saying everyone just go indiscriminately take whatever drug is available. Although a lot of people do that and still, even without the right set and setting and coaching and facilitation still have powerful healing experiences. But ideally we would have a culture around them and they would be treated with as much care as pharmaceutical medicines are today. They would be taken that seriously. It's like, wow, these are amazing medicines. Yeah, the opportunity to have a world of 7.5 billion people with access to all of the plant medicines and even like you said, synthetic medicine is available. That's quite an opportunity society has. Maybe quite a responsibility, even like you're saying. Yeah, I think those are those are most of the burning questions I have. Did you have anything else you wanted to share about? I think I've said most of what I want to say that I could also maybe there's maybe the intelligence in these substances is such that their their entry into legal, you know, mainstream society has wisdom in its timing that we may not understand that they made themselves available to just a few people on the fringes for a period. And then they became part of the counterculture for a period. And maybe that timing was just right. And now they're entering a new phase. And we can be grateful that that is happening and grateful that we have become ready for that to happen.