41. Bruno Moya - Iboga, Initiation, and What It Means to Become a Man

In this episode, I sit down with Bruno, a Marine veteran, social worker, jiu-jitsu guy, and family constellation facilitator who works with veterans, first responders, athletes, healthcare workers, and trauma survivors.

This one goes a lot of places.

We talk about plant medicine, family constellation work, ancestral patterns, growing up in Mexico, combat, fatherhood, marriage, initiation, and why so many men carry anger that is really covering fear.

We also talk about the difference between having a powerful experience and actually integrating it into your life.

Because going to Africa, sitting with medicine, doing a ceremony, or having some huge realization means nothing if you come home and keep being the same guy.

What we cover:

•  What family constellation work is 
•  Why your family system still affects how you show up 
•  Bruno’s first plant medicine experience 
•  Taking off the armor around your heart 
•  Iboga, initiation, and manhood 
•  Why anger often points back to fear 
•  Fatherhood, marriage, and breaking old patterns 
•  Why nobody is the guru, and we’re all figuring this out 

Connect with Bruno:

https://soulminerretreats.org/

Thanks again for listening!

Enrollment is open right now for our Mindful Microdosing Program, which has helped 250+ veterans, first responders, and trauma survivors overcome anxiety, depression, and PTSD.

Visit https://www.becomingom.org/coaching for all the info and to get in touch with us.

Or DM us the word INTERESTED on Instagram.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's up, beautiful people? You're listening to the Plant Medicine for PTSD podcast. This episode is pretty awesome. If you're a longtime listener of this show, you'll probably notice some patterns with uh a few of these episodes that we're putting out right around now, which is that I am uh just selfishly using this time to grapple with a lot of things that are on my own mind. Uh at the time of this recording, Cordy is three months pregnant with our second child, first son, and uh there's a lot going on in my noggin these days. So this entire episode is basically just me uh trying to extract advice from my guest today, who is my my friend Bruno Moya. Uh awesome dude. I forget how we even got in touch in the first place. He's a jujitsu guy, he's a plant medicine guy, he's a smart motherfucker, he's a parent, he's a veteran. Uh so much good wisdom to share, and uh I really look forward to speaking with him some more just on a on a friendship level, maybe podcast round two, maybe working with him one of these days. You'll hear him talk about the work that he does with uh family constellations stuff. Pretty interesting. So I won't ramble too long because I think there's a lot of good meat in this episode. I don't think it requires too much more preamble. So there will be links in this episode description to see where you can find Bruno and some of the work that he's doing. Uh he's a pretty private guy with this stuff, but he has a nonprofit called right now called Soul Miner. I think he's working on a name change, so we'll get the relevant links in the description. You check that out and go enjoy the wisdom that Bruno Moya has to offer. Yeah, dude, the the first time we talked, it was a long time ago, man. I I don't even fully remember how we got connected. It probably was through jujitsu stuff, because you are a brown belt, correct?

SPEAKER_01 1:56

Purple belt.

SPEAKER_00 1:57

Purple belt, okay. Sorry, I'm giving you more credit than you deserve. Uh what's your actual day job, Bruno? What do you do for a living?

SPEAKER_01 2:05

Okay, yeah, great question. Uh so my my day job is I I work for the Legislative Council Bureau here for the state of Nevada, do constituent services. It's uh it sounds super fancy. Um great job, great opportunity. Essentially, what I do is whenever you reach out to a legislature, you know how sometimes you go to the DMV, try to get your license, you run into a speed speed bump or an obstacle of some sorts that you feel is unjust, you reach out to your legislator, and I'm pretty much the guy that that figures that stuff out. So I work for all of them in the state, so I'm nonpartisan. I don't I don't work for a party or anything like that.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Okay. I uh I imagine there's so much annoying shit about that job. Like, I don't know, man. Just dealing with like bureaucracy and red tape and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

You know, being behind uh like be you know, the Wizard of Oz, the uh the wizard is behind the curtain, like being behind the curtain and and looking at all the levers being pulled, uh you you learn to appreciate the slowness because it needs to be slow. Sometimes being too fast is not okay, you know, like with legislation and policy. But uh when you when you're dealing with like certain um bureaucracies, like you know, um a state agency, it can be very very annoying for sure. Yeah, it's like hey guys, get get to work, let's go. You know, a typical state organization, um, but they also have their policies and procedures.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

So and on top of that, you you also told me about how you do work with family constellations, and so is that in the capacity of like leading other people in this, like as a therapist kind of a role? Or like what what does that look like?

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Yeah. So family constellation, um, I do family constellation with individuals, work with a lot of veterans specifically. So the target groups that I that I work for or that I work that I that I that I'm in service of is veterans, uh athletes, healthcare workers, first responders, and trauma survivors. Practically pretty much everybody, you know, that that covers the whole array. Um and and within that, uh at times I I have a property in in northern Arizona. It's about two hours from Las Vegas where I live. And at times we go down to uh my property with with a group of people and we just do constellation work, family constellation. Family constellation, if you want me to explain it a little bit, because it's it's pretty obscure. It's popular in certain areas and it's kind of a growing therapy, uh, but it's very ancient. So family constellation, um, it's practiced in in Africa by the Zulu tribe. The way that it was discovered was after World War II, there was uh uh uh a German soldier who prior to the war was on his way to become a priest uh in the Catholic Church. And then the war started, he got drafted. War ended, he survived. Uh he was in Germany, so he was a little like taken back from the experience and like what happened. So he just decided to leave Germany and go to Africa. Spent 10 years with the Sulu tribe where he discovered that they had a like a system of therapy to try to help um individuals with their uh with certain challenges that they have within within a family system or within within the tribe or anything like that. In a tribal sense, right, like a weak link needs to be looked at because there's you you you have a chink in the armor, like the the whole tribe can really uh it can it can be affected. So um they look at the system as a whole. So family constellation um came from that from that tradition. And the the gentleman's name is Bert uh Ellinger. Ellinger, and he pretty pretty much put a system around it. So he put a lot of foundations and theories behind it. And uh essentially there's like three different orders of love. In order for love to really flow through through an individual, there needs to be kind of like these these three different orders that need to be fully um fully examined, if you will. So a family system is yourself, you know, like all of your lineage and then your future, right? Um and and within that you have to look at the the there's orders in order for for love to be able to flow, like I said earlier, you have to look at hierarchy, which is uh, for example, is like you have your great grandparents, parents, uh children, grandchildren, so on, right? There's certain there come certain times within that hierarchy where uh a child may take the role of a parent because that parent may be unable or doesn't have the capacity to be a parent for whatever reason. A good example is maybe they're just unavailable, maybe they're they're addicted to some type of substance or something like that. And so they don't have the capacity at the time to be able to parent. And so maybe uh typical of the one of the older, the oldest child takes the role of the mom or or the dad, which is fine, it's good. However, in order for love to completely flow and to bring balance into that system, uh, you need to be able to look at that and examine that and then bring um bring that that that balance, which is the other order uh is balance, and and that is pretty much self-explanatory, bringing balance, looking at where there is unbalance in that system, and uh and uh uh and looking through how that that love can flow. Uh so I talked about order, I talked about hierarchy. Uh let me look here. I have to I have to cheat sometimes, man, because I forget. Uh and belonging is the is the is the third one. Um that's that's uh that a good example of that is you know, sometimes we have like an uncle that uh is, you know, like he's a drunk uh or he's the wild one, and like you have a family that's like, hey, we don't talk to the uncle because he's crazy or whatever, you know, maybe he committed really heinous crimes, whatever the case is, um, that individual still belongs in the family system and there needs to be belonging in there. Uh sometimes an individual with a family system, like maybe their family is just way too chaotic. There's too much substance abuse, there's too much violence and and and stuff like that. And so an individual might take themselves out of that system to to be able to to um uh to to uh uh you know to to to live essentially, right? Harmoniously. Uh, but still in that system, you you still belong in your family. So there you need to feel like you belong in your family. That doesn't mean that you have to go back home and cook for them and like you know, invite them to the family dinners or any of that. But in order for love to flow, you need to have a full acceptance of like your family system. And it just is what it is. And many times you talk to people that like they don't even want to talk about their family. So there's there's these blockages in in love. And so family constellation, it attempts to look at those those disorders or those those faulty systems within the family for you to be able to really uh um to let love flow.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Okay, I want to put a pin in this for right now because I actually really want to talk more about this because I know so little, but it seems so interesting to me. So I want to come back to this. How did you get introduced to this stuff? Or like where does your knowledge of all this come from?

