Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life Podcast. I hope everybody's having a beautiful day. I hope the sun is shining. I hope the birds are singing. I hope the wind is at your back. I've got a great show for everyone and just different all-around original thinkers. Aloha and welcome to a conversation that promises to weave together threads of science, philosophy, and the profound mystery of nature. Today, we're joined by Ali Jin Bash, a pioneer in the intersection of human consciousness and the enigmatic world of fungi and plants. With a deep root passion for psychedelic exploration, Ali has not only spoken at groundbreaking events like Breaking Convention and Product Earth, but also cultivated a community of curiosity and collaboration as the founder of the Fungi Consultant and head of mycology at Product Earth. a politics postgraduate with a focus on philosophy, mysticism, and critical thinking. Allie approaches the complexities of human experience with the precision of an analyst and the creativity of a musician. As the co-founder of the University of Kent Canterbury Psychedelic Society, now the longest-running student psychedelic society in the UK, he has helped catalyze a movement of open inquiry and connection. even hosting the inaugural breaking convention conference in twenty eleven. All these fascination with mycelium is no mere metaphor. He embodies his principles of interconnection and resource sharing, bridging diverse perspectives to inspire collaboration and empowerment. Whether he's exploring the symbiotic relationship between humans and nature or harmonizing the realms of politics and mysticism, Ali brings a rare blend of analytical rigor and creative innovation to every endeavor. And I'm so stoked you're here, Ali. How are you today? I'm good. Thank you, George. That's a great introduction. Thank you so much for that. Yeah, I'm doing great. It's... It's the end of the day nearly in the UK, but the sun has been shining, which is a rarity, especially at this time of the year. So it's been great. Yeah. How are you? I'm doing great, man. It's such an interesting time to be alive. Like I really feel like we're on the big engine here with revolution, whether it's psychedelics or just relationships seem to be changing in everyone's lives so fast these days, you know, I'm just seeing so much of it. I'm like, what comes to mind? Sorry, say that again. You broke up with just a little bit there when you asked that question. We're having a little technical there. I lost you there for a minute, Ollie. I'm sorry. Yeah, that's okay. Just what was the question you asked at the end? There we go. So the question is, with so much change going on right now, what are some things that you have been speaking about recently that are at the top of your mind? Yeah, I mean, it is a really fascinating time, particularly with... the way in which people are engaging with psychedelics the way in which people are talking about psychedelics as this healing modality which of course they are it's undeniable the importance of psychedelics being looked at in this way but what's on my mind at the moment is what seems to be a loss of the psychedelic counterculture, the stuff that for me personally got me really interested in psychedelics, the music, the art, the philosophy, the spirituality, that tends to feel like a bit of an afterthought at the moment. And I understand where society is moving. We're moving in this, I guess you could call it an accelerationist direction. place where we we want to figure everything out and you know I'm certainly that way when it comes to things like functional mushrooms I want to know what they're they're doing for us but I think with psychedelics it's all quite it's all still quite new I guess in in terms of the resurgence it's still quite new and I wonder if there's bit of energy that's rushing ahead because we're in this accelerationist mindset and people often talk in ways where it's axiomatic we must do this we have to do this because of this problem we have to further access for psychedelic therapy and everyone just says yes and you know overwhelmingly everyone is in support of that. And then I find myself being a little bit hesitant and uneasy. I don't know if it's sort of, you could call it neurodivergent thinking, but there's something there which wants me to just rein things back a little bit and still stay in touch with the threads of that psychedelic counterculture that doesn't necessarily rush ahead in the trying to like fix ourselves there's certainly a lot of that from the the sixties and seventies about changing the world and the social change but I think that's quite different to hey we've got a mental health problem and we have something we have the solution we're going to fix it I don't know if it's necessarily that straightforward It's brilliant. And I agree with so much of what you're saying. I kind of feel on some level, people are really worried about the Implications of an anti-war movement. People are really worried about a subculture breaking out and ruining it for everybody else, whoever everybody else is. And I'll just define everybody else as like the medical container, the therapy container, sort of the old guard that saw things happen last time and were like, listen. Listen, man, we can't have people out there saying to put this in the water. It's a horrible idea. They're afraid of this sort of same thing happening. But the positive thing I think about that, Ollie, that is the point which forces those radical shifts to happen. As soon as someone's like, you can't do that. Watch out because I think it starts bringing people to the forefront. Like this is ridiculous. Like who cares about the medical container? We've been talking about that for like the last two years. Like what about all these other, what about everybody else? What about optimization? What about education? What about finding new ways to develop the soul in ways that makes everyone brighter, man? I see it on the cusp, man. Do you think that maybe this little groundswell that we're seeing, I know that you have been talking a lot about, is on the way? Like, what are your thoughts? Yeah, I mean, it's a really interesting point about the medical container that we've had it for a while. And that is important. You know, I'm not here denying the medical benefits and the need to create that legitimacy, you know, with the psychedelic society at Kent University, it was very scientifically driven, it was at a time, you know, two thousand and nine, two thousand and ten, where we couldn't necessarily talk about this stuff as freely as we can now. So then we use that medical container. And I don't mean use that in a kind of a negative way, but it was it was very useful. You know, we we helped support the people that were doing research. We provided a platform for people to present their data. And in doing so, that helped to legitimize our use of psychedelics in a cultural sense, not because we were going around and saying, hey, don't worry, you know, we're all out here fixing our trauma in the woods. It was more in the sense of, well, actually, I'm OK, you know, being out in the forest taking mushrooms because they are also being legitimized by scientists. And it felt like something of a complementary thing. way and I I do believe it was and now I guess it's kind of turned into that you know pharmaceutical industrial complex where there always needs to be a solution for the ills that we've got and there's clever marketing and it's I mean it's gone totally bigger than I ever thought it could and that's important for people who have no engagement with psychedelics And I'm seeing interesting things happening in a cultural sense because I really appreciate what you're saying. I also see something slightly odd happening where there are certain figures within the psychedelic space who are rehashing this need for a cultural container and saying hey we need to shift away from the medical side of things and create this cultural container and then me as a musician who you know, my interest in psychedelics was through being raised on music in the sixties and seventies. You know, my, my dad is in his late seventies. I was raised on that music, which was very drug fueled. And I was like, you know, I grew up watching videos of Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock while he's tripping and like setting his guitar on fire. So for me, that was that direct line of, okay, you know, I want to experience what, what this is all about. And that stuff really does exist still. There's a lineage of all that music that hasn't been broken. There's still that generation of people. They're still alive. Some of them are quite old, but they're still going. A lot of them are still playing music into their eighties. So we don't necessarily need these things in this cultural container sense where it is, you know, creating a new way of thinking about things or creating something that hasn't necessarily been around before you know it's like people talk about making sense of the world using psychedelics and you know my way of thinking is that hey we already make sense of it because we We have this connection in an artistic sense, in a creative sense, in a spiritual sense that doesn't necessarily rely on someone telling us what to do. It's not this thing that we're waiting for. We have this eminent experience that we engage with. We have this, it's like a direct line to the divine, I think. Yeah. love it a direct line to the divine like it's such a beautiful way to put it and I and I I agree too I you know the antecedents of music and the cultural rebellion like they'll never go away they'll always be there to inspire everyone and it's so beautiful because I think it gives everyone a it gives everyone sort of a fair opportunity to participate you know it like maybe that's because we're the money is maybe the money right now is in the medical container There are lots of people that are finding ways with certification or testing. There's these ways in which I'm not aware of in the last phase. There's all these microdosing certifications and people learning these different things. And I'm not against that. I think there's a place for all of that. But it does sort of muddy the waters when you're having... huge amounts of people becoming like micro dosing coaches. You know, I, I don't, I'll probably get a lot of hate for that, but I, I don't, I don't know that you need to have a micro dosing coach for like a long period of time. You know, maybe there's a place for everybody, but am I being too hard on, on the, the industry with coaching and certification? I mean, I don't know if you are, you bring up some really interesting points because You know, it's like we... Like, yes, you know, it's difficult. There's seven billion people in the world, right? So there's like, there's always going to be something. There's always going to be something for everything. And, you know, I have, I've spoken to my friend, Robert Forty, who is, you should definitely get him on your podcast. He's one of the unsung heroes, unsung heroes of the psychedelic space. And he actually taught Jim Fadiman the microdosing protocols kind of in the seventies, right? So this stuff is amazing. is really useful you know taking these sub perceptive doses sub psychedelic doses of psychedelics can be really useful for managing different mental health problems and also inspiring creativity being able to help you engage in your relationships more effectively you know I've personally had some really interesting experiences and some good benefit from microdosing but Yeah, the idea of a protocol, the idea of training to be a microdosing coach. And the thing is, this for me is the thing, and it does get into the place of feeling like a gatekeeper. But there's something about it where I'm like, okay, everyone I know who's been in the space for a long time, what I would call a head, especially the people I speak to who've been part of the UK rave scene, people who are maybe, I would say, fifteen to twenty years older than me. If I speak to them about these ideas of microdosing certification, there is a bit of eye rolling because they had this community where they could ask people hey how much should I do well if you want to have this kind of experience you can take a little bit or you can have this kind of experience where you you take a bit more so yeah I don't know I don't the people I see becoming microdosing coaches haven't necessarily been in the space for a long time and I think what gets me is when