Ashley Booth, M.S. - Ayahuasca, DMT, Integration, and Los Angeles

Hello and welcome back everybody to Psychedelics Today. This is Joe, your host. Today on the show we have Ashley Booth. Ashley is great. She is responsible for some really interesting stuff out of Los Angeles. A former marine oceanographer, sorry Ashley, is responsible for a WARE project, Rethinking Psychedelics and Interspace Integration. I think there's going to be events on both sides of Los Angeles, being east and west, in the near future to help serve audiences on both sides of the valley. It seems like a really great project and she's doing great work. Formerly partnered, doing a lot of work with Cherie Malkin-Gadassi, former guest on the show. Let me read you the bio here that we have on the blog. Ashley Booth, MS, is a scientist, a philosopher, and psychedelic ambassador. After years of working in environmental science, she has experienced a radical paradigm shift through the use of psychedelics, which ignited a passion for awakening the human, awakening of human consciousness. Ashley uses her scientific background to break through the war on drugs rhetoric and have an intelligent and scientifically based conversation about the safety and use of psychedelic substances. Ashley is the founder of the AWARE project, Rethinking Psychedelics, at awareproject.org, which hosts educational and community building events in Los Angeles and San Diego. She is also a co-founder of Interspace Integration, innerspaceintegration.com, a psychedelic integration support service and harm reduction organization in Southern California. For a year and a half, she worked as a psycho-spiritual coach at Crossroads Treatment Center, supporting people through Ibogaine and 5-MeO experiences. She is a certified kundalini yoga teacher and is currently training in a somatic psychotherapy program. Ashley is a certified kundalini yoga teacher and is currently training in a somatic psychotherapy program. Ashley is a certified kundalini yoga teacher and is currently training in a somatic psychotherapy approach known as the Hakomi Method. Ashleybooth.net is her site and we'll give you a shout out to that later as well. So it's a great conversation. Really appreciate Ashley coming on the show to talk about her work and sharing her story. I think that's it for that. Enjoy the show. If you want to support us, there's a lot of ways to support us. Some free ways. If you want to leave a review on Facebook or iTunes, that would be awesome. All you do is go to iTunes store, search for Psychedelics Today, find the show, and there will be a review button there. And on the Facebook page, there's also a review. Maybe the best free way is to just tell your friends about the show. Maybe find a favorite and shoot them a link or download a bunch, put them on a thumb drive and pass them over. It's actually interesting to me how many people are not positive on how to use podcasts yet. If you're on Android, it can be a little confusing because you don't have that built-in player. But applications like Stitcher, Google Play now has a podcast integration. So stuff goes right into your Google Play app on your Android phone. So, you know, that's a way to do it. And some people like the old fashion way of listening to it on their computer, if you guys still have computers. I don't think I have too many, but I know some people don't have any at all. So what else? Yeah, the Navigating Psychedelics course is still up for sale. It's launching August 8th. If you want to get in on that, there probably is going to be a limited time window where you can buy it because we want to kind of put people through the course at kind of like a similar pace. So people can learn from each other and they can peer support through the process and we can support you too. So the class is about eight to 10 hours worth of material, probably more, but we're going to be doing masterclasses with about 10 experts in the psychedelic field, giving advice in their particular sub specialty zone. And we kind of wanted to give you a broad survey and a good base from which you can go on your own explorations into the psychedelic world. And we think it's going to be fantastic. Kyle and I also do a bunch of class lecture time going over kind of some basics around safety. Theory and integration work and some other stuff, you know, different applications. So it's not all about, you know, how do you do that five grams in darkness, silent darkness thing? How do you go as far out as possible? It's more discussing the different ways of doing it and the different rules for each one. So we think that's highly valuable. And if you want to check that out, there's links all over psychedelicstoday.com for it. You'll see the banner for Navigating Psychedelics. You can go direct to the website at psychedelicstoday.teachable.com. If you want to reach out for any reason, we'd love to have feedback. We'd love to talk to you guys. You can email us at psychedelicstoday, email at gmail.com. There's also the Facebook page. We'd love to hear from you any which way you want to get to us. There is also a contact form on our page, psychedelicstoday.com. Hope you're well. Take care, enjoy, and see you on the other side. Welcome back to Psychedelics Today with your hosts, Kyle and Joe. Thanks for joining us. Today, we have here Ashley Booth, the co-founder of Interspace Integration and the founder of the AWARE Project, Rethinking Psychedelics. Thanks so much for joining us. Hi, good to be here with you guys. Yeah. So maybe could you jump in a little bit and just give our listeners a background on like your professional work and how you got involved in the psychedelic world? Yeah. So I came at it, I guess, from the side because I was working as an oceanographer for about nine years. And I was really passionate about the environment and saving the animals. I'm a vegan. It's just like, I already kind of had like a passion for, you know, making the world a better place. And also, I think from my science brain, like a really keen sense of curiosity, which is one of the core principles that I've shaped the AWARE Project around is curiosity. And yeah, I mean, it, so about four and a half years ago, well, I mean, I guess maybe even before that, I mean, I've been going to Burning Man for about 10 years. And I started going, like, right after I got out of college, and it just completely shifted my paradigm and, I mean, renewed my faith in humanity. And I don't say that lightly. But also, at the same time, that was the first time I had the opportunity to try, any kind of psychedelic. And I did MDMA for the first time. And before that, I'd smoked like pot, but not anything other than that. And it just, that, you know, that one experience and then being in Burning Man at the same time, it was just, you know, having my heart really opened by such a beautiful medicine. And then also, being around such an amazing sense of community, which I just, had never grown up with. So, that was such a huge shift of the way that I viewed myself, because it was like, I was getting connected to a part of myself that I wasn't