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Yeah. So man, um back back in 2018, uh yeah, 2018, I had my first experience with with like psychedelics. Then um I had already graduated with a master's in social work. So I knew that I wanted to do social work, like that was my thing, you know, and so uh um I I just didn't know it what area or what in under the umbrella of of mental health where I fit in, you know. So I I I did psychedelics. Uh then I knew like right away, this is it. Like this is this is tribal. This is like this talks to me, you know. Like I can't, I don't like being in an office. I love being in nature, I love, I love all that other stuff, you know. So being in an office to me felt like it was very uh there was a ceiling, and especially like in therapies and stuff like that, there's just a ceiling. You can only get so far when you're just secluded to to like a box or square, you know what I mean? So um uh pandemic happened, uh, I lost my job, uh all the stuff, you know. Then uh I found this this this this organization, um this nonprofit organization based out of Colombia that was doing a three-year uh training called psychedelic therapy training. Uh it's known as Aw AWE. And uh I signed up. I I paid 50 bucks to be interviewed, which is something that I've never done in my life. Like I, but it was a pandemic. I'm like, dude, I I got 50 bucks, why not? I got nothing else to do, you know. Uh I got the interview. Uh I didn't think I was gonna get accepted, but like a month later they accepted me. Uh I didn't know how I was gonna do it, but one of the things that really attracted me was that we were gonna go to a lot of different places around the world that that have traditions that practice uh shamanic or indigenous ancestral wisdom. Um I I guess that's a good way of like explaining what that is, you know. Um and that that really caught my eye, specifically going to Africa. I've never been to Africa, and I I've always wanted to like just shamanism as a whole, coming from where I come from. I'm Mexican, I grew up there, and so shamanism is is not something that's very obscure, and it's just something that has always attracted me. So um found the training, uh signed up, got accepted, then went out to to uh be a psychedelic therapist in training. Uh quickly found that the training was really um they it wasn't an attempt to teach you how to be a psychedelic therapist. Their idea, I believe, and this is what I got out of this is my interpretation, is that in order for you to be a psychedelic therapist, you need to completely understand all of your all of your shit, essentially. Right? Like you need to take a hard look at who you are, uh, where you come from, your roots, uh, all of it. And so that's where I got introduced to family constellation is through that that modality is like, all right, in order for for an individual to really be able to flourish uh without any self-blockages, internal blockages, then you need to look at your family system. Uh and that's not the only system to look at, but that's one that makes the most sense. You know, we all we all have a family, we all have mom and dad. Everybody, right? So you just need to look at that system um and and try to understand it to help to to better help understand who you are, where you come from, uh, so you have an idea of that. And also just really taking a hard look at all your shit too. Like that's very important when you're doing any anything with with psychedelics and you want to offer it to people like, who are you and why are you doing this type of thing, you know?

SPEAKER_00 14:29

So did you have a uh did you have a sense of like this was gonna be your path when you did the psychedelics for the first time? Like is that part of why you were looking into it or like what what motivated you to even step onto that path in the first place?

SPEAKER_01 14:40

Yeah, yeah. Uh I remember being a kid and I would I had books about the Mayans, the Mechika, the Aztecs, like all of them, you know, like I would just study that. I was like, well, I was fascinated with it, you know. I remember having books about astronomy and just reading through it, and like, how did these people freaking a thousand years ago figure out the star systems and like the pyramids? Like I was just so fascinated with all that. And so um uh getting out of the military, I served eight years at in the Marine Corps. Uh when I got out, I I had a thing for helping guys out that would reach out. So I just for some reason, guys would always reach out to me asking for help. Uh, and I would just sit down and talk with them. So I I just I I enjoyed that. And because I enjoyed that, I was like, you know, maybe this is the thing for me is uh is mental health. Maybe I can be a counselor, a therapist, whatever that is. I thought I was gonna get like a side in psychology or something. Uh ended up getting a social work degree. I chose that route for a couple of different reasons, but um graduated in 2017. 2018, I took my first experience. Uh, like many of us. Um I I listened to Joe Rogan and and like he talked about it. So I was just curious. Uh, but also I've just been very curious about psychedelics for a really long time. Um, I was very afraid. I I'm not somebody that's like I've never done cocaine math, anything like that. Um I've always been kind of afraid of substances and and foreign substances. However, I did drink a lot. So um uh and and so but there was like something about psychedelics that seemed different to me. You know, and uh I took my first experience and it almost flipped the s it flipped the switch for me where I I mean I came home, my wife didn't recognize me. Uh at the time I was married 12 years, and I dude, I I told my wife that I loved her like two or three times in those 12 years. She says, she says, I think two, I say three. It's a it's an argument in 12 years, you know. So um that that really woke me up. And psychedelics were the catalyst to to help me understand the real hard work that I had ahead of me. Uh it didn't change me, it didn't do anything outside of just giving me the opportunity to look at the things that I want that I should change if I if I want to become the man in my mind that I want to become, you know? So that's that's really how I I got into this type of stuff.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Was that first experience? Was that was that an Ibogaine retreat?

SPEAKER_01 17:34

No, uh it was Kana. It was Kana. It's uh South African succulent, uh, or at least that's what I was told. Um there's I still have a couple questions around that. It might have been just MDMA. I don't know. I was told it was Kana. It was uh the guy that administered it was like uh an old uh special forces vet. I had no reason to doubt him. Uh one of my really, really close friends, um, his father was a special forces in the same unit. Uh and when he, you know, like they met and they they all knew the same name. So the guy, I knew the guy was legit. So he uh he gave me this capsule and he said it was Kana, Sassafras, and and I I forget what else. And uh, and so I believed him, but then throughout the years I've just I've I've wondered about that, and I think it felt more like MDMA, to be honest with you. Um and so yeah, I mean, but that did it. Like my heart was just in in in a cage. It was it was just protecting itself from childhood shit, you know, combat, everything, everything that the world has to offer. And that's that was my viewpoint is just protection and protecting myself. And and so um, you know, I just I was a big guy. Um you know, I was in the Marines, you know, I I just gained a lot of weight because I just I was uh I was like a rhinoceros, just you know, full of protection, you know. Um that that was my thing.

SPEAKER_00 19:06

And you feel like that experience kind of shattered that cage that you had around your heart?

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Yeah, man. It was like, dude, you're carrying around a lot of unnecessary fucking armor, dude. Like, what are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 19:18

I mean, if it's if it's anything like MDMA, that that will have that effect 100%.

SPEAKER_01 19:24

Yeah, it was amazing, dude. I remember my my wife was uh uh seven months pregnant at the time, some somewhere along that line. And uh I remember like it it it here's the thing, like it felt like MDMA, but it was a little psychedelic. I had visions, and I just had a vision of like being pulled down to Mother Earth to the core, and like she was just kind of like she was holding me kind of like a baby, but then she she backhanded, slapped me and she's like, dude, you got this amazing woman. Uh she's your wife, you're you're you're really shut down, you don't show any affection and love. You have a daughter, and you have another daughter on the r on the way. Uh, what are you doing with everything that is being provided to you with these opportunities? So it really, it was like the the best bitch slap I've ever had in my life. Like it was it was the most beautiful thing I've I've ever experienced, but it was a difficult realization. I'm like, oh shit, she's right.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

How old was your oldest at that point? It was 12, I think.

SPEAKER_01 20:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:35

Okay, wow. Yeah. Hmm. Um, you know, you mentioned you were drinking a lot. I feel like that goes hand in hand with being a Marine from my experience with Marines. Uh you you said you felt like you were guarding your hearts pain from combat. And then you said from childhood too. What kind of factors do you feel like contributed from the childhood to like how things were pre-psychedelics?

SPEAKER_01 21:04

Man, I have a great dad. I I love my dad. Uh he had a lot of wisdom. Uh and I miss him. He passed away in 2015. I really miss him. I wish he was alive so I can share this stuff because he was really into this type of stuff. But boy, like he was he was like a cinder block, you know, just very rough. Um didn't really hand you any type of affection. Like if he gave you affection, he would throw it at you like a cinder block and it it kind of hurt. You know, like his affection would be like, uh, hey, uh, I'm I care about you, but uh you're really fat, you know. He would say stuff like that, or like, you know, just things like that. And that that honestly, like that's not that bad. You know what I mean? Like, there's some points in my life where I was, you know, pretty, pretty, pretty overweight. But that's how he showed love. And he was just a very rough individual. I grew up in in a border town in Mexico. And uh so I understand why he was the way that he was. So I don't fault him for knowing what he like doing what he did with what he had, right? I understand all of that. So I have a lot of compassion for him. But just I I saw a lot of different things. Like uh, for example, I I and he was a very machista uh guy. So uh an example of that is uh I grew up in a house where it was myself. Uh my brothers would come and go. Um, he had uh uh uh children with many women, he had some prestige. Uh my mom came from the opposite end. She came from a very, very impoverished background. Um, so because he had a little bit of wealth and a little bit of like power, he um, you know, he he did what he wanted to do essentially. So I grew up in a in a household where it was my mom, my sister from my mom. My mom had a a child from another uh previous relationship, myself and my couple other brothers would come and go, and then my my dad's mistress. So um, like it was just confusing, you know, and there was a lot of like shut up, do as I say, um little a lot a lot of aggression, not a lot of violence, but there was some. And then uh growing up in Mexico in a border town in the 80s, you know, that's when if you've seen Narcos Mexico, it's just like, you know, I grew up in Ciudad Juarez where a lot of that like really um, you know, came to be. So I got to see a lot of those things, but essentially uh I was molded to really not feel a lot, was which was very confusing because I was a very emotional individual. I was a very sensitive kid. So half of my life I was just confused. Like, don't show emotion, be an asshole. That's how you show affection, you know what I mean? And so, um, and that's how I that's how I that's how I grew up being with my friends and the people around me and stuff like that. I was just I was a prick, you know? Um, and I didn't know how to I didn't know how to show uh love or receive love or appreciate just all of that stuff, you know? Um but all in all my dad was still very uh uh a very wise individual, you know, like he he he knew a lot of stuff, so he would always try to teach me things so that he he really inculcated uh like a lot of curiosity in me as well. Um and then my mom, you know, she grew up in a very impoverished uh uh neighborhood, and I felt more at home in those areas than I did uh on my dad's side of the uh of the family. Um there was a lot of a lot of love, you know what what they lacked in in finances and and wealth, they they made up in just you know love and affection and and partying and and having a good time and family and all that stuff. So um I I got to see all of it, you know. I was very fortunate.