I see certain microdosing coaches who have big followings on social media essentially pontificating and then and they're saying interesting things they're saying important stuff but then if you try to engage with it there's no response there's no response with any of the comments it's just like they're set up in this space where they're not necessarily doing anything too extreme. So they're not really going to be challenged. Everyone's kind of agreed. Oh, yeah, microdosing is good for you. Yeah, it helps depression. And then you go, yeah, I'm going to train to be a microdosing coach. And everyone goes, brilliant. And then you can say stuff which... to people who've been around for a while might seem quite obvious but to people who are brand new to the space who will be just dipping their toes in the water and so microdosing is more appealing to the people who are new they will be more marketable because you're you're like oh wow I you know this thing that I've never heard of and then if you come in and and say hey you know there's all this number of people this lineage of people that have been saying this stuff for a while you kind of come across as being a bit sour and you know I often think god maybe I should have moved to the us and trained to be a microdosing coach and I would have had a more straightforward idea of what my career was going to be but then but then it's like ah okay What are we microdosing for? Are we microdosing to be better employees in a system that doesn't really serve us? This idea of, yeah, you can microdose to essentially fit in. And what I understand really is that everything surrounding mental health, a lot of it is coming from the systems that we're in that don't really line up with where we are as humans you know our brains are still set to two hundred thousand years ago and then we've got all these concepts like having a job and having a podcast and being on a computer and you know there's things which aren't necessarily lining up and we we've got to play catch up quite quickly so then okay do we engage in this biohacking, you know, that has all these negative connotations because it implies that you're essentially trying to get ahead of someone else. But actually, hey, I mean, someone like myself, I have a diagnosis of fibromyalgia. I do a lot of biohacking. Every day I'm taking something different, you know, different kinds of functional mushrooms, microdosing, cacti, mushrooms, whatever. Anything that I find that can be a useful tool, brilliant. Let's work with it. So Yeah, but that for me has an interesting balance to it because I don't just want to function. I don't just want to fit in. I want to be able to thrive in a way which is benefiting the soul. So, yeah, I don't know. I worry that the psychedelic renaissance has just become a bit... a bit lame to be, to be, there's so much. Yeah. What? I mean, you just think about the word Renaissance, you know, like I don't, or, or it seems to me when cultures get in trouble, they look back to a time when things were flourishing. And I don't think that these small incremental steps of like, okay, um, Um, take this little tiny dose right here and you'll see colors a little bit brighter. Like, I don't think that that is what's going to cure the ailments that we need, but I do think that if you take, this is maybe irresponsible, but I'm going to say it. I think if you were, if you're functioning well and you want to get a big dose of what the fuck is wrong with you, you need a big dose of mushrooms. You need a big dose of psychedelics to really sit back and Maybe it's seven hours. Maybe it's eight hours of, you know, obviously you're going to be in a safe place, but you will figure out what the hell is going on, what you don't like, some things about you that you need to change. And a microdose is not going to do that. Like a microdose is going to be sort of like. brave new world versus the island. You know what I mean by that? Like it's, it's in some ways, micro dosing is like a dissociate. Like it's, it's a little bit like a dissociate. If you take a little bit, you get a little disassociated. If you take a bigger dose, the scales are ripped off and you're like, Oh shit, I got to fix some things. Does that, what do you think? Yeah, I mean, that's really interesting. You know, it's stuff that I've spoken about a lot with people like this idea of the Huxley Soma. And, you know, maybe I am being impatient and this is like the hump that we're on before we... you know this is like where the the I don't know what you call it the stuff starts to happen that the soup needs to get churned up before we can actually get to that point where it's integrated and we can be a peaceful society because it all feels like something's not quite right okay well hang on we've had this further access to psychedelic therapies and supposedly we're you know, we're alleviating a lot of trauma from veterans, but at the same time, we're not alleviating the root causes of that trauma when no one is apart from you. And I mean, we're genuinely talking a handful of people in the psychedelic space talking about anti-war and, you know, it gets to the point. I speak to people who are a lot older than me, you know, people that are kind of twice my age and they say, yeah, you know, I was anti-war in the sixties and seventies and yeah, Yeah, now I just kind of realised that was a bit idealist. And I guess they're comfortable now. You know, my dad was one of these people. He's got a bit of a comfortable life now. And there is that thing, I guess, of people running out of steam. But to me, you know, these... big doses of psychedelics that I've had and also a lot of bad trips. I think it's actually important. And I do think there are such things as bad trips and they are bad. And I won't say, well, they're bad and they taught me something, therefore they're good. I think categorically I've had bad negative experiences and that's okay. And there is some use in that because that feeling of being sat in that negativity I remember I remember being on acid and it was like a really long trip we've taken quite a lot and we were down in like the sort of basement of someone's house and they put on forest gump and there was you know the scene in forest gump when they're in the vietnam war and uh you know the sound of the guns like really shocked me I was really viscerally caught by that feeling of Fucking hell, what are we doing? This is this is absolutely bizarre. And then, you know, I come back not even to the quote unquote normie world, but just the psychedelic world. And it feels a bit like I'm in an insane asylum where I'm shouting. know come on guys what are we doing and meanwhile everyone else it's like they've had the soma everyone's got their and maybe it's because I'm not necessarily in as comfortable position as other people you know I haven't set up a retreat center I'm not a qualified psychedelic integration coach I'm I'm not I'm not doing these things that you see this kind of life on instagram where It's like the really easily accessible psychedelics. You know, for me, my engagement in psychedelics, it wasn't easy to access. You know, I remember pulling my hair out, you know, when I was like twenty one one day when we thought we were going to get some acid and it just totally flopped and didn't happen. And I was furious. And now it's like, you know, yeah, people can just go on a retreat. If you've got enough money, you can you can go and do these things. So it's almost like. People talk about psychedelics as being a quick fix to that spiritual path, that journey. But actually, there's a lot involved in talking to people, in fostering that community, in being able to acquire the tools to get to that point. You actually need to be initiated. So I wonder if we've lost that with the easy access, the microdosing coaches, this kind of brave new world type thing that I sort of want to deny, but I see it happening a lot where I more and more feel like the turd in the punch bowl. Events and conversations when I bring up stuff and the response that I get overwhelmingly is one of like, can you not make this conversation uncomfortable, please? Because we're trying to follow a particular narrative and we're all... You know, on LinkedIn, for example, You can't say anything even remotely critical because the whole narrative of LinkedIn is bigging everyone up, which is great. And don't get me wrong, I really cherish the support, but I don't know how natural it is. Some of us do have disagreements about this stuff and it's okay. But there seems like there's been a glazing over of like, no, no, come on. We've all got to support Rick Doblin and Maps and we've all got to support, you know, Compass Park. We've all got to just, hey, come on. We're all in agreement that we want to get access. So we just got to do it in this way. And yeah, I don't know. That was a bit of a rant, but. it's beautiful you know I I submitted some stuff about anti-war for psychedelic science and I I spoke to some veterans some close friends of mine and the here's here's my thoughts like There's a lot of military industrial complex supporting the entire psychedelic movement. And I know you have brought this up. When you peel back the onion a little bit, you start thinking about the Veterans Administration. Well, who pays the Veterans Administration? Well, that money is coming from the government. And do they really want you as a veteran talking about, hey, man – You know, those fucked up part about war is killing all these people. And then I got to live with that forever. How about we just give you some of these mushrooms and you talk about you're getting better. That's a way better narrative for people that are making tons of money off a lifestyle that no longer serves us. They're connected all there. And you're right there. There's no no one wants to rock that boat like, hey, just shut up about that. That kind of got us in trouble last time. We don't want these guys to shut us down. And there's lots of funding coming from here. And I see that aspect of it, you know, and it's but I don't think there's any legs to a revolution when the narrative is controlled. And I think that that is what's happening on a large scale. You know, and I don't know how to mitigate it. I don't know what's right or wrong. And it's I don't I don't know that that anybody else really does either. But I don't think you can really. doesn't seem to be a whole lot of push to solve the actual problems and when I say that it makes me think the psychedelic movement at times is a lot like the curing the symptoms not the cause and like that puts us right back where we were with with you know management of symptoms yeah you you bring up a really interesting point because I've I've been You know, what I've been looking into with functional mushrooms and this idea of functional medicine and preventative medicine, it's totally backwards with psychedelics. It's like we're still engaging in this allopathic mentality of, well, we're sort of powerless against all of this stuff, all of these reasons why we're in this sick place. It's too big of a problem. And actually what we've got is this solution. And I think people are so indoctrinated into that mentality when it comes to health that it bleeds out into the wider societal issues. And it is crazy, you know, seven billion people. How do you manage that? How do you manage geopolitical systems and multinational corporations and just these crazy intersections that you can't even begin to unravel that have been in place for however long aren't really even based on anything. It's like all this war is backed on debt and funneling of money from the drug war. And this is a big thing that it's not spoken about. It's like, hey, why do all these wars happen? Well, it's mostly because drugs are illegal and we help to control stuff by then selling it and funneling it back in to then have more control. And it's just this weird sycophantic. It doesn't actually make any sense. So I understand that. why it is that we can't engage with it I mean it's great to hear that you've submitted something for psychedelic science um based on anti-war and you know I was quite concerned last year when I saw South by Southwest being sponsored by the US Army and I think it was Raytheon so it's like You know, sometimes, I mean, you know, I've done a lot of, you know, my research into comedy and humor. And I'm like, this is amazing material for sketches. But it's actually quite, you know, it's almost like people don't want to go there. The psychedelic satirists, they don't