connected to before, you know, coming from a family that was much more kind of left brain thinking. And, but to be able to be connected to my own emotional system in my heart and connection and a sense of generosity and community, it was really a transformative experience. And so, I've been going to Burning Man every year since then, the last 10 years. And I felt pretty good about myself last year, because I got my brother and my dad to come out with me. So, that was awesome. And so, yeah, and just over the years, starting to, I mean, I guess, after having that experience and kind of had this moment where I was like, well, you know, if society was telling me that MDMA like rots your brain and makes you, you know, drugs are bad, essentially. And yet, I had such a beautiful experience and all the people around me that were also doing these things weren't like grungy people living on the streets, you know, they were bright, creative, driven, warm people. And it was like, wait a second, you know, if, if, if the, you know, the society was wrong about that, what, what else are they wrong about? And then, you know, and what, what are all these other substances that they say are bad, you know, and so, you know, being able to be kind of supported by this extended community of bright, you know, progressive thinkers, to be able to kind of provide a sense of like eldering, I guess, because, you know, you know, people that had been using a lot of these things for many years really helped to shape, you know, how these things are used in a responsible way. But also, you know, the, the potential that they can bring. And so, yeah, it just, you know, it started, you know, to explore different things, you know, as the years sort of passed. And, and then four years ago, I kind of got more into more of the medicine scene. And you can call it a scene, I don't know, I'm in Los Angeles, everything's a scene here. But getting into medicine work and tried ayahuasca for the first time, which I actually didn't have. I don't know, it wasn't, what I was expecting. And it was a much more mild experience than, than I would, I thought. So. I mean mild in the sense of like having any kind of visual content and I've done ayahuasca I don't even know how many times now and have still never had any kind of visions um do you have a lot of the purging uh yeah I definitely purge definitely feel really terrible um but yeah there's just not a it's not a visionary space and I what I've at least done to go on a little tangent there I mean I think um I think it seems to be trying to teach me in a more subtle sort of way right um I don't know if that's the case for other people I mean it just seems to be so different for different people um but it's still a complicated relationship I think um but uh but one that I see that is still very um valuable um as as a kind of an ongoing relationship um but uh but one that I see that is still very um valuable um as as a kind of an ongoing relationship um but shortly after that first experience with ayahuasca um I did 5mu um for the uh 5mu dmt for the first time and uh that was the most important experience of my life was that really visionary for you I wouldn't uh well I mean I consider there's sort of two visionary things there's uh visions that have content um and you know you're seeing spaces you know objects or faces or spirits or you know whatever um but or um you're seeing something but it's not content you know maybe it's shapes or just light or colors um so I mean as far as the visual content I mean it's for me it's like going into this white tunnel of iridescent white light um and uh but the the visionary aspect of it is not the part that that shifted me but it was just a a deep connection to something bigger than than myself um that I had never had any relationship with and um just poured love and compassion into me and just completely broke open my heart and in the most beautiful way possible and uh and you know coming out of that experience I was uh it it broke my heart at the same time to know that that 5mu is is illegal as well as all these other things are illegal and that people aren't allowed access to this medicine should they want it to be able to have an experience like the one that I had and that uh that made me really um sad but it also activated me um and so I started getting kind of more curious and kind of geeking out on psychedelics rather than like from a like going experience you know experiential but more for like a historical and um you know uh political scientific you know just kind of learning about all the other stuff um associated with it um besides the experience itself and um you know and I was seeing a lot of um groups up in San Francisco you know have bicycle day events and psychedelic society meetings and integration stuff and then I was looking down here in Los Angeles and I was like oh great maybe there's a bicycle day down here maybe there's a psychedelic society down here and there's nothing pretty much next to nothing and so um my my ex-boyfriend was um an event producer so I was like well I I can't start my own meetings and so um I mean the first idea was to have a bicycle day um and then that kind of morphed into this psychedelic salon series that we've been doing now for two and a half years um with monthly um salon events bringing in speakers to talk about various aspects of psychedelia really predominantly trying to highlight people that are local um so uh yeah I think that's something that I've been doing for a long time and I've been doing that for a long time and so um being able to show all sorts of different kinds of perspectives from science to creativity to you know performances to medicine work to you know all sorts of things so we've been doing that yeah now for two and a half years and all the content's all in YouTube now we're hoping to get it all out onto a podcast at some point but um awesome that's kind of um a project that um you know everything everything's a project so um yeah um so that's been I mean at least that's kind of how the aware project started and you know now we're you know I'm working on handing off more of the the the roles of the aware project onto a team and into the community so that I can start to work on other things um because uh yeah I mean it's it's been my blood sweat and tears for the last two and a half years and it's time to to start to transition so yeah it's it's been really an amazing um journey and yeah to be able my my ex used to who did the events he would say like the the person that gets the most out of producing an event is the person that's producing it it's not the attendees being able to meet so many amazing people and be part of you know an active part participant in this psychedelic community has been such a gift and um just excited to to see what what what unfolds next you know so that was kind of a long answer but yeah yeah cool how did you make that transition of being an oceanographer to say doing this event because you know I'm sure people get like these insights where they want to make career shifts after doing a psychedelic or going to