00:00 - Mel (Host)
No, simple Road.
00:01 - Apple (Host)
Yeah, here we go it does seem like a long time ago, doesn't it?
00:34 - Mel (Host)
yeah, it seems like we did this one like back in december, the beginning of this year feels like two years ago.
00:37 - Aaron (Host)
Well, this is true. Hey, now, no simple road family. This is Aaron, this is apple and's Mel here and we are back for another fantastical, mystical, magical, wonderful episode of no Simple Road. We are thrilled that you are here and allowing us into the cosmic space between your ear holes.
00:57 - Mel (Host)
Thanks for coming back.
00:58 - Apple (Host)
Speaking of magical, where'd Darwin go?
01:00 - Aaron (Host)
He's right behind us. Oh, the dog is laying behind me he disappeared. I was like what, yeah, the dog now can phase, shift out of reality and into I think he likes this new setup because he can have more free reign. There's not as many wires, true, yeah, so hey, everybody speaking of wires our guest this week has nothing to do with wires no, he has everything to do with self-enlightenment, though.
01:24
Yep, that's right. Our guest this week is none other than Cesar Marin of CultivatingWisdomnet. You may know him from some things, such as Instagram and all the other places that you've seen him all over the place.
01:42 - Apple (Host)
Well, you'll hear it here. I've never heard anybody speak so passionately about mushrooms and the psychedelic experience, and you're gonna hear it till you came to it late in life, at 54 years old having his first experience at 54 can you, let's stop for just a second, like, obviously, if you're new to listening to no simple road.
02:04 - Aaron (Host)
Just, I mean, if you didn't couldn't tell by looking at the logo and the guest list and all that you can't tell anything by the logo sure you can anyway. Um, it may be evident that you know we have done psychedelics in the past and you know it. My first psychedelic experience was in my teens. Can you guys imagine coming to psychedelics in your late 40s, mid 40s or early 50s?
02:37 - Apple (Host)
No, I'm 54 right now. Like if I had my first experience this year. Like, in a way, I think that'd be really cool. Like, oh my God, this is like a new thing. I think that'd be really cool. Like, oh my god, this is like a new thing, because it's been a huge part of my life, but then what would my life have been without it? Because it is very therapeutic what about you, mel?
02:54 - Aaron (Host)
what do you think?
02:56 - Mel (Host)
I think that I definitely could have gone without, but I would have to have had a whole different life no, no, that's not what I mean, not that you could go without like can you imagine finding it now?
03:07
yeah yeah yeah, especially with this like resurgence, I'd be interested if I didn't know like I'd be. Like dude, people are doing micro, like micro dosing, and going to work and like people in silicon valley, they're taking lsd like I. I've always been interested, even before I um, I never did psychedelics when I was younger, um, like a teenager or anything, but I was always interested in, like woodstock and hippie culture okay, so you were, you were curious, yeah well, I was just like yeah, exactly Curious.
03:45
Like what is that whole mind expansion thing? Like how do you do it? Like what is it why? Well, if you're curious how to do it, let's hear from Cesar.
03:59 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, man, I can't even imagine. I can't even imagine, by the time you're in your 50s, the routines and programs that run in our heads are so firmly ensconced and entrenched. We have lived, you know, over half a century by that point.
04:21 - Mel (Host)
That's why I think it's so pivotal.
04:22 - Apple (Host)
Yeah for doing the default mode network and to have that torn away or gently lifted or however it happens, yeah, reassembled, yeah well, it's a great time to be discovering it because, like the world, our country and the world is waking up to this right now. Yeah, it's not a secret there is a groundswell so many people coming around of all classes and everything. It's a very interesting time.
04:51 - Mel (Host)
It is an interesting time and it's a great time if you have done this, and this is kind of what cultivating wisdom is like to find other people maybe later in life that haven't done it with you.
05:03 - Aaron (Host)
Right, you know like they'll be more open about it instead of hiding it, like, as in the past, it would be very strange, at 52 years old, to have a psychedelic experience, realize that I'm becoming a different person, and then have to find.
05:20
Find the others yeah, find community that are my age and willing to share yeah, because you know, if you're in your 50s and you've never done that, you're probably working in a job that doesn't support that, or your friend group most likely is is has read about it only in magazines or seen it on tv, or you know what I mean. Like yeah, it's, it's definitely fringe, you know and so what the work that Caesar's doing is is incredible.
05:50 - Mel (Host)
That's why I said enlightenment, because he's helping other people become enlightened to a new possibility in these later years of your life, not like you're still not dead you still have a lot of life.