want to go there. to this point of talking about the really dark stuff, you know, for me, my, my hero in that my comedic psychedelic hero, Bill Hicks, who I wrote my master's thesis on so much, you know, I was starting watching him when I was. And so much of that was about war and it was so dark, but so funny. And he didn't necessarily have anything to lose. He didn't, have a seat at the table that he was worried about losing. And I worry that there's people in the space that afford the benefits of having a seat at the table, afford the benefits of being invited to lots of events and having prominence, whilst also being able to poke fun. And I worry that that becomes a bit court jester like you know you're you're allowed to joke about these things and talk about these things and make fun of these things but don't go to the point where you're going to upset our investors you know it's and I feel like I should just just to be able to say it's weird I'm like I'm not saying anything else other than hey like hey isn't it weird that Peter Thiel, who has loads of shares in Palantir, who are like this awful military company, security company. Isn't it weird that he's also a major shareholder in Compass Pathways? Isn't it weird that Christian Angermeyer, the former... advisor to Paul Kagame, the current dictator of Rwanda. He's the CEO of Altai Life Sciences and talking about making the being the leader in the psychedelic space. Isn't that a bit weird? That's what I like to do in general, is just kind of look at two things and go, That's what do you think of that? And often people just look at me like I'm a bit crazy and other people stop and go, oh, I'd never really thought of that because everyone rushes. It's like we defer. We've deferred the psychedelic spirituality to the. the tech bros, the billionaires. It's like billionaires used to... I was watching a podcast recently, a comedy podcast, and they were talking about the spat between Elon Musk and Sam Altman. And they were like, remember back in the day when billionaires would just silently kill someone and not be on Twitter being all cringy and weird? And... I sort of feel like that. It's like, do we really need these guys on Twitter waxing lyrical about psychedelics? Do we need this level of engagement and interest? It all seems a bit full on and creepy, I think. Man, so many great points in there. On the topic of Palantir, I recently saw they had... there was a viral clip that kind of went around and it was, I think the guy's name is Alex Karp. He's the CEO. And for his meeting, he just came out and he was like, you know what? We're crushing it. We are a technology company and sometimes we got to kill people. I was like, whoa, listen to this guy. This doc shoots up through the roof. I'm like, whoa, it is amazing to think like, okay, let me throw this one out, Jolly. I was talking to Josh Hardman the other night. Oh, yeah. And here's kind of what I see on the horizon that I see echoing. And I might be way off, but I think it's close. It seems like an echo to me. If you look at Trump kind of coming in and you look at his background, like I think his brother-in-law or his brother was an alcoholic and died from drugs. So Trump hates drugs. He's said it publicly multiple times before. He was at a meeting yesterday. where he was talking about, he says, you know, I think the United States is ready to give the death penalty to drug dealers. And I'm thinking to myself, what an incredible statement to think about. And it makes me think there was so many sort of elitist, psychedelic members that kind of were on the bandwagon for Trump. And Trump kind of seems like Nixon with all of this sort of banter about drug dealers and stuff like that. that you know we've already had some kind of botched trials like it's beginning to look a lot like the point in time where you know they tried to put the genie back in the bottle I think like we're one jonestown away we're one mk ultra lunatic away from this thing being Package back up and put back in the lab. And that is when you see the creativity just explode. You see the music come out. You see all these billionaires that are pissed off and they start funding counterculture movements. I think we're on the horizon for that. At least an echo of it. Am I too crazy to see that maybe panning out? What's your thoughts? That's really... Yeah, that's fascinating. That would be an amazing thing to see if... you know, those of us artists and creative people and, you know, could, could get these billionaires on site to realize the creative potential. I mean, I hope it doesn't take, you know, another MK ultra casualty, uh, The whole Trump thing, Elon Musk, RFK, it's often a bit confusing. It does seem like there is a clear directive of the way in which these drugs are being used, very much in this therapeutic sense, very much in this controlled sense, very much deferring the authority to people who aren't necessarily in touch with the other sides of psychedelics, aren't necessarily in touch with ideas surrounding oneness or spirituality or philosophy or nature connectedness. You listen to RFK's views on israel and ukraine it's like he's not particularly anti-war he's he's pro you know he talks about his brother you know using ayahuasca so it's like they're pro psychedelics in this rational sense and it is this very it's like rationalist well okay, we don't want to have a situation on our hand where we have all our veterans killing themselves because if all our veterans killed themselves, then no one would go to war and people would really realize that war is bad. So we've got to make sure that we do our best to mitigate this trauma while still being able to enact atrocities. I know Republicans are marketing Trump as being a peacemaker, but again, it's a rationalist point of view. What's happening with Russia and Ukraine? Putin has just offered up Ukrainian and Russian minerals to the US. So it's very rationalist. Of course, yeah, let's not continue this war because it makes no sense to continue this war. It's got to the point where Ukraine can't win. So now we're taking a rationalist, you know, like John Mearsheim, a real politic point of view where like, yeah, the thing that makes sense is to start talking to the Russians. Have they got all these minerals? Great. You know, it's like we're seeing it's like real estate being bought up. I don't know if you've come across Curtis Yarvin. He's like a tech, ex-tech person, now philosopher. And a lot of these people on the right, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, they are subscribing to Curtis Yarvin's way of thinking, where essentially you run the country like a company, you have Donald Trump as the CEO. And that's why he's brought in these tech people to help him run it like a country where you do just make these rationalist decisions. So I don't I don't see you know, the psychedelic progression as necessarily being positive, I think it might ultimately funnel it down this place of control. And we're seeing I don't know enough about the laws in the US because it's often the state laws can get a bit confusing. But it seems like there's genies trying to be put back in the bottle in places like Oregon, where things necessarily haven't quite worked out well. you know, we might need to reframe how we engage with psychedelics. But I think leaving it up to the government is bad news. You know, we're seeing it, you know, the UK, it's disastrous. And at least you guys have some access, in a limited sense in, you know, certain states. But yeah, it just seems really messy at the moment. Yeah, I think it's right on point. You know, if you if you're going to run your government like a Fortune five hundred business where people are numbers, then you're just going to look at it from that perspective. You know, when you're going to you're going to look at it like, well, we can't centralize psychedelics. So let's fucking put them back. We can't get our arms around it. We don't have a supply chain. Plus, we got these guys called the ATF. They don't want any part of it. They already have a drug trade. Why do they need these new kids on the block? Get these kids out of here. But for me, with the glimmer of hope, it seems to me there's two sides. You've got the Republicans and Democrats. But the Democrats, this is such an opportunity for these people. They could take psychedelics right out of the hands of the right right now. If you look back to the way in which I forgot the name of the house that like back in the sixties, all of these incredible artists up by Woodstock, they stayed in this giant house. It was provided to them by a billionaire and they had all this creative, they had Ram Dass and Casey and all these people were there coming up with how to create a radical movement. And you look at the left in the, in the United States, there is zero momentum. If you are on the left and you're in politics, grab hold of that psychedelic lever right now and start sponsoring the counterculture. Like, That is where these people are going to find a way to break loose. They're just wandering around aimlessly. But psychedelics is like... psychedelics is like the most beautiful person room. Like, Hey, I'm over here. Hey, look at me. Hey, check out this, you know? And there, I think that there's so much potential there to really free up thought, to free up revolution and to have a movement happen. You know, and I, we're in desperate need of a real cultural movement to unify and to give vision towards the future and present something to the kids coming up. And there's some great, there's some great, um, uh chat in the chat I want to read a few here and get your opinion on this so we have uh alignment kk says on point linkedin psychedelic space feels like high school only the popular kids matter that's kind of funny it's funny I'm on there all the time so yeah I'm on there you know and I hey I wasn't a popular kid at high school and and that's what you know ironically that's uh that's what really attracted me to psychedelics was that i got to find my place with the weird kids. I finally found my tribe with the people that also didn't really fit in at school. And we found that like, you know, particularly the psychedelic humor, this shared sense of these novel experiences where you're cracking each other up on LSD or something. And it's this real bonding, this real feeling of like you've stumbled upon the magic. You give a little wink, little nudge to the other person. Yeah. And now I'm like, you know, what I find funny is when we set up the Kent Psychedelic Society and we had our stall at the Freshers' Fair, you know, popular kids would be coming up to the stall and looking at us like we were crazy. What do you mean, psychedelic society? You're all out in the woods smoking DMT or whatever it is, you know. We were like, no, no, doing things very seriously. And now it's like, hey, all the popular kids are like, wow, have you heard about microdosing? I'm like, oh, okay, right. what, what is there something that can kick off a movement? Like, are you familiar with the way revolution start or movement starts? It seems to me it's through music and art. Like there's a real big shift that can happen through subtle artwork. And I think of like Banksy or some of these street artists that go out there and they just, they put up these murals, they put up this artwork and it's, you know, murals with metaphors. And you, you know, I started to Thinking of like Diego Rivera and like how the art can really play a significant role in changing the hearts and minds of the people at the very bottom level. You're an artist. What are your thoughts? Absolutely. I mean, you really do make a good point with this because some people will dismiss the cultural societal shifts that can come from art. But I see it on a regular basis with artists. going to so many gigs, playing shows where I see this very real camaraderie and bonding through often shared experiences of having gone through quite difficult times. And I enjoy heavy music quite a lot, heavy metal. There's an interesting, there's a charity in the UK called Heavy Metal Therapy, which is based on the idea that, yeah, you're in this shared space where you're listening to music, which is quite a cathartic experience. But in that bonded state, you're actually able to both let go and feel that everything is actually all right. And I see it so much where people light up you know, when they come up to me at the end of a show and they compliment me on the music, that experience of being complimented, of being able to give