burning man and then not knowing how to go about doing so or you know might be afraid to or just they don't even know what that looks like yeah I mean um well as far as my if I put my integration hat on like waiting at least a couple of months before making big life changes is always a good idea um because if it's true right now it'll be true in several months so you don't need to necessarily act on um uh but yeah so I mean it it was a problem it took about two years to to see like realize that the work that I was doing all it is valuable and amazing work um it my heart wasn't in it anymore um and one of the the insights that I had coming out of my 5meo experience was that you know not going to quote unquote save the environment or save the animals or anything like that until we heal people and so uh and that's what I felt like was happening in my own process of having access to these things having a bigger like out of the box perspective um and so in that two and a half years I was like okay well do I you know you know step out of my job and be a freelancer so I'm having a little more flexibility or do I want to start a new career and then was thinking of okay well you know be great to be able to provide integration support to people um the patent like how do I how do I do something that's in the legal realm of of this work and and uh I went to a plant teachers conference here in Los Angeles um called um uh the visionary convergence and it was a couple years ago and and me and a friend of mine Sheree Gadassi who we were we were at this conference and and the theme that we are both putting up on is the theme of integration and so we were like okay support this better and and so the idea of creating interspace integration was born out of that and so we formed a um we co-founded this together as a an integration support platform um to serve the greater you know southern California Los Angeles area and then it was like seeing a way to be able to provide support for people um and um and so I started thinking okay we'll become a thing or you know and be able to do this integration and so I okay my job and and then you know luckily I was able to to do the aware project and and have that kind of hold me over a little bit and then started doing hakomi training which is um a somatic psychotherapy training that was recommended to me by several people in the medicine community is a really great tool for great from um from medicine and so I started that which is a two-year program and as a way to kind of get a bit before diving into grad school um so I started that which is a two-year program and as a way to kind of get a bit before diving into grad school um so I started that which is a two-year program and as a way to kind of get a bit before diving into grad school on that like big into it is just with mindfulness it's really amazing it's a i highly recommend people checking out that that you know you can do like a weekend workshop just to kind of learn about it for yourself um or just add it to your toolbox a little bit or you can do like their full course but okay cool yeah um yeah awesome i i've been really interested in hikomi um i really want to take a training to um add to my somatic tool belt because i think it's really important because it's you know it's obviously body centered and to work with the body in these non-ordinary states i think is is extremely important um joe and i have a background with that with breath work doing body work towards the end of a session and you know you can really just see the difference yeah yeah the more that i get into this work the more i think somatics are really like i did you see everything it's just so important um if not like really the most important aspect of it yeah it's yeah you know and coming from you know being you know a science brain left brain thinker which you know wanting to still you know retain that good critical thinking skills especially in this sort of there's a lot of it's a big new age community here in los angeles and having a good uh critical thinking i think is important in navigating through that um but uh but being able to use the body as an access to get out of the mind and the loops that the mind get in gets into i think is you know i mean that's what yoga is you know it's so i see it is really really important and the hokomi method uh can you give a little bit of explanation what that is because from my understanding they don't use too much body work but it's about just using meditative practices to get into the body and to get into the body and to get into the body and to accessing and resourcing correct yeah so i mean it's essentially like a guided meditation into your own present experience so um being able to so that the practitioner sort of helps guide people into you know what are you feeling in your body so it's somatic in the sense that you're focused on you know body sensations and the theory is that the more you focus on a particular sensation and you you know mindfully bring your attention to the body the more you focus on the body to that area the more you're lighting up a neural network in your system that's associated with that and that that starts to connect to memories or images or words or other sensations and so you're starting to light up this whole network and then once you're really in that network it's like you're kind of in a really open state like if you you know maybe you have uh you know a childhood trauma and if you can guide people into you know what are you feeling in your body and then you can that the sensations and be able to light up that whole neural network it's kind of like their mind is in a state like they were in when they you know maybe experience the trauma you know maybe it's you're kind of in that child state and then you can um the therapist or the person can create a um corrective experience um that that that gets in um imprinted at a really deep level because you've activated whole somatic network and or released you know whatever it is that needed that was under there that maybe was repressed um so it's it's really fascinating and to be able to see see it work it's like you you see people kind of go into this state and be able to you know and memories will come up and like these you know all sorts of things and um it seems you know i i see a therapist going to it that have been trained traditionally and going to this you know because they get to a certain point with talk therapy and they just can't get beyond it and so this is a way to to get that um there is a little bit of body work involved not not necessary more as like um we kind of you know maybe you're feeling like a tension in your arm or something and then the the therapist can kind of you know quote unquote take it over and mimic the sensation and oftentimes that will elicit more either memories or emotions or other responses so there there is you know body contact um but it's not necessarily like you're doing energy work or muscular you know massage or anything like that do you ever see people have any uh cathartic experiences yeah for sure cool yeah yeah it's it's it's