06:03 - Aaron (Host)
Best years of my life I didn't say they weren't the best but they're later they're not earlier.
06:07 - Apple (Host)
No they're his whole approach to this too. You'll hear it in here, but you have to go check out, like like mel had said, the cultivating wisdomnet. But that takes you to the cultivating wisdom shop, and he created shirts to start conversations that aren't like they're not tied eyes and all psychedelic with that old spin of like whoa man like the one. It's like scrabble tiles and it just says microdosing. Hey, what's? That they're like conversation starters for people.
06:37 - Mel (Host)
That's really cool, that's really taking into account somebody's um sensitivity to that other side, because it it seems extreme if, say, if you're like um an, an average person who you know doesn't really, you know, partake in psychedelics or you know recreational drug use, um, you may that other way of living, like you know, being on the road, all that they might not even be aware that that exists yeah, yeah, no, you know so this is a very approachable and like real way to find out where the others are, how you incorporate this into your life at this stage, because, even though he hasn't been doing psychedelics for so long, psychedelics like catch you up, yeah and then you get introduced to weirdos like us.
07:29 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, you come hang out with us too, that's right?
07:32 - Mel (Host)
yeah, caesar, thank you so much for coming on the show, being interested and sharing some time with us. It was really eye-opening and we didn't talk about our float tank experience, but after we had this interview with Caesar, you and I went to a float tank experience.
07:49 - Aaron (Host)
Oh, yeah, it was something else.
07:52 - Mel (Host)
And I micro-dosed at my float tank experience.
07:54 - Aaron (Host)
Which we will share in an upcoming episode of the no Simple Road Weekly Rewind.
07:58 - Mel (Host)
We will share the whole thing, no but what I'm going to say is stop stopping me, because this is the second time you stopped me. Now Can't stop her.
08:06
Um, but the second time, or no, but um. What I wanted to say was he was present during that session because he was fresh in my mind and a lot. Caesar, you know, grew up in a, you know, Latin family and so that kind of um under family and so that kind of um undercurrent was in my, was in my experience that day and and he was you know kind of present.
08:33 - Aaron (Host)
Since we had just talked to him, I wonder if he knows he was present.
08:34 - Mel (Host)
Well, he will know now when he listens. You're true and it was very pivotal, caesar. So in another episode you have to stay tuned to what happened. But yeah, that's called. What do you call that a teaser?
08:44 - Aaron (Host)
yeah, it's a teaser later. So, everybody, we are going to get you off into the wild blue yonder of this conversation with caesar marin, but first we're going to do the business of no simple road real quick, like follow no simple road at no simple road. On facebook and instagram you can go to our website. On our website is a calendar of events where you can come hang out with us. There's shows that we're going to festivals, that we're going to be appearing at, things like that. You can get a tarot reading by Mel and I, that's right.
09:15
We've got merch up there and we have a newsletter sign up, all that stuff so you can stay in touch with the no Simple Road family through the website. And then you can go to patreoncom forward, slash no simple road. Now here's the deal. I've been saying this for a few weeks now no simple road now costs a dollar a month, but it is on the honor system. So if you feel honorable, head over to patreoncom forward, slash no simple road and sign up for a buck, be honorable be honorable.
09:44 - Mel (Host)
There's all kinds of I would just want to mention we have had several people sign up recently yes, we have so thank you to ben, thank you to grateful mountain. Yeah, and was there one more? That's it all right, so thank you for being on the honor system and showing us your love.
10:04 - Aaron (Host)
That's amazing there's all kinds of extra content over there. You're getting the friday episodes ad free and early for signing up also, uh, there's all kinds of great music picks by our friend andrew and our no simple road archivist connor is picking the deepest, fattest, juiciest cuts of the grateful dead and jerry garcia band over there on patreoncom forward slash no simple road, no simple road. Um, what else am I missing?
10:30 - Mel (Host)
tepid line 971-808-1524.
10:34 - Aaron (Host)
That is where you can call no simple road and say whatever the hell you want, and I mean that well, and you are, you gonna play that one. Yeah, because this is very special. We have a very special.
10:44 - Mel (Host)
It's a two-parter and we'll talk about it. Yeah, Because this is very special. We have a very special call this week.
10:48 - Ben (Caller)
It's a two-parter and we'll talk about it after you listen, because this is just special. Hey y'all, this is Ben. I left you guys a review a while back and I just got the art piece that Mel sent me. It's incredible, it really is. I don't know what I was expecting at all, but I'm blown away. My expectations, however small they were, were certainly exceeded.