that gift and then someone being able to give that gift of appreciation and then being, you know, it's like I played a festival in the summer where it was headlined by some of my favourite bands and it was unbelievable just to be watching music that I loved and then, you know, anticipating playing and having lots of experiences with people where you are in something of a spiritual state because you're in that elevated, connected place where it is almost like that oneness is really happening. And I do think we forget that. I think... The revolution can't necessarily come from everyone setting up their own retreats or being know number one at putting out content all the time or it becomes a bit exhaustive it becomes a bit like a conveyor belt okay what what are we doing what we're just getting more likes for the sake of likes putting out more content for the sake of it okay and then we get the adulation and and then what we have this adulation within a system which doesn't necessarily serve everyone or serve that oneness so I think you know art is Possibly the most powerful thing we have. There are some difficulties where, you know, the structural systems at play, like in the UK, it's... It's pretty much impossible. Being a musician and playing the type of music that I play, we don't make a living from it. There's not that kind of system in place. Everything is so expensive. The fees are so low. It costs so much to hire out venues. Small venues are closing every week. There's not the support from the government. So there's that stuff that you have to grapple with. But I think... in doing so, in carrying on with that, the communities that get made are really astounding and the joy that people have and the connections that people have. I would love to see something akin to the kind of sixties and seventies happen with more of a targeted focus. I genuinely think the sixties and seventies, my honest opinion, it got derailed by the CIA, I think it's pretty obvious. Timothy Leary, I've spoken to people who were personal friends with Tim, and it seemed that he was aware that he was being used by the CIA and turned around and basically wasn't going to be used, but unfortunately couldn't instigate that movement because it had been derailed. And I see articles coming out that say, was a recent one last year in the summer on rolling stone and it said you know the sixties and seventies derailed uh all hope of psychedelic therapy you know providing uh solutions that it was going to provide. You know, there is this sense that like, okay, we have to get away from the revolutionary side of things, because it's not useful. It's not useful to the aims that we're trying to achieve. But then it's like, well, who set these goals? Who set these aims of whatever it might be, you know, Rick Doblin talking about net zero trauma? Okay, well, where has that goal come from? Why is the goal not worldwide interconnectedness you know as we talk about these things in this uh I guess capitalist way but I do think you know I do agree with you I guess is what I'm trying to say that as as an artist and musician I see it happening all the time and you know the the difficulty is where there's as I said earlier there's not necessarily a whole lot of crossover there's people in the psychedelic creative spaces who aren't necessarily going along to these conferences you know the fact that you have a conference called psychedelic science might put some people off who aren't scientists um but you know you think about okay it's fifteen thousand people that's quite a lot of people for a conference but then in the grand scheme of the population of the united states it's nothing so I'm sure there's more artists out there that don't necessarily know about this whole bubble of psychedelic research that are doing psychedelic art that are engaging in these communities and maybe it's a sense of like having to find those communities that exist and bring them more into the forefront and get them involved and see what they think about what is going on. Stop deferring everything to the scientists and the researchers who are bleeding over into the cultural space and telling us, you know, it's like we've made them. I don't know what we've made them. It's like these kind of godlike figures where we're like, please tell us what to do. You know, we're just waiting. We're waiting for someone to tell us how to take drugs and listen to music properly to get the best experience. Please, I don't know how. You know, I'm like, okay, fair enough. You know, I get it. There's something for everyone. But I do question that kind of thing. People have been taking drugs and listening to music for thousands of years pretty efficiently. It's so true. It's so true. It makes me think that, you know, there's always... Like an insurgent on some level, whether it's, you know, inserting someone into a black block group or inserting someone into the psychedelic movement, because the narrative is so powerful, you know, and if we're starving for novelty, like we're starving. We're starving for novelty. We've made some of these people that are writing hypothetical papers on mechanism of action equivalent to Jimi Hendrix. There's no comparison there. Why is this person who's writing papers who's never worked in the real world at all, at all, at all? Why is that person so important? They're not. They're not. Listen to what they're saying. It's really not even that interesting. Oh, that's your theory? Oh, okay, cool. Awesome. Have you seen this guy play guitar? Have you seen what this guy's doing over here? Why is there so much? Because the only thing I can think of, Ollie, is that that's where the money's at. That's where the patent comes from. This is, this is a group of people in the back that say, Hey, here's a young kid. He's kind of cool. Let's put all the weight on this person. And then we'll not only will we get the drug out of it, but we'll control the narrative and we'll have a patent afterwards. It's, it's like putting in sync together instead of allowing some band to come up and find their own rhythm. It just seems, you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting that you mentioned that about the young people, because I mean, I'm not necessarily that young anymore. I'm not necessarily that old. I'm in my mid thirties. So I'm kind of in this, I'm in this midway point. And I see a lot of these rising young stars, which don't get me wrong. I think is great. And I champion, you know, there's the people that have taken over the Kent psychedelic society who are, You know, right. Nineteen, twenty years old. I'm sort of there as an elder to help them and suggest things and an oversight. And it is wonderful having that connection. But what I find interesting is, for example, you know, twenty one year olds who are just like come out of nowhere being propped up and they are these. rising stars and it's amazing and wonderful but also I think okay it's great to have that enthusiasm for the young people we need this younger generation coming in to help change things you know right there's been there's arguably you know generational issues with the psychedelic space with stuff to do with healing and war that might weed themselves out once a new generation comes in But actually, there's a lot of people in the space who are still alive that I consider to be elders that I, you know, have had, you know, I guess reverence for because they've been connected to people in this space who have done the groundbreaking research and, you know, put their necks on the line, so to speak, where maybe it wasn't so cool to talk about this stuff. And there are a lot of People I consider, you know, in their kind of seventies and eighties who might be unsung heroes who don't necessarily get enough press because they're old. And we do live in an ageist society, unfortunately, where it's like we are, you know, we've got the Forbes thirty under thirty. It's like that's that's an important thing to be, you know, under thirty years old. Because once you hit thirty years old, that means you start, you know, you're starting to get old now. And it's just a bit weird. You know, I'm like... this is a psychedelic space it's a magical space but where are the wizards and the witches and the hags and the crones everyone is so yeah it it feels like as you said this kind of you know it's so funny you're talking about it in terms of n sync because it does feel like there's just people that come out of nowhere and I'm like hey is this an industry plant You know, what's going on here? You're talking about things in a certain narrative that then dictates the way in which we engage with the substances themselves. yeah I couldn't agree more it it makes me feel like I do see some some cool threads out there you know for people who are interested for people who are interested I there's there's an easy way to hijack narratives and it's through art like if you take a like find an event going around and then create your own artwork around it like there's no reason why you can't Create the narrative and especially in the world of psychedelics, like that's what the psychedelic movement is about. It's about finding a new way to push the movement that is beneficial, not just for a handful of people, but for all the people. You know, it seems that creativity is not only inspired by psychedelics, but it's it's goes hand in hand with it. And I'm hopeful, I'm looking forward to this conference. I wanna meet a group of like-minded people and I wanna listen to people whose ideas are radically different than mine. And I wanna have incredible discussions with people I disagree with about what is this thing doing and what's that going on? And I think those are the most incredible spaces. And for everybody listening, if you're within the sound of my voice, I would love for you to join my campaign of creating a psychedelic science poster. Like there's no rules. But let me see some of the artwork. And this message goes out to not only the artists out there that may have a degree or the graphic designers. I want all you to design. But all the kids out there, all the older guys, everybody out there, I want to see what your idea of a psychedelic poster looks like. Create the poster, write psychedelic science, twenty twenty five on it. Send it to me. I'll promote it to all my channels. Give you all the credit for it. Get you some exposure, hopefully. But I think that that's the kind of movement where we can begin to foster our own community. And it's it's it's campaigns within campaigns. So for everybody out there, it's an open invitation to you. you know how about how about bands coming and just playing on the side for a little bit you know I think there's all if we can treat these conferences sort of like a dead show I think we can sort of create the the charisma and create the creativity that comes out of it man is it is it too wild to think that we can have that kind of creativity explode out of these conferences No, I don't think so at all. And the thing I love about these conferences is often the times when I'm not in the talks, when I'm outside talking to people, engaging with people in these creative conversations, which are inspiring and give you this sense of community, but also this sense of empowerment, of feeling like, there is that tribe out there of people that want to do really interesting things with their writing or art or music or doing podcasting, having interesting conversations with people that just get the the juices flowing it's like hey this is what enlightenment is is all about from my perspective it's having these conversations it's asking people hey what do you mean and what's that and show me this and let me listen to that and let me play you this you know it's um that constant unfolding of human experience which is so delightful and keeps me forever in the creative space you know I've been a musician since I was five years old and I love it more than anything because it brings me that richness and that, that connection. And I think these places are real melting pots, you know, especially something like psychedelic science where you have so many people, but even breaking convention, which is happening in a couple of months, I think April. Yeah. There's one and a half thousand people, I think, which is, that's a small, that's a really small number of people for, uh, know a major event in the uk but for a psychedelic event it's massive so and and there's so many different people from different parts of the world that come together and I think irrespective of the