beautiful and sometimes it gets very visions where they're like i feel like there's you know like this egg in my chest or you know so there's the symbolism becomes very um like transpersonalish trans yeah yeah and um yeah and i see you know and i've seen people go into you know in medicine space that start to kind of hokomi themselves they don't even know what it is but like the medicine sort of supports their own system and doing it themselves like you know they'll just start to go into it and it's it's so i see where the overlap is um that it's it's kind of what the system wants to do it seems right yeah and that was going to be another question i was going to ask like have you integrated some of these hokomi techniques or has hokomi influenced you with doing medicine work and how is like maybe for navigating some of those psychic spaces and dealing with anything that comes up yeah i mean as far as i mean i guess it's sort of my own personal work it's definitely um given me a lot more attention to my body and and and kind of keeping my mind out of it a little bit more right and then as far as providing integration support for people it it's a really great tool that if you know something's not fully kind of grounded in you can use it as a tool of like okay you know a bunch of stuff came up during you know your experience how do we continue um to allow a safe space for that stuff to continue to come up um and you know using you know very similar channels that this that psychedelics use to begin with yeah awesome that's great i could probably keep asking you questions about hokomi i'm seeing so much overlap with like bodywork and breathwork yeah breathwork it sounds almost like um this could really extend the bodywork aspect of breathwork um so i'm i think i'm sold thanks for this yeah it's it's cool and the other practice i mean i maybe you can ask someone else if someone else has done this but somatic experience is another i think related practice um or it's called se um i don't i don't know how how similar or or or different it is from hokomi but i think they're pretty similar so if you can't find hokomi near you we might try somatic experiencing see if a workshop's there yeah i forget so ron kurtz is hokomi and then um is is it pat ogden or steven levine i believe does peter levine yeah i've got the website up it is peter levine yeah so i think they were all kind of part of some sort of somatic thing which i think was sensory motor um and then what is that i think they all they all kind of broke off a little bit here and there but it's all kind of influenced sensory motor uh i forget i think it's just sensory motor um and then what is that therapy or uh it's a similar sort of somatic yeah yeah yeah yeah i think if they're all in the same family yeah exactly but yeah there's a lot of people in um there's a lot of overlap between the hokomi and the medicine community yeah oh fascinating i'm yeah very happy i learned all this right now oh good good um cool so where do we want to go to next yeah i mean i guess i i can talk a little bit more about what we're doing with inner space integration um yeah so uh yeah so we sheree and i started inner space about um yeah over over a year ago together and just started doing integration circles here in los angeles and um she's since decided to to um break off and and start her own independent practice but inner space is still um kind of a more of a communal um thing and so we've built out this whole network of integration support providers and just launched it last month so really excited about it and um try to get a a people with a lot of different backgrounds you know from therapists to acupuncturists to energy workers to um you know life coaches you know all sorts of different backgrounds and so um and we started providing more integration circles um in la and and one of our providers is looking to start some things in san diego so really wanting to you know help the community um get access to this you know these these spaces to be able to share stories and meet each other and um yeah it's cool and you know and our and the people in our network also provide uh um you know skype or you know um remote support if if needed i mean obviously not for acupuncture but but but for coaching and therapy Um, uh, if people don't live in the Los Angeles area, they can check out the people on our, um, on our network page and, and see if they, you know, see if anyone resonates with them and get some remote support if they don't live in Southern California. So, yeah, so that's kind of, um, taking on a life of its own now. And, um, uh, yeah, so, you know, I do a little bit of coaching through that and, um, but being able to, I mean, I just, I see how much, um, how much the integration work is needed and just, just gathering space for people, you know, physical gathering space. Cause you know, I mean, the more, I don't know, the more I get into this work, the more I just want to spend time with people face to face, um, because I feel like there's so much stuff online. And I mean, if you, if that's the only option you have, like that's going to be, you know, that's great, but, um, providing these physical spaces for people to gather, I think is completely invaluable. Yeah, I definitely agree. How's your turnout been for the groups? Good, consistent, you know, meetups been a really great way for us to help, um, uh, get the word out to, you know, kind of outside the community, um, uh, to a more broad, you know, public audience. And, uh, but yeah, it's been, it's been consistent. And, um, you know, and then providing, uh, now starting one on the other side of town now, um, I think we'll be able to, to provide support for more people, but, uh, yeah, it's, you know, trying to get the word out. Um, cause you know, when I started first doing psychedelics, um, you know, I mean, I guess the integration and all this other stuff wasn't as big back then, but at the same time, it wasn't, it wasn't even like part of the conversation, um, either integration work or even like, you know, um, you know, drug checking, you know, that wasn't even part of the repertoire, at least that where I was in. Um, so I, you know, I, I keep thinking about like, how do we, how do we, there's a lot of people doing the specialist, but, you know, especially in a recreational setting, how do we get the word out more that, that this, these spaces are, uh, available and, you know, you're not going crazy if you have a big experience by accident or. You know, that there are other people out there and that there's support and, um, yeah. So I, I, I'm continually, you know, collaborating with, with different groups like the drug policy Alliance and dance safe and, um, the Zendo project to be able to, you know, get the word out on what we're doing and what they're doing. Um, so that there's a lot more cross pollination happening. Yeah. Which I think is definitely needed. Um, cause it is some, it is like a topic that is growing and people are aware of it, but maybe they don't know what it is or actually what it means. And I've definitely had conversations recently, um, since