11:09
I'm just very grateful for you guys and for what you do and for really the care that you guys put in everything. It's just really meaningful to me. I just wanted to extend some gratitude, extend some love to you all. I don't know if you guys this is kind of random. I don't know if you guys keep up with the Biscuits at all, but their new album that they put out, the animation for it really is quite reminiscent of this art piece that y'all sent, and I think that's an interesting kind of overlap, because I've been nonstop watching the new Biscuits movie and now I have this. It kind of feels like I have a little piece of it now. It's a very similar kind of collage-y thing, but this is.
11:50
It's just really dope and you guys are really dope and I'm really happy to have a little piece of NSR that I can put on my wall and think positive thoughts about and be connected to the show in that way, and I owe you guys a Patreon. I'm going to get on that as soon as I can. Yeah, keep doing what you do. Thank you very much and yeah, you guys are the best.
12:14 - Aaron (Host)
Okay, there's a part two. We're going to continue on with this, Maybe if I can push the button.
12:20 - Ben (Caller)
All right, this is Ben again. I just kind of had one more thought. I wanted to give to y'all that sort of like the note that Mel left on the back of this picture. She said the music maker is one who can transport people to the outer edges of the universe.
12:35
A podcast is sort of a cut and dry kind of not not that psychedelic thing. It really, the way y'all do it is there's there's more to it than just the word. There's a lot of you know energy being thrown around and a lot of kind of overlaid specialness that you guys inject with your you know, with your your tone of voice, like everything about it just is kind of tailored really to the same end that jam music is tailored to. You guys achieve the same destination that the dead achieve, or the fish you get to the same place by talking. Sometimes it's remarkable to watch you.
13:23
You guys have this like this improvised conversation that crescendos into such a like universal peak for for lack of a better word and I well, I read that little note and I thought that that was exactly what you guys are doing To emphasize that because it really is, it is special that you you've cracked the code of podcasting, because it turned into kind of a psychedelic thing and I really appreciate it. Yeah, well, I have to say this maybe I'll call you back again another minute or two with another thought, but you guys are the best ben, you can call back any time, yeah you're the best.
14:02 - Apple (Host)
First off, I just gotta say, ben, I love your voice, dude your voice is so sincere and like calming, I just had to throw that out there.
14:11 - Mel (Host)
And what high praise and that was really rad that, just the whole thing, the fact that you're watching that disco biscuits movie and you said that it's reminiscent. Um, we recently, in a future episode, had John Barber on, so that was weird that you sent, you told us about that backstory because we have had him sitting for a week or two, maybe even a little bit longer than that, to come out in a future episode. So, yeah, we did know about it, but it wasn't in my, it wasn't in my thoughts to make you anything that was reminiscent of that. I was, I saw that well, that's not an alien, it's an astronaut and I just had these, I don't know. It came together pretty quick, except it took me a while to put it together.
15:02 - Speaker 7 (Host)
You know what I mean.
15:03 - Mel (Host)
Like the pieces I found for the project fairly quickly, but how I wanted to do it and the cutting and all that. And yeah, man, I appreciate you saying that and being so thoughtful about it.
15:19 - Aaron (Host)
What he said about us taking conversation to the same place as fish and the dead, us taking conversation to the same place as fish and the dead, that is extremely kind and high praise and I don't take that lightly so ben. Thank you so much for saying that, brother I I. That means the world to me. I hope you understand what that means to hear that it's a great.
15:39
It's a great perspective, because now I all look at like aaron just did a solo right there a little jam and then, like when we're all talking back and forth, it's like us playing and then everybody takes a solo hearing him say that made me think about doing having the conversations that we have differently, because I remember garcia saying, um, that every show can't be a home run and that sometimes he would think that the show sucked, and when then we would listen back, it was great. And I feel like that about our conversations too. Sometimes we'll have and I'm like that one just didn't hit and then I'll listen to it in the replay and I'm like holy shit.
16:23 - Mel (Host)
Actually I have that very rarely. I think that, not that we're like the best, but I feel like our conversations really hit the spot 98 percent of the time in my head.
16:35 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, like on a personal level you're, or just like trying to keep the flow pace going and like just being a host, like trying to keep shit together, and so I'm paying attention to everything, and when I can just let go and listen, then I hear what happened sometimes, which is weird. Anyway, Ben, thank you. That's how you use the tepid line everybody 971-808-1524. And then followed through with the Patreon. That's right, and here's the other thing you can do leave us those reviews.