wider narratives of pharmaceuticalization and corporatization which have existed you know forever and will probably persist for forever right there's these moments of creative spark that you find in these places where everyone is everyone is just on a buzz to be there and I think you know and don't be wrong there's a lot of people who are you know having a little microdose or two right yeah people are in that like elevated state there the the there's been like a few breaking convention conferences where I've had to like I had to just like go and take time on my own, not because the conversation's been overwhelming or anything, but because I'm just picking up on this crazy energetic field, this buzz of excitement that is like, wow, you know, and that is really exciting and really important to hold on to. And it keeps us reminded of that intrigue and I think it is a lot to do with like you know maybe inner child work finding that stuff that excites you that keeps that inner child alive and connected to the wonderment and enchantment you know I talk to people a lot about these ideas of re-enchanting the psychedelic space connecting with these people you know connecting with writers and other musicians and artists and poets and I'm I'm trying to always have these conversations and share people's art and champion Things where I see it and find ways to collaborate with people is really important in an artistic sense. You know, I love... you know, I really love playing shows with other bands that I really love and respect. You know, that just gives me so much joy to be like watching a band and be like, these guys are awesome. And, and we're playing the same show, like what? And it will be, you know, a tiny show where there's like whatever, a hundred people watching, but it's, it's, it's awesome. And yeah, the more that we do that, the more that we engage with the, the practical eminent side of things, you know, where things can emerge, you know, people coming together, you get these crazy things emerging that you didn't know could happen. And yeah, I think just more of it. I love it. On some ways, I think that it's conversations like this. You're talking about the band and the music you play and what it means to you and playing in front of shows. And you're also saying, look, I've been taking these particular drugs that help me with my creativity. There's not enough of that. There's not enough of people listening to that. I remember a long time ago, hearing like the bass player or the lead. I think it was the bass player come from Green Day. And there was this interview, like, how did you come up with this riff? And he's like, oh, I was slammed on like eight hundred mics of LSD. And it just came to me and it just came to me. I just played for like five hours, man. And I was like, there you go. Like some kid gets a hold of that and he's like, I'm going to do that. That's where it comes from. Like and it's just so interesting to see the contagiousness and the the sort of I'm reminded of the quote from Hunter Thompson, like, you don't find acid, acid finds you. Like, we need help. You know, we need help letting it find people. But let's talk about music, man. What you got? I mean, that I really like, you know, that whole thing of one of my favorite bits is just a little snippet from an interview with Black Sabbath. in the in the seventies and I think it's an australian interview and he's like what do you like to do in your spare time and then ozzy osbourne just goes oh mostly smoke a lot of marijuana you know and he's like you're not serious are you he's like yeah you know and and for me it was like black sabbath were man they were you know one of the first heavy metal bands rock bands that I got into when I was quite young and One of my favorite songs, Sweet Leaf, where it literally starts with the sound of Ozzy Osbourne taking a puff on a joint and then coughing. And it's a song in homage to this plant. And for me, particularly with the kind of metal that I was listening to, this breed of stoner metal, it is explicitly infused with songs about cannabis and also a lot of the psychedelic stuff. There's you can't escape it, you know. And a lot of these bands maybe weren't so explicit. You know, a lot of the more like the progressive rock bands, they were more about the kind of musicology and the weirdness and the fantasy and the fantastical side of things. But it was... you know, for me, you couldn't separate these two things at all. So I have, you know, as I said, that was my interest in psychedelics. That's what got me in was that the cultural side of it, but I didn't really understand it until I started to take psychedelics and play music. And for me, that creativity comes from essentially removing me, removing the I don't want to say ego because the ego is important in these states, right? I'm still me. playing music I still have to have a sense of ego right I play the saxophone I have to be within my physical shell and know that I'm playing with other musicians but it's this interplay of of ego and non-ego so I have to have just enough ego to get on stage to to be able to count keep in time do all these things that the ego needs to do but I need to have it reduced just enough so that everything can flow through me and I become a vessel for the music, which is out there, right? It's not coming from me. All of this stuff, the, whatever you want to call it, the architecture of music exists within physics and maths and all of this stuff. And then you bring it into the space. So for me, LSD was unbelievable. It, I think restructured the way in which I, perceive music from a, an experiential point of view. It's like I experienced music as this kind of three D space, almost like a structural space. And before I didn't really used to, it's like, I can feel myself moving through. I've entered into this realm. That's also, it's like a four dimensional space I'm in there, but it's also flowing through me. And I'm, it's like creating an interesting feedback or something where it, it, creates a flow state and then in that flow state when I'm jamming with other people you know I frequently will and I you know I'm very open with my bandmates about this and even my the the lead singer of my band will almost prescribe to me she'll be like ollie here's a little microdose of acid we need you to be on on point on point for this gig and it's astounding what happens because the the stage fright all that stuff just goes I'm like I'm locked in and that has come from many years of taking LSD and being quite comfortable with it and really enjoying it and enjoying the space that it puts me in. But that ability to not get in the way of myself and then be able to connect with other people in a way that just flows. And almost you sort of engage in this telepathic way of doing things where you become this omni mind right and you're all just in and you're locked in and and somehow you all come in at the same time you know when you're jamming you come in at the same time or it gets really heavy you're anticipating stuff at the same time you're all in the same space and yeah you know for me psychedelics have been amazing for that and my bandmates they don't necessarily dabble as much as me but they are all experienced in that sense I love man this should be like you and your band like I can see in my mind's eye right now like a write-up of you and your band and like double blind magazine or maybe dustin hawksworth fat nugs magazine like we need that like you can see the culture like I can I can see the culture happening like dude these new magazines coming up are sick like you got jack gorslin who's like he's like the new hunter thompson man the guy's just blasting stuff out, putting people on blast. That guy's amazing, man. I love that guy. He's writing for Double Blind, which is a cool magazine. You got Dustin Hawksworth's Fat Nugs magazine. These magazines are the Rolling Stones and the High Times of the next generation. And you can see the High Times and the Rolling Stones kind of falling away and these new magazines beginning to rise and the artists that are coming in there. Like, man ollie like I can see it like this I'm going to talk to those guys I I hope that it would be cool to have a featured artist in there right like that's my relationship with cannabis let's do that let's let's yeah that would be that would be epic because for me you know from a from a the psycho-spiritual perspective with with music but also from a physical perspective you know struggling with physical health conditions and like the ability for psychedelics to and and cannabis to put me in a state where I'm feeling empowered and safe with my body and feeling like, yeah, let's, let's do it. Let's go for it. Let's push myself. And let's, you know, finding the joy in the creative art has, it trumps the, Any physical pains or exhaustion or like, you know, going on tour is certainly not glamorous at all when you're a band of my level. But, you know, you get those forty, forty five minutes, an hour on stage playing a set and it's the best thing in the world. And all of that other stuff becomes worth it. So, you know, the psychedelics give me that like overall life appreciation. I think it speaks volumes to creativity as an act of healing. How many people out there be themselves? How many people have been blinded to this illusion of the race from the graveyard to the crematorium and you got to make as much money as possible? Where are the dreamers, man? I think psychedelics is such a gateway and a doorway to to creating the very best version of yourself. And so much of that comes from experiencing what you're capable of, whether it's music, whether it's singing, whether it's poetry, whether it's sculpting, whether it's being a plumber, whether it's being a welder, being a trucker, whatever it is, man, that kind of calls to you. I think taking some psychedelics will really help you create the very best version of yourself. And it's such a – I wish there was more of that. Like I want that out there for the young people to be like, okay, I'm an adult. I'm responsible enough to figure out how to use this in a way. Maybe some rituals, man. I've seen – there was a great interview with – Caesar from cultivating wisdom and Gary and they had Rick Doblin on and Rick Doblin was telling the story about how when his kids turned twelve he's like you know what I think you're ready for MDMA if you want to do it here's a responsible way to do it and I thought whoa I never heard that story before what a cool story and it takes me back to the book the island where they climb that rock face and they sit in that church and Hey, let's show you what you're capable of here. Is it, is it too much to think about? I know I'm kind of just blasting out here all in, but what is it, is it too much to think that we're ready to have kids at the age of twelve or fourteen have like a, a ritual experience with what's the mind is capable of? I'm not sure if I'd agree with Rick's desire to give his twelve-year-old kids MDMA. I think the issue is that we lack rites of passage in this society. I don't know whether instilling an MDMA rite of passage at twelve years old is necessarily going to be good because there's no cultural context to that there's no there's no um precedent for that so I I don't know you know I come from uh jewish society where I've had rites of passage which haven't necessarily been that positive but um you know uh it's a fascinating thing. These ideas of like, you know, young kids taking psychedelics, you know, I know people who have been ayahuasca shamans and they all reverence in, uh, and they've given their, their kids, their young kids, ayahuasca and their kids are super switched on, you know, really capable teenagers now. And, um, But there's been some cultural container for that ayahuasca. I don't know where the cultural container for MDMA is. I don't know. I don't know what the effect that would have, you know, having a parent who is the the authority on MDMA, then giving you MDMA and saying, this is going to be good for you. You know, can you make an informed decision at twelve years old surrounding psychedelics? Sometimes I wish I'd taken LSD when I was like fifteen because I probably would have been. Much cooler in in in high school, you know, and it's you know, it certainly really helped with that. It certainly helped me make me feel more at ease and I took MDMA, mushrooms. I think when I was nineteen, even nineteen or twenty, so not not necessarily that far off from twelve, but still, you know, I'd had life