we've been focusing a lot on integration and the course and having conversations where people are like, well, you know, there's really not much to do with it. Um, so yeah, it's, it seems like a difficult to actually get the word out there and really talk about what it is and why it's needed. Right. Why it's important. Yeah. Or even just, you know, being able to, that, that if you, you want to use psychedelics for transformation specifically, that you, there's so much you can get out of it when you start to apply all of these other techniques and to be able to have a community of people around you that have like, Oh, well I've used these techniques, you know, and I've used this or like, Oh, this really helped me, you know? And then you're really allowing yourself to, um, catapult forward, um, in, in the amount of benefit. Um, and so. And, you know, healing that's possible. So we hear a lot from people on the show about, um, well, I, I've been hearing about it lately. People are actually more and more curious about all these crazy stories. Like, um, I don't really want to say crazy stories, but like you shared earlier, you know, uh, your heart getting broken, busted wide open at the same time, like, you know, people want to hear these stories about, uh, you know, talking to snakes and seeing their grandparents, you know, you know, I've, I've spoken to dead people in my experiences, but you know, I didn't think I was going crazy, but some people really might, it might be so conflicting with their worldview that maybe they have to hear two or three people at one of these events go, yeah, you know, I, I had that two years ago or 10 years ago, however it is, you know, there's elders in Los Angeles too, which is interesting. Um, yeah, yeah. Does Richard Grossman ever show up? Yeah. He was a speaker, um, uh, last year at the war project. Yeah. Yeah. He's great. I'm, I'm really excited to, uh, connect with him. I think we'll get to talk to him in a, in a month, but yeah, there's people like him. There's a whole world there, I think partly because the weather's good and a lot of people have just kind of like settled into nice weather in Los Angeles. But, uh, yeah, it seems like a really cool thing you have going there and I, I really appreciate how much energy. You're putting into it. Um, it seems like it's really helping a lot of folks. Thanks. Yeah. It's been a labor of love, but I can also see, you know, how much people appreciate it. And, and now I'm, you know, part of what I'm also trying to figure out too is like, you know, cause I've seen a lot of people go through big medicine work and you know, what's the difference between certain people that are like, Oh, well that's a cool experience or like, Oh yeah, I'm getting some healing. And then others who just get really activated and want to get like, uh, I guess, you know, activist-y and like political about it. Um, you know, I mean, I, and you know, what, what is that thing that catalyzes that shift? Um, cause you know, it obviously happened to me. Um, but I, I wonder, you know, what is it that, what, you know, how, how, how do other people make that shift too? Um, and you know, maybe it's not necessarily getting activated to, you know, get it more into psychedelics, but maybe it's activated to get more involved in whatever it is that you're passionate about. Um, and really dive in fearless, you know, courageously. And, um, you know, cause I'm part of, you know, this process of, of shifting the aware project, um, over to a T you know, a larger team taking it over is like, how do we empower new leaders? Um, you know, both in this field and in others, because I mean, in, and that's what the world needs right now is, is entrepreneur types and, um, leaders, um, that want to really, you know, pour their, pour their energy and their heart into making the world a better place because, uh, we all know that it needs it right now. Um, so I don't know, it's just something that I've been, I've been thinking a lot about recently and, uh, being in Los Angeles. I mean, it's a really interesting. Cause it's a city, it's a city where people come because they're inspired to do something. And so, uh, it makes for a really optimistic, uh, ethos. So, um, I don't know, this is most of my philosophical musings, but this is something I've been thinking about recently. And I don't know, I mean, I'm curious, you know, what, what made that shift for you guys too? Um, like what, what, what took you from being, you know, like the, and, and, and, or other people that you've, you've heard on, you know, their speakers, like, what was that shift that happened? Like between just being like, um, taking psychedelics to like, you know, I'm getting really activated and like, I want to do stuff. I'll let you go, Kyle. Okay. Um, for me, I don't know, I guess I've always been into it. Um, you know, almost dying at 16, having a near death experience and then having such a shift in my consciousness at a young age and seeing the world so differently than everybody else around me. It was so traumatic and difficult. And I, I had nothing else to do, but seek out like, um, like elders, I guess, or teaching. So I dove into books, but, um, I mean, what really shifted my mindset was taking, um, a psychedelic and just having this, this experience of dying and realizing that, um, it was, it was so like the psychedelic experience is so similar to dying. And I was like, oh my God, like this is the most interesting thing ever. Like, I don't know how anybody would not be interested in this. Um, but it also helped me like relive a lot of the trauma. Like I was in a really bad place psychologically because of having this near death experience, not having a community to hold me and move that experience forward. I felt really alone in it. And to be able to relive that just kind of pushed me through and it made me want to study the mind. It made me want to study the mind. It made me want to study psychology and it made me want to really just get out there and get involved. So, I mean, I think I've always kind of been in it at a, since a young age because of that near death experience. Like I always think about like where my life would be if that didn't happen. And I don't know, like, yeah. So how about you, Joe? It's been a long project and really holotropic breath works been at the core of it. I've always had this kind of serious drive towards. I don't know, pseudo transcendence or like, you know. know escapism spiritual bypass that's the word and uh you know i just realizing that it doesn't work on its own it has to be part of like a something bigger i went to this psychedelic conference in new york horizons in like 2008 or 9 and daniel pinchback was speaking there and he had this like vision that kind of like tied in my sense of ecological crisis to psychedelic optimism and it was just blew my pants off i was like all right well i'm right in uh so shortly after that i started organizing events similar to what you do but you know it took me like it was a balancing act and like finding my place i was putting on themed events that they wanted me to put