17:08 - Apple (Host)
Uh, we ask you to go over to apple podcasts and do it, but reviews can be left in many forms. There's google reviews whatever line whatever, whatever you're using, you can send us emails. You can hit up the dm on the instagram like, just let it talk to us most importantly, though, is apple podcast. Yeah, because that gets the algorithm that gets it to pop up in front of people, so that people that haven't heard us can, and you can be part of making that happen by easily doing that?
17:32 - Aaron (Host)
yep, and last but not least, we ask that you tell somebody that you love about. No Simple Road. Turn them on, man, we'd appreciate it. And it helps the no Simple Road mycelial network family grow and the tendrils of our whole thing go out there.
17:46 - Mel (Host)
Oh, I didn't even realize that I did that so even if you're tuning in for the first time because you're a friend of Caesar's or you follow Caesar and you want to hear what he has to say. Tell someone else about this episode that you think might be interested. Tell your 50 year old uncle about it. Tell you know. Tell your coworker. Tell whoever you-year-old uncle about it. Tell your co-worker, tell whoever you can.
18:08 - Aaron (Host)
We appreciate it. Shout out from the rooftops. We're the bees knees.
18:13 - Apple (Host)
Cat's pajamas.
18:14 - Speaker 7 (Host)
All right, everybody.
18:15 - Aaron (Host)
That's it. We're done with the business. We are going to get you to this conversation with Cesar Tootsweet, and that's that, without further ado, the no Simple Road Crew gives you.
18:25 - Apple (Host)
Cesar Marin. Rehearsal.
18:35 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, rehearsal is good. You know what? It teaches us, we rehearse every day in our life for the next day in our life.
18:42 - Speaker 7 (Host)
So it's important for us to do that, so.
18:44 - Aaron (Host)
Cesar, because I was not recording correctly. Can you please tell people again who you are? I'm sorry.
18:51 - Cesar (Guest)
Of course. No, of course, it would be my pleasure. So again, my name is Cesar Marin. I'm the founder and owner of Cultivating Wisdom. Cultivating Wisdom is something that was born out of my introduction to plant medicine. So I was a producer at CNN for 25 years before plant medicine came into my life. It completely changed my life, changed my perspective of who I am, changed how I'm present for the world, and it was crazy because I had never had a psychedelic experience before the age of 54. Again, I dabbled in different little things.
19:24 - Aaron (Host)
I mean, I grew up in Miami in the 80s, so you know, I know that stuff, but for some reason, I guess, because, again, that stigma that existed psychedelics, which is never part of my world.
19:35 - Cesar (Guest)
And it was funny because psychedelics and plant medicine came into my life right when my life was going to get turned on its head. I mean, after being at CNN for 25 years, I was going to get laid off from CNN. After it was bought out by the Discovery Channel and plant medicine pretty much said you know what, don't worry about it, keep your feet on the ground, take a deep, deep breath. We're going to close this 25-year chapter that you had at CNN and we're going to open up this brand new chapter. So it was just amazing how plant medicine was able to help me reinvent myself at the age of 55, when a lot of people are going through this. You know what? Life is almost over. I'm stuck here. We'll see where we are. You know, retire in 10 years and everything will be fine. But the plant medicine really told me you know what, don't worry, you're going to have a different life. You can have a different outlook on life're going to have a different way of conducting yourself and being present for who you are and people around you. So it's just it's been an amazing year and a half since plant medicine came into my life.
20:34
Now, you know, I created this platform, this cultivating wisdom platform, for two reasons. One, so that people can manifest the fact that they're using psychedelics without it being again trippy or psychedelic issue tie-dye and not that there's anything wrong with it, I love tie that but if I want to have an honest conversation with someone who has no clue about this, if I'm sitting there with tie-dye stuff, I'm going to get the wrong impression, right. So the idea was to create apparel that's conversational, that we can wear, something like this that says microdosing right, that starts conversations, you know. Or different types of apparel that you know at least elicits conversation, without again having that stigma oh, this guy's a stoner, or this guy's out in the woods or this guy's going to whatever. And you know, that's that's.
21:17
That's again, what I want to have is honest, open conversations about psychedelics, and especially for people over 50, especially for people my generation. You know that someone can see someone like me say oh wait, he's got gray hair, I have gray hair, he's been divorced, I've been divorced. He lost his job, I lost my job, his kids are grown up, my kids are grown up. That there's this relatability right that people say you know what he was? Where I was am right now. That's where he was 12 months ago, a year and a half ago, and look at how he's thriving. So it's been an incredible year and a half filled with incredible memories, meeting incredibly wonderful people like you guys, and I'm living the best day of my life every single day.