experiences. I'd been on I'd been on a gap year before university. I'd drunk loads of alcohol to the point where I never wanted to look at alcohol again. I'd been smoking weed from the age of like fourteen or something like that. So I, you know, I, I yearn for some sort of cultural container. I, it would have been nicer to not have had such traumatic psychedelic. I had some nasty psychedelic experiences early on and it would have been great to have not had them, but I had the experiences that I had and I don't know. I like to think I'm quite a nice person. People tend to get on well with me. I'm pretty peace-loving. I have a good relationship with my partner and my dad and my step-mom and my brother and sister and my cousins. Relatively close to family members compared to other people. Part of me thinks, hey, wouldn't it have been lovely if we'd have all had these experiences together and you know I'm sort of the black sheep in my family where you know other people in other members of my family haven't had these experiences and often it has created a bit of tension and and that's sad you know and there's often I guess there's that sadness there's that lack of connection there's that lack of shared story and hey maybe if we'd have all taken mushrooms when we were ten years old and connected to the local forest spirits we'd be more of a like I don't know cohesive family less disparate less separate lives but yeah I don't know there's certain cultures which certainly you know it's like if you didn't have that stuff the society would fall apart Yeah. You say the black sheep of your family. And my story echoes that as well. Maybe that is some sort of a cosmic ritual. When you start looking back at mythology, there's always the person that's kind of shunned or different or weird or even loved and revered. But then all of a sudden, they find themselves way over here on this side. And hey, man, don't talk to that guy. That guy's doing a lot of drugs, man. I got to cut that guy off. You know what I mean? Yeah. I know for me, being a podcaster and being open, I've gotten quite a bit of stigma with people, not only people in my family, but people in polite community. They're like, you talk about what? Oh, George, I listened to one of your podcasts. Are you okay? You need some help, man? I'm like, no, you guys might need some. That's why I'm doing it. Interesting. But is it a cosmic? Maybe it is a certain type of person that's been through some tragedy that's that's that thinks a little different that might be out there that's attracted to psychedelics. Maybe it's not for everybody. Maybe it's just for the people that it calls. Yeah, I mean, you you you raise a kind of critical point, I think, with the psychedelic stuff. You know, if you think about places like ancient Greece or the Eleusinian Mysteries. know people weren't people weren't from what I understand from speaking to scholars about this stuff people weren't talking a lot about drugs they weren't trying to get everyone on drugs they were reserving these experiences for certain people and you you know one could argue that that is elitist and gatekeeping but arguably if we have a society which is cohesive where it's not one that's based on competition but it's based on connection then ultimately you don't need to have everyone having that experience you know the role of the shaman is essentially that black sheep who can go out into the wilderness into the forest commune with the the spirits take that substance plant whatever it is and go deep and then bring back that knowledge and also take on a lot of the stuff from that tribe. You know, this is what I find with being the black sheep. It's like I often, you know, and I'm interestingly, I'm the youngest out of my brother and sister and I have quite a lot of older cousins. And for a while I was the youngest of the cousins as well. So I was always this. And even in my mid thirties, you know, still whatever these patterns coming up where I'm treated a bit like the youngest. Yeah. And there's a sense of, uh like taking on everyone else's stuff or getting the blame for things or always getting it wrong or whatever it is and actually realize okay well you know I've done a lot of living in you know my family's all from a particular part of london and a lot of those people live in the same kind of area and I've I've lived in australia I've done traveling I've been in other countries I i aren't not necessarily always kind of attached to that family dynamic. But when I have been in these places, it's felt like I've been on something of a quest to find out, okay, what is that magic? What is that deeper essence? And don't get me wrong, I try and bring that to people in my family and often it gets met with disdain, but I still keep doing it. And I wouldn't want to not do that. I wouldn't want to give up and go, Well, they're not interested. I mean, don't be wrong. There are a lot of moments where I'm like, well, they're never going to be interested, so I won't bother. But I think as well, just still like, hey, I've got family members following me on social media. So even just posting stuff up, even just it sparks a conversation. At first it became a bit uncomfortable where family members would say, oh, I've seen what you're posting about psychedelics, but actually doing that enabled, it was an icebreaker to say, yeah. They said, I've seen what you're posting about magic mushrooms and depression. Yeah, that's right. This is the research. And then in doing so, you can comfortably be that black sheep. You can comfortably say, yeah, don't worry. I'm going to go and find out this information and I'll bring it to you. And hopefully in however many years' time when the stigma's reduced, you will thank me for bringing you that information. And if you don't, then no harm, no foul. I'm not here to gain any points or have anyone say that I've saved them. My dad has Parkinson's. I got him on Lion's Mane coffee for a little while. He tried it. He said it was working, and then he stopped doing it. I'm like, all right. know there you go at least there's that at least you've tried it um but I'm not here to try and be the psychedelic savior I think that the black sheeps can lead by example really and and yeah I don't think I don't think everyone has to be on psychedelics I think it's a fallacy I think it's a fallacy to have to have the experience I think There's a caveat to that because you get a lot of people who are becoming authorities on the experience that have never had those experiences. But I do think, hey, as a society overall, can we have certain people who are these black sheep, shamanic type people to hold the space and what was called the road man in Native American culture, the person who stokes the fire, who makes sure that everything is in check. and then the rest of society can resonate from that. Yeah, it makes sense. It's, you know, I'm reminded of two quotes. One of which is being really early looks a lot like being really wrong. And, you know, if you've had these, it's a good one, right? Like, I think that's kind of with psychedelics, like for, for people that have been in, in, far beyond me. Like there's, I'm coming up on fifty and I've had a long relationship, but there's people that I think are younger and older that have much more knowledge than me in this area, but it does seem like, you know, telling people about how your psychedelic journey has found, how you found a way to see the world differently. It seems wrong to so many people, but maybe it's just early. Maybe the micro dosing is helping other people find a way to, to see reality different in the micro dosing and all this stuff can, can be like a Trojan horse that kind of just, you know, pops out at the middle of the night and starts inspiring people or something like that. But yeah, I know that's kind of a, an interesting tidbit right there, but do you, do you see your opinion? Do you see this? Yeah, I think we're still so early, you know, I've been having conversations with people about psychedelics who are outside the psychedelic space. And, you know, again, you know, just thinking about the numbers, it's like, okay, when you're in the bubble, um, fifteen thousand people at psychedelic science it's like wow and then you step outside the bubble you know none of my family members have heard of maps until until my brother and sister have have have heard of rick dublin and maps then it's still really new it's still really small you know until your your grandma is talking about MDMA and okay, there's this stuff happening in the US where you have more of that scope. But I still think, okay, if you go into like, I'm sure that's still within certain bubbles in American society. I'm sure if you were to go into like Middle America, how many people in the Appalachian Mountains have heard of Rick Dublin or like you go into these parts of the UK to like a village in north wales where they've still got their roofs made of slate and all this stuff you know it's like no one's heard of these people no one cares about this stuff but they might start to care when you know they encounter difficulties or want to enrich their lives in a psychedelic way but I still think we're so early but it is interesting how there are big players in the space really influential people in the space talking about this stuff which might seem like okay we're we're unable to recapture some of that enchantment but I still think there is that essence there and we're not we're not too far gone. I still, you know, going back to what I said about it kind of being like this soupy mess. I still think, I think we're in that state where we've got a lot of interest. There's a lot of hype. There's a lot of money come in. It's all happened really quickly, but actually there within all that noise and that chaos, there is that room to create something really solid, creative, artistic that has longevity. Is that, is that like, Is that a philosophy? Or maybe you could speak about your philosophy. It seems to me, sometimes when I look at the way mycelium grows, you can see, at first it just seems chaotic, like it's going everywhere. But it's really searching out the right paths in order for it to fruit at a certain place. It's looking to link up with other parts of itself so it can strengthen itself and then grow at a pace where it can consume the entire substrate. Do you think that maybe like, that's kind of what's happening with the people that find themselves taking a lot of mycelium or taking a lot of psychedelics? Or are we in fact like a fractal unit of it? Yeah. It's really interesting that you brought up, uh, the fractal unit. I was having a fascinating conversation yesterday with someone called jazz Razzle. Who's been doing some interesting research into, um, essentially the architecture of consciousness. And I'm speaking to my uncle as well, who's been doing research into something called post quantum mechanics, which is looking at these kind of nonlinear processes related to consciousness using fractal mathematics. And it seems like the actual architectural structure of consciousness might be working in line with fractal mathematics and so then you see how mycelium is growing in this fractal way you look at brain scans of people under the influence or you know with psilocybin and lion's mane combination it seems like it's growing these you know the dendrites at the end of your brain cells is growing in this fractal way it's it's mimicking you know it's showing us this very real kind of oneness but actually you know in understanding this fractal nature fractal nature we are able to engage with the you know it's like we understand the fractal nature of our architecture we are able to prime our bodies more to engage with the fractal nature of psychedelics mycelium this mycelial network which is working in a way which it's not like a top down hierarchical structure where we're telling people how to do things and fixing stuff. We're looking for where are the necessary resources? Where can things be best placed? Where is the energy directed in a way which is going to be efficient and supportive and not in this competitive way you know it's like the the brain is a network right the the networks don't I mean in some cases right they do compete and in people with with disorders they do compete but actually you know how the brain is working optimally it's these group of networks which are complementing each other and they're not competing and they're not trying to gain dominance they're talking and communicating and I'm sure you know working in this kind