on but also you know breaking off and doing my own things just like psychedelic salons where you get together and just kind of share stories no other real thing other than sharing stories which to me you know coming out of holotropic breathwork is just core to the healing process yeah so it's kind of all that and uh you know i just found that podcasting allowed me to be able to talk to really great folks so i kind of just um stuck with that for a very long time i think that was 2006 i started podcasting so you know it's been core to it so it's breathwork podcasting daniel pinchback yeah i i wonder if it's the you know when people find a sense of healing it was the thing that really like lights the fire of that passion you know because i you know you can go and have like a trippy experience on whatever but i think it's when you actually feel like something that like clicks or heals that really makes you like maybe a little humbled or in awe that that shifts you know to a place where you're like oh my god i'm so happy i'm so to be like wait a second um yeah and i mean i think and then you know making sure that you know i think that's where the integration support can be really important because you're you're helping people contextualize what maybe they might have written off as a trippy experience but then you know if you help kind of ground them into it a little bit you can help them see that it's actually been really important and for whatever for whatever reason um and that and that they can just that they can take something away from that and actually shift their life in a more positive way and you know and it a lot of times people feel that next step beyond the healing of the self is the healing of you know greater humanity in the world maybe that's where the right um yeah yeah there's something there and it's something about building layers of human connection too and decreasing alienation all that kind of fun stuff um yeah yeah have you have you personally had the chance to try how tropic breath work yeah i've done it a couple of times cool yeah you know it's not five amio dmt but it's it's something it could you share a little bit about your perspective of that yeah i mean i think it's something that's a really great tool you know like all these things i think they're all tools the toolbox um i you know it i think it it it's the same sort of tool set just in terms of you know like not having expectations about an experience because you know i mean like the times that i've done it people have had such a varied experience including you know where you know you know i tend to just get the false sleep and then i'm like oh i missed the rest of the whole thing right and everyone else is like i just swam with my mermaid family or like they're having like convulsions and screaming and catharsis and i'm like oh all right well i didn't have that experience but but then i had this you know last couple two times i've done it i've had much more of a subtle sort of space where like i felt feeling kind of like sorry for myself for like sleeping through most of it and then i was like oh i just wasted my time again and then i was feeling like but then all these emotions started coming up and um and i just started crying and i didn't really know there wasn't any content to the crying but it was just i was just crying and then you know one of the facilitator uh came over and just sat with me and just like you know didn't ask any you know wasn't asking me a lot of questions wouldn't ask me to explain myself and it was just i so i just sat there and cried and had someone hold me and i was like hold me and it was so uh uh nurturing and um corrective and just uh so healing to just have my emotions be held um and you know not that i had to like put them into words or explain them but just to have someone be there and witness it and and and create a loving space it was just really healing so you know i i see the breath work is just you know it's like it's a catalyst and it comes out in all sorts of different ways and and learning that that healing can look a lot of different ways and that you know having emotions that don't have any content with them was definitely a revelation for me and very confusing at first but it's really served me a lot in the other medicine work that i've done and and in the irrigation support that i provided for people that you know maybe maybe you don't have to necessarily remember or understand all of the things that are coming up but if you can just allow yourself to feel be in your body and let your body release whatever it needs to release um you know not getting wrapped up in the story i think it's been a really huge lesson that's a really great point i remember my first acupuncturist or acupuncture session they were doing an initial consultation and they're like oh like your lungs are flaring up like that you know they prick you and then that spot on your body just red ends and it correlates to where that energy is stuck in your body and it's like well the lungs uh relate to grieving they're like what are you grieving about i was like i don't know nothing i don't think you know and as soon as she pulled that that needle out i just started bawling and just shaking and convulsing she's like what are you crying about and i could not find the words i had no idea why i was crying but it felt awesome and you know it just felt so nice to cry and then have somebody sit there and hold that space for me you know yeah so i think that's a and not to get caught up on the story all the time yeah yeah and i mean that's kind of what hokomi is about too you know like the basic thing that we first learned is like how do you create this like therapeutic bubble you know and this this safe space holding um that you know it's useful for all sorts of things yeah sweet well i'm kind of uh curious to know what where what are your visions for the aware project and inner space like where do you think you're taking this taking it you're talking about bringing on new leaders and kind of embodying them with this entrepreneurship and so yeah what are you thinking about doing with it if you can talk about it yeah yeah i mean i i was seeing the aware project as being an umbrella that other types of active you know awareness psychedelic awareness building um activities that we can do and and you know in supporting new yeah new leaders to come in and like oh you've got an idea about something great like we have this whole community of people with all sorts of different skill sets to be able to support you with that idea you know and and encouraging people to to run with it and so um you know we have uh you know connections to people all over the world doing all sorts of things and um you know if you want to work on something to help bring the awareness out in some other new way um like let's collaborate um so we're and we're doing a lot of work on that and we're doing a lot of work on that and we're doing a lot of work um you know we're going to keep the salons going and you know hopefully get everything up on a podcast uh but you know just trying to create a