SPEAKER_00 25:11

You mentioned um the dude who found who you know came up with family constellations, he was on his way to become a Catholic priest. Uh was religion ever part of your upbringing? Obviously, Mexico being a predominantly Catholic place.

SPEAKER_01 25:27

It was in a sense, it was. My dad was a big follower of of Jeshua, Jesus. Uh he he studied Jesus, he always taught to me about Jesus and all those different um in in his life. Uh, but he was very distrusting of the Catholic religion, which is the prominent religion in Mexico. Uh he always told me, like, be careful with the Catholic religion, but love Jesus. Uh so I had I always had that mysticism, you know, that that was introduced to me. Even my name, my name is Bruno, and he got that, he got that from Giordano Bruno, the Italian uh mystic um who was burnt at the stake for being uh uh for for challenging the Catholic religion.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

So a few hundred years ago, you would for sure be being burned at a stake. Yeah, yeah, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

Damn. All right, so you have this experience with the kana, you get bitch smacked by Mother Earth telling you to like, hey man, what are you doing here with your your family? Yeah. What uh what realizations came to you from that, or or maybe like what change was affected afterwards? Like how what what did you see that you were doing to your family that you didn't want to do anymore?

SPEAKER_01 26:51

There's a lot of awareness, man. That that's a great question. I think about that a lot. So I it's it's I'm quick to answer with that because like it was just pure awareness from there on, like, okay, dude, you've told your wife that you loved her twice or three times, whatever it was. It it's still fucked. The numbers suck. Okay, like it's not okay. You should say I'll give you the three.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

I believe it was three.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

Thank you, man. Yeah, but that's what you should be telling your loved ones every day, three times minimum, right? Like, fuck. Yeah. So just a pure awareness. Uh uh looking looking at my daughter as my children as as my teachers, not like me asking them questions on what to do, but like uh they offer such a rich opportunity for me to understand what it is to be a man. Okay. They're little girls, but I'm a man. And so what what does that mean? Like I don't know. My dad didn't teach me that. He thought he taught me that through like, you know, being rough, you don't ever cry, blah, blah, blah, blah, all of that stuff. Um, but but those are, you know, those are certain characteristics, but sometimes those are those are ill-guided, I think. And so it gave me a lot of awareness. And so from that moment on, I I became hyper-vigilant in a sense, um, of of of awareness of like what I was doing and the things that I needed to change. Because I knew, like when I was very cold to my wife, like I knew that was not all right, but it felt good because that's what was taught to me, you know. So I'm like, I'm just doing what I was told, you know, and that's not okay, you know. Like sometimes you shouldn't do what you're told.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Yeah, that's funny. It's like it it it it feels familiar, it feels natural, but then at the same time, there's part of you that knows that it doesn't feel right. It's like this isn't how this is supposed to feel, right? Right, yeah, yeah, it's interesting. Yeah, dude, what did uh what did your daughter think of this? Because you you said she was 12 already, so like she's a fully foreign person at that point, you know. Like we we work with a lot of people where it's like, yeah, I have a I have a two-year-old, and it's like, well, they're not, you know, obviously they know things, they remember stuff, but like she's a whole person at that point. So like she she had to see a change in you and just be like, Mom, what's going on with dad? He's acting all weird, he keeps hugging me.

SPEAKER_01 29:13

Like, yeah, yeah. And he's not yelling at me anymore. Yeah, and he's not getting drunk anymore. You know, it's like, what's going on? That that was probably I tell a lot of guys like that that I talk to is like the greatest gift you can give your children is giving them the opportunity to see you become uh a very mature, healed, whatever that means, individual. Like for you to do your own hard work, uh, for you to say I'm sorry when you when that's when that's required, um, for you to step into your own power, you know, like whatever that means. Like my power is doing what I do with everything that I'm doing, and like, and being unapologetic about, you know, like living my life uh with morals and ethics and love and compassion and being rough sometimes and being like a uh just a knucklehead and being being a brute sometimes, you know. Like I do jujitsu. I love doing that stuff. I love throwing weights around. I love, I love, I love being a kid sometimes, you know, and like being unapologetic about that. Um, so I I gave my daughter an opportunity to see a huge shift. And then the spirituality that came into that, just like this this understanding that there's something greater, and maybe that's what we need to like really focus our attention on, like um, you know, like all these taboo things, you know, like even sex, you know, like I I talked about uh talked uh uh about sex with my kid, you know, it's like all those things, you know, like hey, everything is sacred, all of it, all of it is sacred, you know, and so um uh having very profound discussions with her where it was just like, hey, uh, you know, uh let's watch a movie or something and let's talk about just kind of like what do you want to do in life? You gotta get a job, you gotta make money, you gotta, you know, all this stuff, but like, where's the substance? Where's the life experience? Where's like when you're in your deathbed and you're looking back in your life and you're like, yeah, I did that stuff, and I I wouldn't I don't regret any of it, you know? So just that huge shift um that that she really appreciated because our our relationship became very profound, very deep. Um I had a lot of I had a lot of uh I'm sorry that were that were lined up, you know, and uh not all at the same time, you know, like something came up. I remember there was a point when she was like uh 14 or 15 or something, and she was just super depressed, man, and like I couldn't figure it out. There's you know, she she had we're very fortunate that our our kids don't have like deep you know trauma. Um they do have some from from from her from their parents, you know, like we didn't we're not perfect, uh, but uh uh I remember when I was in the Marines, my wife was pregnant with my first f with my oldest kid, and um it was the Marine Corps ball. I took my wife out to the ball, she was pregnant, and I was in my dress blues, and we were in Las Vegas, and like, dude, I'm a combat vet, I have all these medals, like all this bullshit, right? And so uh I'm looking at my wife, I'm like, dude, I want to go out with a with a guy. So I dropped off my wife at home, uh, went out, and uh, I was just I went partying, you know, and then uh like three, four in the morning, my wife goes and looks for me because I wasn't answering my phone. And I'm on the dance floor, just on my dress blues, just dancing, you know, and she comes up to me in her in her in a nightgown with a big old belly, and she's like, hey, whenever you want to come home, it's it's time to come home. Just that realization that from the womb I was already, you know, being very uh uh I was kind of abandoning abandoning her in a way, and just uh, you know, those those those emotions, those things, th that energy that that she felt and even in the womb. So, you know, coming clean on those type of things and and just kind of like, hey, I I don't know if this I can only offer you this, that that maybe some of your this emptiness that you're feeling is is because from from the womb you've you've had two parents that they were just trying to figure it out. They didn't have we didn't have a roadmap like some other uh kids do of very loving parents, you know, and and like we were very guarded, you know. Even my wife, uh she's from El Salvador, grew up in in New York. Um, but you know, her history is not is not a pretty one, you know, and so they they fled the Civil War and so and they they saw a lot. So we just didn't have a lot of love and affection in in you know in our family. So um coming to terms with a lot a lot of that stuff. And also like, okay, we grew up different than our kids, and these kids are growing up with like all this all this stimulus, and so they're being told like they're being told whatever they're being told on social media or wherever at school. And uh and it's different at home, so it's like it can be very confusing. So it was it for me, it was just kind of like bringing it all together and and helping her understand where she fits in in the world.

SPEAKER_00 34:42

What what does that have to do with the depression that you said she was going through when she was like 14 or 15?

SPEAKER_01 34:48

You know, I just we didn't we didn't know what it was. She couldn't pinpoint like where the depression was. Like there was there was something. Um and her school was a little confusing too. Like there was just a lot of like different ideas uh that didn't really clash at her home, but like there's not that's not these ideas weren't part of our foundation, you know, like uh um just different things that they were being taught. And so like at home, she was being told one thing, at school, she was being told something else. So that was kind of confusing. I think that had like a lot to do with at school.

SPEAKER_00 35:24

She's hearing stuff like the earth is round, and then she comes home and you're like, nah, it's not round, stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 35:30

Yeah, or the other way around.

SPEAKER_00 35:34

Bro, as a side note, our daughter's gonna be like, I think I'm gonna fuck her up in this way, which is that I just can't take things seriously. So like she'll ask me what something is, and I just like make up the most ridiculous stuff, and like they trust you because like obviously they trust you. So I don't know, man. She's gonna go over to somebody's house one day and just say something completely ridiculous, just be like, Yeah, of course. And then she'll be like, What the fuck are you talking about? But that's me, and that's my stuff to work on. But bro, even just the fact that you recognize that she was depressed and you were trying to figure it out and talk to her about it, puts you like so far above the standard parent of just like no idea what's going on with their kid, and their kids just trying to figure it all out by themselves. So I think you get a lot of credit for having those conversations with her, dude.