of mycelial fractal way seems I mean hey it's like the best structural pattern in nature every everything seems to use this fractal structural pattern so it seems pretty efficient it seems like a really efficient way to get uh information into these tiny spaces you know when my uncle was talking to me about the fractal mathematics of the brain it's like you've okay you've got a series of one to ten but then in between the one and the two you've got another series of one to ten and then in between that one and two in that series of one to ten you've got another series of one to ten it just keeps going so you can have all these information just like swirling in on itself and I picked up this uh book which is you know it's funny I just like thinking about this stuff and then I was in a thrift store and I found this book that was about the spiral in, you know, in all these different cultures, all these different, you know, pieces of artwork where the spiral has been drawn and looking at the concepts of the spiral in Kundalini and Taoism. And it's like there's something going on here. There's some there's like a very real. There's never been any more obvious signifier of what's going on. To me, it's the fractal. It's that spiral. It's that thing which I have been obsessed with. If I was to show you all my notes of doodling, I just have constant fractals of just doodling. It's like a weird obsession to draw it because there's something where you're returning and going back at the same time it's a feeding into itself and and going out so you're always in this state of just being open and also opening yourself to you know it's it's yeah for me that I'm just I'm all on the fractal stuff at the moment I love it man I can't help but think that particular imagery and those particular patterns are also what you see with the geometric imagery on like really large doses, whether sometimes eyes closed, sometimes eyes open, like you just see these mandalas or sometimes these, you know, three D geometrical images that are just spinning in place. And I'm like, dude, what is it? this is a language right here. And once you see it, you know, it's, it's, I think it must have something to do with the particular activating system. Like once you see it in a trip, like you can see it in other places. And I do think that it helps you further understand the Mandelbrot set or the fractal ideas. You know, I, I can't help but look at a map or a globe and see all the supply chains, all the, all the stuff is going and like, you know, like all the boat paths and all the flight patterns. And like, man, it looks a lot like a neural network. You know, is this how much of this was conscious? Like, this is just what we're doing. It's just, it's, it blows my mind to think about that. And then you start looking at the language, like, well, we have a, in the world, we have a right hemisphere and a left hemisphere. You know, you start thinking, understanding how the language fits in everything else, man. It's so crazy. Yeah, absolutely. It's astounding, isn't it? Mind blowing. You know, here's another one too, as, as someone like yourself who studied mycelium, I think there's lots of ways to engineer stuff too. There's that. Are you familiar with that experiment where they made like a mold of Japan and then put that subway? Yeah. Yeah. Can you tell people about that? Yeah, so that was an experiment done with a slime mold, which can act like... So it's not a fungus per se, but it can act like a mycelial network in the way that it grows. And they built a model of the Tokyo subway system with the stations all around. And then they put bits of grain... in the different stations as food. And then they placed the slime mold in the middle and the slime mold figured out the most efficient way to find the food. And so then the path that the slime mold made was then used as the model to make the Tokyo subway system. So I think these ways of looking at mycelium, mycelial interconnectedness, whether it comes to modeling physical systems or modeling organizational systems in the workplace or just say even in your your relationships and your family you know coming together what do we need let's have a think let's not just be in this like top-down didactic way of I'm telling you this is what you know and a lot of families are like that the dad or whoever it is I'm telling you this this is how it goes and and actually if you know you asked a mushroom how would a family work might say well you know we we'd see what people's strengths are and where they might be able to offer some input and we then would figure out the best course of action for everyone. And often, you know, in a business relationship, in family relationships, you know, in our intimate relationships, it's not always the best solution for everyone. It's often, you know, people think compromising means that someone has to lose out. Or it's like, well, we do your, you know, you're going to feel bad, but I'm going to feel good. And therefore... that evens out and it's like, how about we find a way where we can both benefit from this situation? How about we find a way that's win win? There really is that out there. And I think people have mistakenly thought that they need to get one over on people. And people like Donald Trump, he doesn't operate from this mycelial mindset. making sure that in order for something to be good someone else has to lose out so and I don't think mushrooms think that way I think mushrooms genuinely think what is the job that needs to be done okay is there I don't know has there been a forest fire brilliant okay we'll come and clean up all the ash has there been a radiation spill brilliant we'll come clear up the radiation is there loads of shit everywhere is there dead animals are there all these things that need processing brilliant we will get on board we'll you know help to create accessible nutrients for trees so that they can grow. And then in doing so, the trees are giving us, you know, these essential carbohydrates that we're going to then use to make enzymes to make sure that we're not getting eaten. So it's like, there's this relationship which is win-win and don't you know nature can be harsh and brutal but I don't think you know from my understanding of of mushrooms when you have competing species they don't try and out compete each other they try to see where the resources can be directed and I think the more in which we think about this stuff you know my my partner she works for a non-hierarchical organization It's a charity which provides resources for lots of different community groups in Brighton. All the different community groups are supported by this charity. And when they do things, when they decide things, it takes a long time, you know. And it can get frustrating, but they always come to the right decision because the right decision is always inevitably what is going to benefit everyone and where people aren't going to lose out in a way which is going to affect them to the point where they can't carry on. So I've been talking to some people about, hey, are there ways to create courses for... people in high pressure environments where you look at these principles of mycelial interconnectedness and run workshops and you know there's difficulties of people engaging with people from different countries you know you might have different ways of talking about things or thinking about things and you're trying to do a business deal or something or you're trying to create some art or you're trying to do something which you know requires collaboration writing a paper presenting something Could you create some sort of mycelial interface which allows you to think in a way where you've got mycelial protocols which allow you to then come to the most efficient way of going about something? Yeah, it's brilliant. I feel like there's so much we can learn by sitting at a battered coastline or checking out the environment around us on some level. And we just forget. We forget how much the world or nature is trying to speak to us. Maybe that's because we're distracted or whatever, but I'm really hopeful, man. And I think psychedelics really open you up to that kind of language. They open you up to learning from the environment around you instead of an authority figure who may or may not have your best ideals in mind. Yeah, absolutely. I think that is the beauty of psychedelics, is the empowerment, is that knowing. I've had what I perceive to be direct communication with magic mushrooms, and that doesn't feel psychotic. It hasn't Those experiences haven't led me to do anything dangerous. If anything, those types of communications have allowed me to really do the work on myself because then I'm open. It's like respecting the authority of the mushrooms, deferring, giving yourself over to the mushrooms to that experience is for me where that healing happens. You know, one of the, I would say, most highly regarded mushroom masters who's sadly no longer with us, Baba Kalindi E, who was a proponent of the really high dose experiences, talking to twenty to thirty plus dried grams. He often said, you know, the mushroom is the. shaman the therapist is the set and setting is the hymns is the songs is all of this stuff encapsulated in one and actually you know engaging with that stuff okay you know he was quite out there with the doses he was talking about but I do think those principles are true like there is something of you could call it an ancestral birthright with these plants and fungi where Yeah, I, I know what this is about because I'm a human and I'm connected to this web of consciousness and nature, and I don't necessarily need someone else. It's not to say that I won't ever need someone else. I've engaged, you know, I've had experiences of guided ceremonies that have been really beautiful and amazing, but I think a lot of that work that we can do can come from establishing that personal relationship. Yeah, I would. You know, I, I've been paying a lot to like the the decentralized science that's kind of going on. And as my map comes down behind us, you know, and it and it makes me curious about different experiments, like there seems to be a lot of, of experiments with trauma and helping out, you know, people with different doses, but I would love to see some experiments with like huge doses, like, you know, like, you know, like, you know, like, you know, like, you know, like, I think that there's some, that would be fascinating to see the research come out of that, but I guess there's, there's too much liability involved in something like that. Are you, are you aware of any studies like that that have happened or? Not like that. Possibly with that, I don't know what kind of state you're in with twenty to thirty dried grams, whether someone would actually be able to even do an experiment. I know there's been some work with the prolonged DMT states, the DMTX. I haven't necessarily seen a lot of concrete stuff to come of that. I think it might be quite difficult to do experiments with people under these states I think it's you know it's going to be that like real psychonautical exploration relying on yeah I mean maybe we'll get to that point where we have the technology and the means to be able to understand what's going on with someone in that state And I think possibly, you know, some of the people that are working with DMT are getting their people like Andrew Gallimore with his DMTX studies. Maybe he is getting to that point where, you know, when I spoke to Kalindi and I said, is this state of the twenty to thirty dried grams? Is that essentially like a DMT state? He said, yes, it's kind of indistinguishable from the DMT realm, except you are in there for a longer period of time and. so yeah maybe there is some promise with those experiments that they're doing I'd be interested to see what... I'd be interested to see it all. The peak of it. I would love to hear people try and tell me what happens at that peak. Anyone that's out there that's done that. I've talked to Adam. Adam Tapp had a really huge experience on over-twenty-five grams that we spoke about. But I think the after, the philosophical stage, the after, the hour four, hour five, where you're sort of kind of coming back you know down the road back to home a little bit you know it would be interesting to see and I bet you can measure the neuroplasticity on some level whether it's through ukg or something like that but I think that's probably where the real healing is done like those huge doses they gotta have a radical effect on connectivity they have to