consistent gathering space for people i think is the is the the core of what we're doing um and and then as far as inner space goes again it's like you know we're creating space we're creating consistent gathering space for people um and then you know having this you know network of people that can provide support to people both locally and you know wherever um so uh right now i mean my kind of goal is to to see what the community wants where they want to take it you know um and but you know making sure that we're sticking with some of the core things you know the core parts of creating these spaces um going so yeah i mean i'm my kind of vision has gone to a certain extent and now i'm kind of see you you know where where the community wants to go with it and where you know some of the people that are stepping up want to take it um because i've got my own projects and other things that i'm kind of transitioning to so uh yeah i don't know i i we'll see what happens it's already been a wild adventure um and where i couldn't have imagined uh that i'd be here you know from where i started so i don't know i don't know yeah i'll start taking on a life of of its own. Exactly. Yeah. yeah sweet yeah it's really cool that you're you know you have a lot more local speakers come to the um you know the aware project events and what are some who are some of your favorite or what really interesting topics have the local people brought um well one of one of my favorite speaks we had recently is actually shree's um husband ben malcolm gave an actually he's a pharmacist and so he gave an excellent talk on the pharmacology of ayahuasca and he's such a great speaker too because he's a teacher you know and and so he he just gave a really great talk so i highly recommend people check that out because um he brought something up about um some research on how ayahuasca creates lasting changes in your body based off of you know like shifting basically kind of the the expression of certain genes in your body so that you have like these ongoing effects and they've started to you know there's the research is starting to to come out about some of this stuff so it was really cool so i highly recommend people checking that one out um um who else um we just had um a podcast with zach leary um because he's taking over the doing a podcast for maps um and highlighting the new um maps mdma uh for assisted psychotherapy for ptsd trial that's coming out so that's um fun we're going to keep highlighting um that process is it as it's going forward and through phase three and the next couple years are going to be very exciting on that front um who else yeah richard grossman was great he played you know a lot of music and really interesting to hear about his his background in acupuncture and you know he's been doing a lot of work on his own and he's um music and medicine combining all of those things so yeah i mean we have i mean we've had over 60 events oh wow that's awesome so um uh it's been it's yeah there's a lot of people and i it's like hard for me to kind of remember them all right right yeah but um yeah checking checking out the youtube page is is cool because it's just a wealth of all sorts of information cool is that just the aware project on youtube yeah you can go to our web page and and find it through there so simple google search yeah the google find it yeah just found the youtube site looks like you have a lot going on here that's great oh yeah in the show notes for sure oh my goodness that's so much yeah so yeah it's a lot yeah it's well yeah it's a it's a another lesson for me and and and other people people that are getting into this to make sure you're pacing yourself because when you get activated you really want to just go in full force um but you got to pace yourself because i definitely burnt out a little bit um and now i've kind of scaled back a little bit and come back in you know so it's been it's been a psychedelic and transformative experience in itself uh doing this yeah i bet so question we typically ask our guests is how they answer the question when when younger folks or people just kind of want to get professionally involved with the psychedelic field like what do you have any kind of stock advice you give out um yeah i mean this is probably that if you want to go the therapeutic route i mean this is the time to start to get the school done so you'll be ready um because you know mdma is going to be coming online in the next couple years and psilocybin hopefully shortly after that and um having those credentials is going to make your life a lot easier um because if you're not i mean otherwise you're going to be you know you're only going to be able to do kind of integration work you're not going to be able to do the the therapy the you know mdma or psilocybin assisted therapy work um i mean there are other countries you know that that you know you can use ibogaine and m5mo um you know depending on where you are different things are are legal but um you know getting some kind of support background you know whether it's therapy um a very professional therapy training of some kind or coaching or other types of work but i i really see the the synergy that's happening right now in the western world in relation to psychedelics is that we're creating this uh synthesis of you know uh traditional indigenous shamanic wisdom with eastern mystic mystical practices with western psychology and i think we need all of those different tools to be able to uh maximize the benefit of of these tools um because if you're if you don't have um either the the spiritual kind of contextualization that you can get from you know western or from eastern spiritual traditions or other indigenous practices um it can be really confusing you know what it is what your it is that you're experiencing at all and then you know from the healing perspective you know if you don't have some knowledge of psychology and somatics it that's not going to can also be really confusing so i think we're really creating um this new um practice you know that's never been created before because the people that are alive right now in western modern culture using psychedelics are a type of of human that's never existed before and so we're having to create a context um uh around us to be able to support you know being a modern human um because it's really hard i mean it's always hard being human but like it's it's particularly i don't know it feels particularly crazy right now so so we we we need all of these different tools to be able to help support both our internal like balancing process and also um balancing and and process of the society we're in right now so i i yeah you getting getting that that the education whether it whatever you're getting so yeah i mean learning these getting educated in all these different types of tools i think is either going to help you either on your personal development path or in this you know if you're wanting to make a career out of um you know supporting people in this healing process um so yeah there's a lot out there to learn it's really hard to learn it's really endless i