SPEAKER_01 36:18

Appreciate that. Yeah, I felt that a hundred percent. I recognize that. That was and that was good on me, man. Like, I felt good like holding her in my arms and like, hey, I'm here, dude. Like, you're whatever this is, your dad's right here with you.

SPEAKER_00 36:33

So that's awesome. So you have this experience with Kana. You go and look at this uh, what was it called? The A AW, the Awe, like the training thing. Yeah, which is like a three-year program, super legit. I see, I get freaking targeted ads on Instagram now for like a weekend course to become a psychedelic coach. I'm like, shut the fuck up. So you're you're doing this, getting exposed to all these different uh different lineages, if you will, right? Like you're going to Africa, you're going to well, where else did you go? You mentioned Africa.

SPEAKER_01 37:06

What other parts of Yeah, Africa, Mexico, uh with uh we what what we call them Wichol, which really they're Wiraritari, they're uh Wirarica people, you know, that's the actual term. Um uh Colombia, Ecuador, the Amazon jungle with the with uh, and then Africa with uh with the pygmies or the bueri tradition. Yeah, so those are those are the places that I that I traveled to.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

And was the idea you're kind of working with different like medicines in each one of those places and kind of like learning different traditions? Like, like what did you actually do?

SPEAKER_01 37:49

That yeah, that like being seeped into were some of these uh medicines, but m more than the medicine, the tradition, the culture, the understanding, the lifestyle, the sacredness, the the importance of it, like uh uh uh in in in with a Kofan, for example, right? They uh uh the Taitas or the shamans that that administered ayahuasca, they call it Yahe. Uh the the shamans that that that that that um that served as Yahe, uh they started when they were eight years old and they were seven in their seventies and eighties.

SPEAKER_00 38:30

Yeah, wow. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 38:31

So it's like, hey, if you want to be an ayahuasquetto or a shaman, uh well the that this is the road that they took. So it's not like you said, it's not a weekend uh certification, it's like a very in-depth training, and you ask them, they tell you, I'm still learning. I I I don't know a whole lot yet. Yeah um one of the one one of the elders, uh he passed away just a few years ago, Taita uh Kerubin. He was like, they estimate he was around 110 years old, and he would he would even say, like, I'm I'm still learning, you know. Uh he was alive during when I was in the program. I didn't get to meet him. He was supposed to go to our our pilgrimage, but um, because of his age, he he couldn't travel all that much, so I we we didn't get a chance to to sit with him. But we sat with with his children, and his children were the the the taitas that that administered or that that served Yahed to us, and and they told us like we we're we're following our dad's footsteps and and we don't know uh but this this is our tradition. Um they they were very humble and people, very loving. And it's just like they were very connected with their roots, very deeply connected with their roots.

SPEAKER_00 39:50

What what was the name of the people, like the indigenous group? What what what were they called?

SPEAKER_01 39:54

Kofan C-O-F-A-N Kofan.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Okay, interesting. Yeah, I I I know very little about Colombia and and and the Yahe tradition. Really, all that I know comes from Jared Fecetty, shout-out, and um the Operation Purify people, uh Carlos Ryan. I don't know if if you've ever crossed paths with like him and Ryan Carey. Um, I think you'd actually be really interested in the stuff that they do. They run a retreat called Savage Encounter, so it's like a men's retreat where Jared Fecetty actually teaches jujitsu now at this like three-week-long Yahe retreat. So it's pretty cool thing to put together. Yeah. Oh. So all right, so you went there, you went to the Weratica people, where I'm assuming you worked with some peyote out there.

SPEAKER_01 40:38

Yeah, yes. They call it hikurian. So it's just like, yeah, what was your question?

SPEAKER_00 40:42

Hikori, yep. Yeah. Well, uh, my first question was how did you find the taste of it? I thought that peyote tasted so fucking bad.

SPEAKER_01 40:52

It's hard to go down. It is hard to go down, man.

SPEAKER_00 40:55

It's not easy. I never in my life thought that I would ever find myself saying, Man, I sure wish this were ayahuasca that I were drinking because it would taste better. Like, dude, it was the gnarliest shit I've ever consumed. And the way that we did it, which I think is not super traditional, but it was like dried powdered cactus that was ground up and then rehydrated, but it doesn't turn into like a paste or something. It's now just like it had the consistency of like if you shredded cardboard and then just put that in a cup of water and told you to drink it. Like it was so gnarly, bro. I really I did not enjoy that one bit.

SPEAKER_01 41:36

It you know, they say it's like that's the first step in in the medicine is like is feeling it in in in in your uh in the mouth and and all of it. Like you gotta really like yeah, it was is is the I don't think it's I don't think it's for me, man.

SPEAKER_00 41:55

I'll I'll tell you a little bit more about it if you want to hear it. I don't think I had a it was not a good experience. I would be down to try it again if I were like out in that part of the country with legitimate elders who really knew what they were doing. I think that um I don't even think I consumed enough of the medicine to actually really connect to it for one thing, because I I couldn't keep it down. I just threw it up like as soon as it as soon as I swallowed it, which I I think was perhaps my body almost protecting me from going really deep with the medicine because I didn't feel safe in the environment that I was in. It was a sexy place and a sketchy dude guiding it. So I think my brain was just like, nah, we're not doing this right now.

SPEAKER_01 42:36

That has a lot to do with it for sure. I've I've learned that the container is is key in in any of these aspects. You you just have to trust the hundred percent. You have to trust yourself knowing that you're where you're supposed to be, you know. Like you don't have to trust the person that you just met a few days ago fully. You know, it's it's very hard to just trust them, but like you have to trust yourself that they know what they're doing and and like be able to surrender to that.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

The dude who is guiding it, he is my TameScal guy, and I trust him to the end of the earth for a TameScal. And I learned that day that, you know, I think he should know his own uh the limit of his capabilities, perhaps, you know.

SPEAKER_01 43:18

Yeah, um he could be the two, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 43:23

Yeah. Uh so what what was that what was that like for you? And um, you know, I I don't need like a play-by-play of all these different medicines, but I'm really curious like what you picked up from each culture and maybe how they were different. Because like nowadays there's so much information, people hear all these different podcasts, all these different things, like it's really difficult to figure out like what is right for each person or where they should start. So, like, how how would you almost how would you like characterize the differences of what you learned from each tradition or from each medicine, or maybe like the lessons that you applied to your life? Or maybe there's not even that many differences, and it's just kind of like the medicine. And showing you whatever you need at that time, whether it's a peyote or yahe or Ibogaine or what have you.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

Yeah, good question. I would say that each medicine and each tradition and each people's uh they taught me a a specific thing. I think it's just individual for me. That's that's just my takeaway from each one. Like for example, the Kofan taught me about my fears. Uh uh in Witikuta with with with the Widari Kari people, you know, they they taught me about spirituality. There was a point I was in the desert and I was just kind of looking at my dirty hands, and I was like, dude, what am I doing here? Uh and like what what is this all about? So it really taught me about spirituality. It's like, yeah, what are you doing here? And what is this all about? That's a great, that's a perfect place to start.

unknown 45:00

You know?

SPEAKER_01 45:02

Uh I I felt a sense of like uh at some point I was I was walking, we did a vision quest, so we fasted no food, water for two days by ourselves in the desert. Um, and so it just came to realization I was like, wow, you know, G Jesus did this and Buddha did this in the desert, they fasted and and they just try to they were look they were in search of something within, you know, and so uh Hikuri really taught me about spirituality and and and the bigger thing there, you know. Ipoga with with the pygmies um taught me what it was to be a man. Like that was that that that was very clear, like hey, what is it to be a man and how how do you live as a man? Um Colombia, that that kind of brought I we worked with uh specifically with with the with the teachers there, like the the the organization. So um uh it wasn't like a specific tribe or anything like that. It was just the uh a group of people that have been practicing this. So they taught me uh about the different modalities. Uh they put a lot of academic behind it. So, like, hey, the container, like other medicines out there, like some people are on antidepressants and they want to do ayahuasca or or mushrooms, like you have to understand, you have to know that people are doing other um uh other type of prescription medications and how they interact. And you have to understand where people are at. Like in in with a you know, in in in Africa, like you do iboga, like everybody that it's it's not one big melting pot like it is in the United States. In the United States, you have a melting pot of ideas, cultures, everything. So it's like take a moment to really l examine each individual and what if they should be stepping into this field of of psychedelics. Uh, and if not, okay, that's okay. But like getting them ready to be able to walk them into something safely in that container. Because maybe they want to do it because they saw the Netflix special uh and they they're running to ayahuasca, but maybe that's gonna really hurt them.

SPEAKER_00 47:33

So it's like you got some of that education on on like the the safety and harm reduction, and just like, hey, let's slow down a little bit and really look at what we're doing here. But uh you I would love for you to share some of these answers with the class here, Bruno. You said the Ibogaine taught you how to be a man, and the the he could he taught you about spirituality and like what are we doing here? Uh what it what'd you learn?