have a radical effect on conceptualization and ideas and you know if we can agree that a micro dose is brightening the colors What is the long term potentiation or what is the long term ramifications of like a thirty thirty gram dose? Like it's got to be stellar on some level. Any thoughts on that? Yeah, I think it does. I think it does radically shift people. You know, the people that I know that have done, you know, even the we're talking kind of seven. Plus dried grams around that seven to ten dried grams, you know, people that are getting into those realms, they are talking. in terms of ancestral wisdom knowledge about the origins of humanity engaging with these myths and legends that you know might have some testament to to where we come from it seems to be that these doses are going further than the psychotherapeutic the the healing aspect I you know it seems like there's a different order going on there's something to do with engaging in the nature of reality and understanding things like the death process and becoming better equipped to go through that process of death and potentially rebirth and I think there is stuff with the mushrooms, which is a lot greater than our trauma and our healing. Whilst all that stuff is really valid and really important. And we can get a lot done. I think, you know, I've had experiences where it's like four dry grams of semelanciata, the Liberty caps. So quite strong. Yeah. And I had really, you know, an amazing cathartic experience. But I had the very clear message of, okay, you've had the healing. Now's the time for the lesson. I was like, ah, okay. And, you know, at that point I sat up, I grabbed a pen, I started writing down what was coming in, you know, the download. And I was like, okay, this is about, you know, and I've had a lot of experiences where the mushrooms are like, Let us show you this alien world. Let us show you where we're from. Let us show you where you're from. I'm like, oh, holy fucking... And I'm literally out loud going, oh, shit. Fuck. Okay. And it's like really... It's like I'm watching a documentary, but it's really... it's not just someone's telling me about it. It's like, Hey buddy, this is what it's about. And you're like, Oh my God, of course. You know, I had that full gram experience. It was like, it was so funny. It was like a radio host came on. It was like, ah, welcome back. Welcome. Well, we've missed you. Well done for tuning back into, you know, the right station. Where have you been? I was like, Oh, Oh shit. This is, this is the origins. This is like where, uh, you know, and I don't know, you know, you can go into some real rabbit holes with all of this and go down the Graham Hancock route and all of that stuff. But it's like, you speak to some cultures, you speak to the Dogon tribes, you know, people with DNA. That's like, you know, the pygmy people, the stuff that Darren LeBaron talks about where, People with DNA that's one hundred and fifty thousand years old, the longest, you know, measurable DNA in the world. And then you ask them, OK, so where did you come from? And they go, oh, we come from Sirius, you know. Yeah. And it's very clear, you know, there's a lot of these cultures. It's like, yeah, yeah. We didn't originally come from here. And, you know, I've had that with. interestingly, just those Liberty caps. I don't, I don't really get it with other species of mushrooms. So there's something going on with like the biochemistry of particular mushrooms, which are unlocking this extraterrestrial side to, to the experience where I've consistently had extraterrestrial experiences with Semelanciata, you know, quite astoundingly so. Yeah, it's, it's, It's incredible to try to explain to people about talking to an alien or hearing a voice or being in contact with something that you can't describe. But it's a real thing. We can argue what it is that we're talking to. Is it your higher self? Is it a non-local consciousness? What we choose to label it as is kind of irrelevant. It seems to me, but it's there. And there's real knowledge that comes. There's real ideas that are uncovered. And it's so amazing to think about how, on some level, incoherence can breed such clarity. Those things, you don't think they would go together. Yeah. It's crazy to me. It shakes it up, doesn't it? Yes. What we read about with the mechanisms of action, the default mode network, this network in your brain which is keeping... you know, your consensus reality together. And then you take some magic mushrooms and it destabilizes that and knocks it out. And then all this stuff starts to flood in and okay, you've shaken things up. You've created some, some chaos, but actually in that chaos, you realize, ah, okay, there really is this filtering valve that goes on to make sure that we don't get eaten by saber tooth tigers or whatever it is, you know, you know as our brains still set on whenever it was so we've still got these systems in place to keep us really safe but in doing so they you know they potentially limit us to to these revelatory experiences and actually in knocking that out and allowing the things to flood in you know I've read I'm pretty sure I've read something that says we Our brains get hit with eighteen million bits of information every second, and we can only consciously process eighteen bits. So we're only consciously aware of a millionth of all the sensory input. So what does that mean? Does that mean that, hey, if we take some DMT or some mushrooms, do we then suddenly become aware of all the other stuff that's going on? Is there something that happens to the architectural structure of our brains that then allows us to be more susceptible to that stuff coming in? It's like we've primed our system to then be able to interface with the wider stream of data that's out there. It makes so much sense when you say it like that. When we start talking about the architecture of the brain and concepts like the default mode network, that sounds to me like what we're running on as a species. Look at our governments. Look at our corporations. Look at our ideas. That's the default mode. Yeah, yeah. It's like the that's like the easy level is a default. Like, let's what else is there? Okay, well, let's let's get off the default mode network. Let's take this sort of ally that will help us get off the default mode network. And like, it just speaks to the idea of creativity, like no wonder so much creativity comes from psychedelics, you're getting out of the default mode network, no matter you're so upset when you come back to it, like, damn it. I didn't want to come back to the default mode network. Okay, well, you got to do the work to create this thing that we showed you that is possible. Like, it just seems like real-time evolution when you start looking at the language, looking at the creativity, looking at the work, whatever that means for the individuals. And, man, it's so fascinating just to see the way all these things line up and to see the trajectory. Like, yeah, we should be off the default mode network. Like, that's good for... if you want to default to the world of mediocrity yeah right yeah exactly and then you know in doing so we can engage with the neuroplasticity and the creativity and the stuff that is helping us to flourish and be the best version of ourselves Yeah, it seems so true. If you can sort of harness the intention, and I think people can. I've done it. I bet you have done it. If you want to be better at something, psychedelics can help you achieve it. You have to come off the default mode network. Take your psychedelics, have your intention, and it can't be once. It's got to be a routine. I would recommend going with big doses followed up by micro doses. I recommend if you want to get really good at something, whatever it is, Write it down. Study it. Take a light seven, like a seven point two. Boom. Take it. Enjoy it. And then follow that up with like once a week micro dose or twice a week micro dose for the next month. And then another big dose. Keep a journal and find out. Write down the insight that you've had. Write down all that stuff and you will see the progression not be linear, but be exponential. I've done it in my life and I... You know, I don't know that there's a protocol for it. I mean, I should write that down and call it the George Monty Protocol. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why not? Why not? Everyone has their own protocols, community protocols. Yeah, why not? Why not? Yeah, yeah. It's a GitHub for psychedelics. Yeah, yeah. Amazing. Ollie, this is so much fun, man. It's been great. I enjoyed every second of this, man, and I feel like we've barely scratched the surface. Yeah, yeah. Let's keep up the connection and, you know, it'd be great to meet in person one day if you're ever over in the UK or I'm over in the US, it'd be awesome to meet. Yeah, and we'll talk more offline. I'd love to do that. Before I let you go, though, man, can you please share anything? You've got gigs coming up. You've got some music with your band members. Can you shout out your band members? Or what else? Yeah, shout out to Codex Serafini. My musical family, my adopted family, I just absolutely love them. Some of the most talented individuals that I could ever possibly hope to play with. So it's a real honor and joy. We have our – we're in the process of writing our second studio album, which we're recording in April. So fingers crossed that will be out in the summer, maybe sort of June, July. Before that, we're going on a little tour with an awesome band who we love called Kulk, K-U-L-K. They're a heavy band from the U.K., And we're doing some shows with them. We've got a little mini festival coming up in the beginning of March, end of March. End of March, we're playing something called the Karma Weekender. It's sort of very psychedelic-minded, so that's fun. And then the other shows that we're playing are more on the kind of heavy... side of things. So it's good. We like to traverse these two subcultures. And yeah, we've got a really exciting festival coming up in October. We're playing a jazz festival in Poland called Jazz Janta. I don't know how they say it, but that's really exciting. That was sort of, I guess, a bit surprising to us uh but it was someone who'd reviewed our album a while ago for their magazine and then is involved in this festival and yeah it's great to be thought of in the the jazz circles as well I don't know how that's going to go down but I think it would be be quite fun I play I play saxophone so for me like I love jazz I love all that kind of stuff so yeah engaging in in more of those um kind of stylistic style of things uh Potentially, I'm speaking at breaking convention in April. I'm waiting to hear back about my submission. So fingers crossed. And yeah, that should be an exciting event. And just carrying on with more mushroom stuff, collaborating with people in the fungi world, doing things on the education side of things, trying to set up a space locally for people. So yeah, lots of interesting stuff. But yeah, creative wise is definitely where the energy is. To everybody within the sound of my voice, go down, check out the show notes, check out everything Ollie's into. He is an incredible creative individual and true to the form of mycelium. He's branching out into so many directions and they're all fascinating and interesting, man. So go down, reach out to him. He's available for gigs and talks and check out the band. I'm going to be talking to him a lot more often. Hopefully we'll have some bigger discussions. Yeah. you know what though before I let you go can you give like where are people where can people find you like what is the name of the site for the band what is the name of the site for you like where's the best place to find things you're doing so if you go to linktree forward slash codex seraphini that's for the band and then you can again linktree forward slash ollie genbash that's got all my links so Videos, articles, all different kinds of things. You can connect with me on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook. Yeah. All right, ladies and gentlemen, you heard it here. I hope you have a beautiful day. I hope you decide to do whatever is necessary to become the very best version of yourself. And when you do, the world will thank you. And thanks so much for listening today, everybody. I hope you have a beautiful day. Aloha. And hang out briefly afterwards, Ali. But to everybody else, I'll talk to you soon. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Okay. Thanks, George. Bye-bye.