i like to tell people to really you know listen to themselves like somebody could tell you the exact path to go down and maybe it's not for you like maybe you would be better as a tai chi instructor instead of a licensed therapist like right yeah yeah and you know maybe you choose some one of some of these somatic techniques we talked about before instead of being a licensed therapist to support the therapy um right yeah you know and go go slow hasten slowly um yeah yeah it's i think it you know the the the passion whatever your passion and whatever fits with you will will slowly emerge and it's not a process you can rush the ego always wants to rush everything and that's the process unfolds at um yeah so uh well we've been recording for what 40 minutes now um i think it's a bit longer okay i need to get off soonish all right cool um we can actually wrap this if you'd like unless there's anything you want to throw out no i think i'm good and where can people find you again yeah so people can find us at awareproject.org um or innerspaceintegration.com and we're all also on facebook and meetup and youtube so come check it out and and it's instagram that's sweet can't forget that i know yeah thanks awesome well thanks so much ashley it's been great talking to you i love all your insights and wisdom and what you're doing for the psychedelic community thank you yeah it's been a really great talking with you guys there you have it ladies and gentlemen ashley booth of the aware project and innerspace integration uh really cool stuff coming down the pipeline from her too that you'll hear about on the show in the future i hope there's going to be a lot of involvement i think uh with some of the research uh in the near future but we'll see how that plays out and uh really excited to hear about it and uh it's also really interesting to see that the los angeles community is uh getting more involved and more stuff's happening there which is nice uh this is kind of maybe risky territory to talk about but i wanted to bring it up and let you all know that there is plenty of kind of backroom to talk about talk about the psychedelic world and people sometimes this doesn't relate to ashley at all but you know, there's people in the psychedelic world that have, um, perhaps spotted pasts or have done something questionable and, you know, maybe, or maybe they didn't redeem themselves. Um, and it's also interesting, like, how do we relate to that? Um, how do we allow a scientist to keep being a scientist and doing science, even if there's something bad that happened or be a therapist, even if there's something bad that happened. And also kind of a side note on that is that there's just a lot of, um, gossip that happens. And how do you know if someone's telling you the story, how do you actually know that it's a real thing, unless it happened firsthand to this person and you trust this person's story, stuff like that. So really important stuff to pay attention to, especially with psychedelics, because people's perceptions can be very far from, what actually happened and, you know, their feelings could have been hurt far more than make sense. So that's something very important to keep in mind. You know, maybe that ayahuasca retreat center isn't really all that bad. That person just got a little inflated or paranoid or something. And as a result, the situation for them personally was not great. So, you know, just something to think about their food for thought, and it kind of relates to this article. This is speaking for myself, not for Kyle, this article that came out about, uh, I think it was just yesterday. So like July 26, it was circulating on chakruna.net about how psychedelic research needs to be more inclusive. And while I don't disagree, I think we need to be possibly a little more careful on our rhetoric because it's already questionable. We're having legal status to do this research right now. It's not a hundred percent certain that we're going to be able to keep it. So is there actually a balancing act here that we need to strike to keep, um, strange attentions off of us from people in power, issuing money and issuing licenses to do research. So for instance, the article talked a lot about, um, somehow including, uh, more money. So I think it's important to keep that in mind. And I think it's important to keep that in mind, but I think it's important to keep in mind that we need to think about how we're going to do this research. And I think it's important to keep that in mind. How do we involve them more? It was, the article was a little rough because it was a little accusatory. I don't really know how to solve that problem, but what I'm really getting at is, can we just get through the science first, the basic science? If people want to get involved, get involved. Um, I don't personally have any involvement with science, so I don't know what it's like to be a, uh, transgendered person trying to get reelected. I don't know what it's like to research grants or get on the board of a nonprofit. I have no idea what that's like. And I don't know if that's happening or even minorities. But if you are a minority or transgender, try to get involved. I don't think you're going to see much change from the establishment reaching out to you personally, unless you're a really outstanding person, which hopefully you are. But get involved, get your PhD, get on these boards, really just do what needs to be done to be on these boards. Because it's often a very specific set of things you need to do in order to get those credentials. So as the whole privilege debate kind of plays into this, do you have enough privilege to get those credentials to get in? I don't know. Figure it out. Dig in. See what you can do. Have conversations with people that are in power. See what they think. So that's kind of it on that subject. Sorry if that's kind of a crazy rant, but don't be disempowered. Be empowered. Go out and get it. Do it. If you're disempowered and not privileged, sorry about that. But really just take that power that you have and do something with it. Okay. And rant. If you want to support the show, leave us some reviews on iTunes, Facebook, or check out our Navigating Psychedelics class, where we help keep people safe by educating them on the basics of psychedelics and some advanced things like practices you can execute on to keep yourself in top health when doing more serious work, or how to be safe recreationally with you and your friends out at festivals or parties. And also we have a selection of, I think, 10 masterclasses, 10 or more masterclasses from experts in the psychedelic field giving great advice on their sub-specialty area. So I hope you check it out. I hope you leave us some reviews. If you like the show, let us know. Feel free to reach out at psychedelicstoday, email at gmail.com. If you have any thoughts on that little rant I did at the end, please let us know. I would love to have a debate about it. It's been something that I've been thinking about for about 24 hours now. So take care. Have a good one. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.