SPEAKER_01 48:00

I I don't know. I don't know. I'm still trying to try to figure that shit out, man. Uh I I well, I can tell you like with the boga, I I did an initiation with the buy tradition.

SPEAKER_00 48:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Dude, a good friend of mine just did this like by accident. He thought he was signing up for just like an Ibogain retreat, like just normal, just take Ibogain, see what happens. But he got there and it was like a full-on initiation into this tribe. Yeah. And he was like locked in a fucking cell for a week with like no food and no water, and he was like, Yeah, I thought I was gonna die the whole time, but really glad I did it. Like fucking crazy.

SPEAKER_01 48:40

Yeah, yeah, dude. It's probably the the hard I remember uh because I was there for like three weeks, I believe it was three weeks. My initiation was towards the end. So we did two initiations with the group that we that I went with. I think it was 11 of us. There's uh three men, and uh the rest were were women, and the women did their own initiation, and I remember like you know, we helped prepare the initiation for them. So they had the iboga, they they took the root from the iboga tree, they put it in honey, they put all these different flowers, they made them into these little balls, and they like the the presentation was just like very feminine. And with uh with my initiation with the misoko, it was uh they gave me a bowl, they threw all the uh iboga root, and they told me that I had to peel the the the uh the root, so like the skin of the root, that's the that's the psychoactive aspect of of the of that's the ibergine, right? And so they gave me a bowl with like all these roots that I had to peel myself. I had to like dust off all the dirt, and then I had to eat it. There's no honey, there's no, it was a freaking just a bowl. They kind of threw it to you on the ground, and it was just like, all right, have at it. And I remember chewing it, and like you think, you think hequity is is is hard. It's this is because you had to chew it, and so you're chewing it, and that in itself is just like that was just an experience almost to me. This is just me, that almost was traumatic within itself, just like having to eat this bowl, and the and you're in front of a mirror, and the whole tribe is there, so they're just watching you, you know, and the kids are there and they're playing music, and it's just like it it was it was game time, you know. And so um, yeah, that that uh the the boga uh as far as like the that energy and that initiation of of manhood was was significant because it it really I I came home with an understanding that I've I was like 39, I think, some somewhere along those lines when I did it. And it was clear to me that I was that I was a 30 39-year-old child. I was not a man. You know? Uh and uh and I came home and it was very there's a lot of conflict in the house after I came home. Um very necessary conflict though.

SPEAKER_00 51:13

Um like a a a reckoning of things that had been out of alignment, and so therefore there's just kind of friction as you make changes, or like why was there conflict?

SPEAKER_01 51:24

Yeah, um I I I I I feel like you know, I was going in a direction was the right direction, but I was I I was too aligned with the feminine energy within myself, you know. I would let things pass. I just kind of like flow and it's okay, yeah, it's alright, you know. And also I might I have to add that uh coming home during that time, my wife, I think when I was in Africa, my wife boom started her her perimenopause. So I I came home.

SPEAKER_00 52:03

Doesn't help.

SPEAKER_01 52:04

Yeah, no, no, no. I came home needing uh needing my wife to hold me in her arms every once in a while and just letting me cry. You know, I I just in my head, that's what I needed. You know, I I needed that. I I just needed to cry. I needed to to like, okay, what what is this? What what is going on with everything that I just saw, with what the medicine showed me with the initiation, like that that was hard. It was it was very hard. And my wife uh on the opposite end was like, nah, and you know what, stop breathing because it's annoying. And so it's like, you know, it's you know, it's like I remember we would shower together, and and like I would like put dip my head in the shower and to try to take the soap off my beard, and she's like, dude, you're hugging up all the water, get out of here, you know. And it was just like this huge rejection of of the feminine. And as I was learning, you know, that I that that what manhood was, you know, and and it was it was just a hard, like two words collided, you know, because my my wife needed to to be more masculine uh growing up. She's the eldest, so she took the role of of the mom, you know, and so she and she was a protector of her sisters. So like she was very um she was just very masculine. She was a protector, you know, and like I would tell the kids, go wash the dishes, and she would protect the kids from the dad, because that's that's in her head, that just made sense, you know. Um that's that's how she needed to survive. And so that shift of being able to and really what this work has taught me is really uh how to how to approach that without like you know being very blunt, being uh very un unaffectionate or uncompassionate. It's just like, okay, I see a I see an I see a thing here that is not working out, it doesn't feel right, so how do we address this? Um and so that that's it's really helped me out in that. Looking at myself of manhood and all of that also is just like, hey, look look at these areas. What what is it to be a man? Like develop your your own understanding of what manhood means to you, and then live by that. Like live in those in that in whatever you say that whatever you believe that to be, whatever your morals, your ethics, your sacredness, like all those things, like you gotta live it. You can't just be like this dude that's like, oh, I went to Africa and I'm like very spiritual and like all this stuff, and and then I come home and I'm born, you know.

SPEAKER_00 54:46

What I would call integration. It's like how do we make this a more than just a crazy vacation that I took to Africa, but it's actually this is a turning point in my life. Um, all right. So you said that you were 39 when you had that trip?

SPEAKER_01 55:00

Yeah, I think I was cool.

SPEAKER_00 55:01

I'm 31, so I got I got eight years. I got eight years to become a man. I can do that. All right, we're gonna we're we're gonna enter the purely selfish part of this podcast right now for a minute. So you said uh you're figuring out what it meant to be a man. You said you gotta develop your own understanding of manhood and live that out. Uh what did that look like for you? Because I I I'll give you one little piece of context here. So my wife is currently three months pregnant with kid number two, and it's gonna be a boy. And this, I think the ultrasound was just on Monday, so this is still sinking in in real time. Today's Thursday. Um I've been thinking about how you know people say like raising boys is easy, and I think that's nonsense. And one of our clients the other day was actually like people say that what they mean is raising a like boys are easy to ignore, so you can just pretend that things are fine. Uh, that really stuck with me. But um, I have found raising a daughter to be pretty easy so far because all I have to do is be like loving and protecting, which is for me is very easy, but I don't think right now I would set a good example for a boy. Like if my boy grew up to be exactly as I am right now, I would be disappointed in him, right? So help me, Bruno.

SPEAKER_01 56:24

Oh boy, oh boy.

SPEAKER_00 56:27

You're like, I don't know, bro. I have two daughters.

SPEAKER_01 56:29

I have two daughters, yeah, exactly. Oh man, I will tell you one thing, man. Uh I was when I went to Africa, I was with this other guy um that was part of the training. He he been to Africa in the past, and I'm gonna go into like I'm gonna loop around to we're we'll go back to to this question here. So um, and we just we just hit it off, man. He was super cool, dude, you know, very young. He was like 20, he's like 27, something like I don't know, very young, but like just I I felt that he was just he had this presence of him, you know. I just started talking to him. He was in Africa, he uh spent like three months with a Masai tribe in Africa and the plains of Africa where the lions are at and stuff like that. And he told me that he witnessed uh oh no, that they taught taught to him, uh, and he almost went out to hunt a lion. So their initiation of manhood uh for their boys is uh, and this is according to him, and I I believe this is true, and I've kind of looked into it a little bit. Um what they do is when the boys are are are transitioning to manhood, what they do is they're they line up the fathers, uh, they go look for a lion in the plains. Once they find a lion, they have the boys circle the lion. So they they form this big circle around the lion. And the boys are in front and the fathers are behind them, right? And the fathers have the spears, you know. The boys are without any weapons, and so they're being confronted with this lion. And now what the lion has to do, it has to survive. That's that's the mission, is to survive. And what the lion does is they it looks for the weakest link in that circle, in that chink, right? They they need to look for that chink in the armor because that's the way out. So it starts to circle around, looking at each boy in the eye as it's going around. Once it identifies which boy has the most fear, right, then it locks into that. That's when the men come in, and then they open the circle and then they let the lion go out. Uh, I think that's what he told me. I think they might might kill him. I don't know. But then, you know, they I the point of it is that they identify which boy has the most fear. And instead of scolding that boy of like, dude, you're weak, you know, like you don't belong here, that's where they the all the resources to help that individual become uh strong. Instead of like scolding him, then they pick him up. Then they they then they like we here we would like take him to jujitsu and just kind of like being compassionate, but also like, hey, dude, like we gotta pick it up here because you know, like you're part of why this tribe is going to continue to survive. And we need everybody to be to be strong, you know, but also loving and all those things. So to kind of answer your question, you know, one thing that I've realized in all of this is um is initiations, you know, just the the smallest things, you know, like the the rituals, the the everyday, it's just like making something in important with with voice so they can understand like the the importance of life, the importance of their power, the importance of of why they they seem to be protectors, like we're protectors of of women, right? In a sense. And that that that you know that might not land well with a lot of people, but in a sense, like for me, like I, you know, in if somebody were to come into my house, it it's out of order if my wife gets in front of me and tries to tackle the the thief, you know, or or whatever that person is. Like that's my job in a sense, right? Uh including my daughter. My daughter right now, she's she's seven, my oldest is 19, and she's in college, you know, and it's my duty to make sure that that I jump in front of the lion if I need to do that, you know. So um, but how do we do that? And that's with under is is giving individuals the understanding of the importance of every step in in your life, and also understanding that, like, okay, you fucked up big time in this part of your life, you fucked up big time. And that's okay. Like, we're here living a human experience, and that experience means that you're going to go through the array of everything. And so maybe you have a lot of shame, maybe you have a lot of anger, maybe you have a lot of fear, maybe you have a lot of whatever that is. Maybe you're a very violent individual, all of that stuff. Like, that's your human experience. So, like, let's let's examine that for a while. And when it makes sense, when it's no longer serving you, how do we create a ritual uh or an initiation to to move on to the next step in life? Um, and I feel like in in in our society we've really forgotten about just those steps of like these initiatory aspects, right? Like, oh, you walked for the first time. Like that's important. What does that mean? This is like, oh, now you're walking, not now you're walking into who you're gonna become in the future, like all of those, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:52

Well, it's funny. I don't know, I mean, dude, you're fucking for one thing, you're spot on with the initiation, the importance of that and the lack of that today, and how that's fucking us. The other thing that I pull out from this lion story, other than that's fucking crazy, and like epic is that there's also this tribe around that like weak quote unquote boy who's then investing in him and lifting him up, right? Um, because I I think you know, we run this this microdosing program, and I resisted for the longest time having a a men's group in there, which is probably because dude, I feel like men's groups are usually fucking lame as hell. I don't know, dude. It's uh it's a little sit around and sniff our own fucking farts. But also I'm sure part of that comes from me being scared to confront the things in myself that I would have to change and and you know be called out on. But I am like the shepherd of this little flock, and like I need someone to fucking shepherd me, which is maybe why I've also been like embracing Christianity lately because there's a lot of that kind of imagery and stuff in there. It's really interesting. But um, on the initiate, we can circle back to that on the initiation front. I have this watch. I have I'm kind of into collecting watches. This was given to me in my bar mitzvah. So 13 years old, you're supposed to be a man now. Like, what a load of bullshit, bro. I got up there and I recited some shit that I don't even know what I said. They taught me how to pronounce Hebrew. I couldn't read it. So I could speak it out loud, but I didn't know what the fuck I was saying. It was like the worst day of my entire life because I was this fat, nerdy, little awkward kid who has to get up in front of people and not just get up in front of people, but now sing in a different language. Like, get the fuck out of here. And then congrats, you're a man now. Here's a watch. Like, what are we even doing here, dude? It meant nothing. But with our daughter, so we just weaned her from breastfeeding like five days ago, maybe four days ago. And um, there's this book. If there are any other parents out there, there's this book called Booby Moon, and it was it's amazing. So we did this little ritual where you read her this book for like months to like prepare her for it, because the book is about this ritual, and then you do it, which is we got a helium balloon and we tied glow sticks onto it. She'd never seen glow sticks before in her life. So the glow sticks were the booby magic, and the booby magic has to go back up to the moon because you're a big girl now and you have teeth and you can eat with a fork, so you don't need it anymore. It has to go back to the moon, and then the moon's gonna give it back to another baby who who you know needs the breast milk. And so we were explaining this to her for months, and then we go and we do this thing, and she releases the magic back up to the moon. And now when she wants breast milk, we can remind her, like, hey, you remember when we did this, like we said bye-bye to the magic, like we don't have it anymore. It had to go back up to the moon, and she's like, Oh yeah, and like she talks about it like all the time. She talks about like releasing the balloon and like how the Chi Chi is we call it Chi Chi and fucking Mexican slang for titty. So we actually call it the Chi Chi moon. But uh, so like that gave her an understanding of this transitional period. That's because there were like a couple nights with a little bit less sleep, but like I got nothing to compare it to, but it seems like a very smooth transition for her, which is like she's breastfed to sleep every single day of her entire existence up until five days ago. That's a pretty major thing to just like poof disappear one day. And I I I really think it's because of this like physical ritual that gave her the understanding. And I feel like maybe for you, it's almost similar with like the Ibogain was this turning point where like any time that I am conflicted or any time that I feel like I'm straying, I think back to that thing, and like it was so profound of a turning point that it's just a little reminder of like, oh yeah, this is what we're doing now. So for my daughter, when she's like, Mama Chi Chi, Mama Chi Chi, we're like, no, honey, remember? We sent it back up to the moon. And she's like, right, yep, we're done with that now.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:53

And dude, like, we don't have that in any meaningful way in our societies anymore. Like, I don't look at this water. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm a man now. Got it. Like, dude. I don't know, man.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:06

Yeah, no, that's yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:09

No, I was gonna say I'm I'm I'm done. I'm done ranting. So I'm trying to figure out we're trying to figure out how to do that for our daughter now. And you know, she'll do she'll do psychedelics and stuff in time, and I'm sure we'll make some rituals and ceremonies and stuff around that.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:22

Wonderful, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:23

Um, but yeah, I maybe that's the answer, dude. Maybe I need to, I don't, I'm not going to fucking Africa, dude. I'm not doing Ibogaine. But uh I am very interested in like a vision quest. My TameScal guy keeps trying to bring me out to the Sundance to do a uh a vision quest and do like the sun dance with yeah, so maybe I'll do that. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:42

Maybe, yeah, yeah. For sure, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:44

It resonates that you say that uh eboga for me was the teaching one, like because it's true, like those are like five five words that have never before been put together in that order in the history of humankind, bro.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:58

It's fucking so true though, bro. Uh it took away all all the safety net, is just like, dude, get out there. You know, like go. You know, and and I think that's one of the things for men specifically is being comfortable having no safety net. It's all on you, man. Like it's it's all it's it's all like it's all on all of us. But like some maybe you'll be homeless for a day or a week or a month or a year. It's like, yeah, you'll figure it out, dude. It's okay. Like, figure it out. You'll you'll be alright. Like just get it learn to get out of your way. And I think for men, uh I I agree with you on uh on men's groups and stuff like that, but uh I've learned that uh you know, helping men confront their fear and them understanding that their fear like could do nothing to them all along. You know what I mean? Like just in your head, stop it. So I think for for young boys, you know, being a father, if I had a son, it it would be teaching teaching him slowly, slowly with a lot of compassion, a lot of love, and a lot of uh strength when needed, and being rough when needed on uh w how to do away with fear. Because if you look at it too, man, like I I do a lot of work with women and like they talk about their how men um treated them in many ways, and uh it was a guy that was just full of anger and the precursor to anger is fear, you know? And so uh the quicker we are to teach men um how to do away with fear in a certain in a certain sense of you know, again, initiation, dude, you're confronted with a lion at some point in your life. Everybody's confronted with a lion. So um being able to identify that and the you said sorry, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:59

I'm I'm sorry for interrupting you. You said the precursor to anger is fear, and I just nodded like, yeah, dude, of course it is. Uh why where does that come from? Because I mean I we we talk about anger a lot in our program, and it I I feel like anger is a surface level emotion, like there's stuff under it. We often point to like grief or sadness. I don't know that fear would be the first thing that I would point to either. So can you help me understand that? You're like, fuck, I don't know, it just sounded cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:32

No, no. I uh I I I've I'm learning that the more and more that I work with people, the more and more I see that there is just this there's the shame, there's the all all of it for men specifically, I'm talking about men, okay, right? Uh I see that there when somebody's very like aggressive and you start to like start to like unravel and help them help them see deeper within, it it always points to fear. I'm not great with words, so I'm not gonna be able to like bring this like super like uh philosophical like meaning to it. Um I I do very well again in the family constellation. That's really where where I'm able to to help people see that for themselves, you know, like I family I go back to Family Constellation to help answer this. In Family Constellation, usually what I work with either objects, so I have like a bunch of different objects, I have like all sorts of different like little statues and like little things, you know, like you know, maybe like some something like this, you know what I mean, with like a candle or something like that. Um just a bunch of different things that I have uh that that we use. Uh or we use other people. For example, in a family constellation, say uh you, David, you you come up and you're like, you know, I just uh I don't know. I I have a lot of uh I have a lot of anger, and then I just start asking you more questions about your family, how's your relationship with your dad, all these things, even even this, this, this experience with the bar mitzvah. And then at some point, uh I'll ask you to like pick somebody that could help represent your dad, for example. And so in the group, you look around, and it doesn't matter if it's a boy or a woman, you'll you'll pick somebody that could represent your father, and then somebody that could represent your mom or something like that. And then you just put them in this field. The field is is is essentially like in the circle, you know, like where the lion is, essentially, right? And then from there, it just becomes like uh a movement. And so I'm asking you to like, okay, place your dad somewhere, place your mom somewhere, and and within that place, wherever you place that that that individual that represents that that whatever that whatever you bring to the field, because I'm not telling you like, hey, you need to work on your dad. It's like, no, you're talking about something that happened in your childhood that you're that's still unresolved. So it's like, let's look at that. So if that could that possibly could be your dad. So let's bring your dad into the picture. Let's let's see where do you place them and then how far apart you are from that. And so it's just like it's always going towards this um, this a deeper level understanding of okay, you have this anger, but like what where was the where would that that where was that creation? Where did that start essentially? Most of the time it's through some type of abandonment or feeling of of like uh you know, for you know, just kind of like going off of what you're saying, right? Like your bar mitzvah, it's like it was just very confusing. And so it's like, oh, I'm supposed to be a man now, uh, but you're 13 years old, right? And now you're a man. And so it's like now you're you're flung into this world uh with the understanding that you're a man. And so like in the family constellation, we'll we'll constellate that so you can see it. And I can tell you that nine times out of 10, it for men specifically, it was that they were they were just scared of what was happening around them or what happened to them and and all that situation. Uh the same thing with like the objects, you know, like somebody will place an object. Sometimes, you know, like they hate their mom or something like that, and they'll place an object that's just like very um, could be very dark objects, you know, and like they'll place it somewhere in the field, and it's just like it's information, and that's how they're viewing their their their their parents, just in this dark essence. And so that was the creation of where all of this, all of these emotions started from uh from from developmental stages, you know, and so um I can I again I don't know how to answer that in a very like academic way, but what I can tell you is that most men, if not all, that I've worked with, the underlying to all of their anger was that they were they're not good enough, they're not loved, they they didn't receive the love. Uh their fathers were just not present, and so it created the sense of not being good enough, and so there's a fear in that, not being good enough. So, like you have to like really bring yourself up. You know, you have to be a very violent person or whatever that individual's going through. Uh you just have to be a very angry to like that that's the first level of defense is your anger, and that that anger, in a sense, kind of diffuses whatever situation that you're f that you're afraid of. Um and so it works for some time until it doesn't. And so it's just really examining that. And so again, from my experience working with men, most of them, if not all, like the fear was the the thing that created anger. Protecting that.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:09

Yeah, and I I think a common thing for a lot of men is like shame of various things. Um and I guess shame is really nothing more than like the fear of being found out, or like the fear of being seen for how you truly are, or some some part of you being brought into the light. So that makes sense. Hmm. I'm intrigued by this family constellations thing, man. Uh the only uh you're the only um non fucking crazy person that I've ever talked to who who's into this. I say that because like I don't have you actually been to Tulum. Do you know like what this place is like here?

SPEAKER_02 1:15:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:47

Yeah, bro. There's just like you know, white people with wide-brimmed hats with feathers in it and wearing flowing fucking robes and calling themselves shamans, and like that's my only experience with family constellation people. So I think off the bat, I was like, this is fucking nonsense. But the way that you have described it to me, it sounds like that it could be very valuable to pursue. Um, I don't know, man. Maybe I'll come see you one day before I turn 39.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:14

I got yeah, the the soon as you got you got seven more months before he before your son is born, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:22

Well, bro, that was that was why I did peyote the first time, man. Was like my my wife was pregnant with our daughter Sita, and I was like, the the man that I am right now is not this is gonna sound wrong. I was like, it's not good enough to be the father that I want to be, and not not good enough as like I'm unworthy or whatever, but just like there's some shit I'm doing wrong that I gotta stop. Like I gotta stop fucking these things up in the same way. And that I peyote and a lot of Tama Skulls were were part of that. Um I don't have fucking time for that, man, because like still got one kid if you could watch that.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:57

That's true, man. That that yeah, that's the yeah, that if I can just say, like, when you say like I'm not good enough uh to be a father of a daughter at that point, like if that's what you felt, like that's a fucking great place to start. And that's where you need that's where you need to just start doing the work, man. And so we often are are like we put ourselves down uh often, and then you know, we say something like, and I've I've done this and I hear this all the time, like I'm not good enough to do this, you know, like yeah, that that's if I had a a dollar for every time I heard that, right? Um, but in in in my mind, like what a perfect place to start. Like when you said that, and then you went out to do the work, and then you said that with your son. It's like uh, and you're right. Like right now, dude, you're not good enough to be a father. You're 31, right? Like, yeah, you it's you gotta go out there and learn. And and so that's it's beautiful to to look at it, and that's how I approach everything. It's just like shit, I don't know how to do that. All right, so I gotta I gotta go fucking look up a manual or I gotta go to Colombia or whatever, you know. Like I want, I want to learn, and that's that's where the beauty is really doing that.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:12

I'm trying trying to convince my wife. Part of that is me getting into woodworking. She doesn't want me buying all these fucking tools, but I'm like, dude, gotta teach my son how to do this.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:22

You gotta do it, man. You know, for for me, I'm like, yeah, that's what you gotta do. And also that's part of like being a man, also, is just like, hey, babe, yeah, I got a DJ set that I just got here. You know, it's like right here, and I told my wife, I'm just gonna buy a DJ set, and she's like, dude, you're 43, bro. Like, come on. I'm like, yeah, but you know something? I'm gonna do it, you know, and like all these little things that I got. Like last month I bought like uh a toolbox and I just bought a bunch of art supplies and I packed it, and now I'm doing art, you know, and sometimes I do music, and it's just like again, that's part of like being men of the creativity we we need.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:04

I talk about this all the time with our clients, man. I I don't know what the ratio is, but there is an ideal ratio of creation to consumption for humans to just function well, and modern society puts you in like 99.9% consumption mode. And even if it's something positive like podcasts or books, you are still consuming someone else's ideas. Terence McKenna talks about this a lot like culture is your enemy, do not consume culture, you have to create your own culture, dude. Complete silent. Do you know the the artist Akira the Don? Do you know who this is? Yeah, yeah. All right, good, good.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:42

Yeah, he's he's a good good artist, man. I mean, I love his music.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:47

I often think, like, what would my life look like if I listened to nothing other than Akira the Don and I read nothing other than the Bhagavad Gita and maybe the Bible in the mix? Like, if that was all that I consumed, I would probably be doing so much better. But instead, I listened to a podcast about the Fukushima nuclear disaster the other day. That didn't make my life any better. Why was I listening to that while doing dishes? Like, what's wrong with me, dude? I don't know, man.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:15

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:16

Bro, what's your wife been up to with all this? Because like she's got her own shit from her upbringing. Does she get to heal and and go play shaman in Africa? Like, is she doing any of this or is she just fucking holding it down at home?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:28

She does not that that does not interest her at all. And so it's not something with all of this stuff for me. Like, um I I don't uh I don't ever s again go into conception. I I don't try to get people to consume this stuff. Like you don't have to go to Africa.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:44

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:45

Uh you know, you don't have to you don't have to do any you want to stay home and watch a movie, do like that's what you want to do with your life, go for it. You know what I mean? There's consequences. So with my wife, it's really been uh a huge journey and in one where I I'll tell you, I um a couple years ago I started doing this work. Uh, I've been doing it for a couple years at that moment. And I remember her looking at me and she said, I I feel like you're so far ahead of me in like your spirituality and like your healing and like all this stuff. And uh when she said it too, like I recognized because she doesn't she she won't give me a compliment until uh unless she really means it, you know? And so she's like you know, when you first started doing psychedelics and all this, whatever this was, like uh for me it was just like oh it's just a phase, the shoe will drop, you know, like he'll find something else in three months, like he always does. Because I went when I before this, like, oh, I wanted to do this, and I went, did it, got bored, did something else. So for her, it's like he's just gonna get bored. A year later, it's like, oh shit, it's not he's he's going at it still, like he's still he's still working on himself. Two years, three years, four years, and that like around that fourth year, she she turned to me and she said, Yeah, I just feel so behind. Like I have so much like things in my spiritual, I don't know who Jesus is, I don't know, I don't know, I don't even know my lady parts, like I don't know it, I don't know any of this stuff. Um, so that that's when I just kind of pulled out my hand. I'm like, well, it I'm I'm always here to to to to walk the path with you, you know. Um, and and that's how I approach that with her, and it's been very beautiful. She's a trauma nurse at at a hospital here in Las Vegas.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:34

So she's too she sees crazy shit.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:37

Yeah. Every day she sees uh intensive life or death situations when she's at work, you know? And not just that situation, but then also dealing with the families, being a mother, um, often seeing young kids, 19-year-old kids that are, you know, got ran over by a drunk driver or something like that. And she's dealing with not just the the person that's that that got hit, but the family and and all of that stuff. So uh that always brings up things for her. Uh so it's it's for me, it's really being the opportunity giving me the opportunity to to have a place that she can land, feel safe, feel heard, uh, feel important, and feel like she can just um like let go let go of work and all the other stuff. And then also giving her the opportunity sometimes to be like, hey, you know how this area of your life you're struggling with, and then that's when I kind of use my all my I call it whale shit. Uh there's like chicken shit, there's bullshit, and then there's whale shit, right? Again, this is something that I learned uh chicken shit is just like little things like like that don't matter, like you're uh a uh do you like chocolate chip cookies? No, I would never eat chocolate chip cookies. You eat you you eat chocolate chip cookies, dude. Like, don't lie. You know, like little things that we say or or little ideas about who we are that we tell ourselves, you know, bullshit or like bigger things, bigger ideas about ourselves. Um, maybe it could be something along the lines of like um, you know, yeah, uh, I'm a uh I'm a perfect father or something like that. That's bullshit, dude. You know? Uh and then well shit is just like the philosophy, and like maybe it's Christianity as a whole, or or Buddhism, and like there's this all of this stuff is like at the end of the day, we don't know. None of us know. We might feel like we know the truth, and that's perfect, and that's good, and it feels right, and follow that. But all of it at the end of the day, like nobody knows what this is all about. Nobody has the answer. We're all just trying to figure it out together. That's it. You know what I mean? Like Jesus, maybe he knew, like maybe maybe Siddhartha knew, like, maybe they they they were brought and they had this understanding, and that's great, but I'm not Jesus or the Buddha or anybody like that. I'm just a regular dude that's trying to figure it out. And in my heart, I know I know what is real to me, and I know my truth and the way that that it makes sense to me. But that's that's all well shit. Even like the healing aspects, like sometimes I'll go into like, well, you know, you gotta this is you know, this makes sense that the reason why you're doing you're protecting your heart is because your your mom didn't love you and this and all of that. That's like maybe maybe, maybe not. I don't I don't know. You know what I mean? So it's like uh I I never approach something as though like I'm a guru and that's the truth and that's that, you know what I mean? All of it, it it's all poetry, you know, like religion, uh Jesus, uh the Buddha, you know, Muslim, like any of it, even in the in in in the indigenous traditions, like their belief system, it's all poetry, and you gotta read it and you gotta appreciate it, and you gotta soak it in. Um, and sometimes you just can't take it that serious, you know, like yeah, life is sacred, but like uh you're gonna die, you know, and then you're gonna find out the truth, and then I don't know what the truth is.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:31

Dude, I think that's that's beautifully put, bro. And uh hopefully this podcast has been some good poetry for people to listen to. I appreciate it, man. This is this is good shit. This is thank you. Uh yeah, this is cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:43

Thank God.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:44

I gotta fucking talk to you more, bro. Not even not even in in podcast context. Um I really appreciate you talking to me about this stuff, man. If you couldn't tell, there's some shit on my fucking mind that I'm trying to figure out via apparently podcasts. So thank you for for doing this with me. I really appreciate it, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:01

100%, bro. I love it. And again, dude, go. I I don't know if your wife will approve of me saying this, but go buy the woodwork stuff, man, and just go create something better than being on Instagram, you know what I mean? Like, do it. That's what we're supposed to do, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:15

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:16

And it's gonna make you better at some point, you know. It's like you're gonna be sitting there trying to mold this boat together and you're gonna fuck it up and you're gonna have an epiphany of being a dad, you know. I I don't know, or not, I don't know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:32

Uh, dude, I mean, I I I think so. Um, I've talked about this before. The whole reason I even wanted to have kids, I was on a bike ride in New Jersey. I bought this nice ass bike during the pandemic, like everyone else did. And I was listening to Akira the Don, and I was on mushrooms, and I was stoned, and I had drank a bunch of coffee, and I went for this bike ride. And like this one Alan Watts lecture in this Akira the Don song just like hit me in a certain way, and it completely changed my worldview. And I decided in that moment. Moment that I wanted to become a dad. So clearly, I need to get really high and go do some woodworking, which is probably not advisable. And I'll have some more fucking epiphanies one day. That's my plan.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:11

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:12

I it sounds you're like, yeah, I wouldn't, I wouldn't advise that, but you know, everyone has their own.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:17

I don't know what you know. Again, dude, like I don't tell people what to do, man. Like, that sounds like you might you you're onto something there, you know, and why not? Again, like the whole world for me, I I I'm being more observant of the world, and the whole world is trying to tell us what we can and can't. There's always these left and right lateral limits of like, hey, don't do this and don't do that. And psychosis is bad, and don't do this, and like, you know, like all these things that they're telling us what we can and can't do. And uh, and and I mean, I don't know. I I don't know if any of that is right, you know. Like I've I've I've had my fair share, a little bit of like psychosis in one of my experiences, and it's just like there's a lot, there's a lot to learn from that. You know, there's a lot to learn from from going out there and and again, like not having that that that that safety net and just plunging into life and like all right, you know, I was told not to do this, I was told not to go to Africa, I was told not to do iboga, I was told that, you know, uh West African cultures are very they're very dark and they they summon the devil. I was told all these things, and then I went to go find out for myself, and uh I'm pretty happy with everything that I found out. You know, it's like it's a it's a great life experience that I've had so far, you know.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:37

So thanks again for sharing some of it with me, man. I appreciate it. Yeah, um is there anywhere that you would like want people to go check you out? Not really, right? Fucking go file a complaint with a DMV in in Nevada. I like I don't know, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:54

Yeah, uh no.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:57

I'll cut that part out.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:59

No, that's no keep it in there, please. Uh I I uh you know, right now I'm in the process of creating uh well, we've created a nonprofit. Um we originally called it Soul Miners, but now we're calling it Soul Sacrifice, uh and it deals with jujitsu at the property out in uh in um in uh yeah, and it's it's right by the Grand Canyon mountain ranges. It's just it's small, very very small. I take a handful of people out that are just interested, and we introduce them to uh jujitsu. And I work out at Extreme Couture MMA here in Las Vegas, so it's like a really famous gym. There's a lot of martial artists there. Just like, you know, I I love that world. You know, I know you're really into it. So I just I felt like, you know, I have this, I have this home, I have uh, you know, this network. Why not create a nonprofit out of it? Uh make a little money as far as like, you know, buying mats. Like again, like I I had this, I had this uh this obstacle. Like I wanted to do jujitsu at the property that I bought because there's like uh I have a 1600 square foot garage there. So how do I buy mats? I don't have the money to buy mats. Well, you know, create a nonprofit, fundraise, buy the mats, invite people over, give them food, teach them how to do breath work, yoga, talk to them about the lion.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:24

This is amazing. I have not, for the life of me, I have not been able to understand why I was the only person on earth doing something like my jujitsu retreat, where we I mean, I know yours is gonna be a little bit different, but literally I was like, how is this not everywhere? Like, this is the coolest fucking thing I have ever heard of. Why did I have to make this be a thing? I don't want that. If I'm actively trying to stop doing them because they're like so fucking stressful, and everyone keeps trying to twist my arm into doing more of them. So, yes, please buy these mats so I can tell people to go to your fucking place.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:02

I'm not gonna I'm not gonna lie to you, bro. Like, there's a couple of times because you you invited me to your to your retreat, and it's just like I I was super spaced out, uh spread out, and like uh when you invited me, I'm uh I'm like, man, I really want to go. And then the idea came to me a couple months later, and I'm like, oh David, I'm I'm copying, I'm cutting and pasting. But you know, it's that's okay, you know. Like, you know, and uh and so I just figu again, dude, like I love jujitsu. I I I love the guys and the girls that I do it with, and like we so it just made sense and and uh and and everything. So yeah, dude. Yeah, so uh our website is soulminersretreat.com uh or dot org. Uh and uh yeah, soul minorsretreat.org. And then you can find out more about what we're doing there. Uh we're in the process again, we're in the process of uh shifting everything. The the website when we first started it, we're just gonna do like hikes, we're gonna like do breath work, ice baths, all of that stuff. We shifted it into uh uh because we were like, all right, like it just seems stressful. And some of the people that I work with, they we all do jujitsu. So at one point we're like, why don't we just do jujitsu? And that's it, and breath work, and and and then we eat and then we have a bonfire and we make fun of each other. You know, it's like why don't we just do that? Uh and then so yeah, yeah. So um there's no medicine involved, nothing like that. It's just it's just we go out, we have one of the guys from the gym do a seminar, they teach us how to how to do a move, uh, then we roll for a couple of hours, then I feed everybody, then they can go home or they can spend a night there.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:50

Yeah. Cool. That sounds fucking lovely, man. Um you obviously know what you're doing, but if there's anything I can ever do to support with my uh with my wealth of jujitsu retreat knowledge over here, you know, you fucking let me know for real. Anything I can do to help you with what you're doing. I I like the sound of this a lot. Appreciate it. I wish I could just give you my mats, but that's not really gonna work. They're all in my fucking underneath my stairs, just taking up all of the storage space in my house, dude. All right, man. Let's call it a day here. I got I gotta go, I gotta go feed my pregnant wife. So thank you very much for your time, buddy. I love you, man. Be in touch soon.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:30

David, thank you, bro. I really appreciate you reaching out. I know we we talked a while ago. Thank you for the the time and the opportunity and the questions and and what you're doing too, man. Like, I really appreciate it. I know that everybody's out there trying to do psychedelics and and like uh, you know, you can throw a it sometimes it just feels like on social media I'll uh I'll throw a penny somewhere and it lands on a shaman. Uh definitely not that. Uh and like really, you know, like your questions and your approach and everything is uh I really appreciate it. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to be here and and let let me you know flap my mouth for a little while and and and give you a bunch of whale shit.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:13

Not dude, it was is good whale shit. I hate it. Thank you. Thank you. Of course, man. Appreciate you. All right, guys. Hopefully there were some good nuggets of wisdom there from Bruno that can apply to your life. I think there definitely was some interesting stuff that hopefully I will apply to my life. And uh truthfully, I I hope that you enjoyed this little window into my brain and the issues that I'm facing right now. I feel like I've been a little bit more vulnerable than usual on the podcast. So I hope that you're digging this and I hope that it's valuable to you. I hope I can figure some shit out as well. So thank you for listening to this podcast. Until next time, God bless you. Peace out. Talk to you soon.