22:01 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, Before we got cut off, I asked the question of who was Caesar before this because you said he's a good guy. But how did you relate to psychedelics before you actually took them?
22:15 - Cesar (Guest)
That's Mel. That's a great question and, in all honesty, if people you know who know my story I was I was a cannabis addict for a really long period of my life and, look, I respect cannabis. I think cannabis is a beautiful, beautiful medicine when used intentionally, right. But it's also a medicine that you can really get lost and become very escapist. And I became that person where the cannabis was you know, wake up, get high, go to work, get high.
22:47
Cannabis was you know, wake up, get high, go to work, get high at work, get high. Uh, go home, get high, be at home. And like, hey, babe, I gotta go get eggs what for? There's eggs in the refrigerator? No, I gotta go get the special organic ones for a special recipe. I'm doing, yeah, bullshit, you're going out to sort of get high. So it was that escapism that had me gripped and it wasn't until um, you know psychedelics, sort of that that someone talked about it. But it was crazy because it was a recreational curiosity. I mean, it wasn't like you know what I've read about this. Let me sort of figure this out. It was a recreational curiosity and it wasn't until that first big journey, which was crazy because it was the Monday before Halloween 2022. And I have half a chocolate bar that has psilocybin in it.
23:30 - Mel (Host)
You went trick-or-treating early.
23:32 - Cesar (Guest)
Huh, I did go trick-or-treating early, which made it crazy because, imagine this so I'm on a bike ride with about two 300 people downtown Atlanta. We're sort of taking over the streets. We do this on Monday night. We're riding around, houses are decorated, there's like skeletons in the shrubbery, it's just. And all of a sudden I go wait a minute, this is what my hands feel like and this is what it feels like when my lungs are full of air, and that's what the trees smell like, and that's and wait a minute.
24:04
I got this sense of look at all these things around me that I was missing out on, that weren't there, that I was escaping to. But you know, what's really crazy is that, as I'm driving home from this bike ride and the street lights are going off, it's like fireworks. It's crazy. Something inside of me said why are you driving this way? And I was like who's who's saying that it was my conscious. It was this conscious awakening of why this isn't smart, like you shouldn't be driving like this. And it's crazy because, if I think about it, if it was alcohol, I'm sure I'd be like, hey, I'm driving worse than this. You know, if it was cannabis, like I, don't cops around, go ahead Like that, right now, go ahead.
24:47
There was something that said what are you doing? Like, why are you driving this way? And it was amazing this right, when I get home, it's a big journalist. I mean, I've been CNN for 25 years. I'm like that these substances did that just made me feel something that I've never, ever felt in my life awakened, conscious, alive, in tune with what was going on. And I start to eat and I go wait a minute, they're using psychedelics as medicine and they're using this for ptsd, and they're using this for depression and they're using this for anxiety. And I come across this term called microdosing and I'm like wait a minute, people are using small amounts of psilocybin to get over substance dependency. And it was crazy because right away, the heart was like did you read that? And the brain was like no, we didn't read anything no, I didn't see anything man yeah, yeah, yeah, just keep going.
25:39
And it was that it was. It was that that said you know what? Maybe through this microdosing, you can control that substance and it doesn't control you. You control the substance and you can live a much better, more awake, more enlightened life. And that's exactly what the medicine did for me.
25:59 - Aaron (Host)
Wow story. What it sounds like is I think a lot of us go through our lives um numbing ourselves to the reality that's happening inside and outside of us. We are constantly taking ourselves out of the present moment in order to anesthetize traumas and fears and insecurities and anxieties and all that stuff. And it sounds like what the mushrooms did for you the first time is brought you into yourself in the present moment and showed you what it was like to really be alive.
26:37 - Cesar (Guest)
That's exactly what it did. You hit it right on the head because before I wasn't being alive, I wasn't living this moment. Before, the best day of my life was, oh you know what. I was on a cruise and I was there with my wife and me and the kids were there and it was Mickey and I got high fives and it was an all-you-can-eat buffet. And then, if I think about it, how can that be the best day of my life? I'm no longer with that person. My kids are grown up. If you put me now, I'd be like, oh man, how can that be the best day of my life?
27:10 - Speaker 7 (Host)
no, the best day of my life is right now, this present moment.
27:11 - Cesar (Guest)
absolutely that's what it's about and it's awesome, aaron, that you said that, because it's that it's. You know that that that sense of living in the past right, which brings on those depressive feelings. You can't, you can't be anxious about the past, you can only be depressed about the past and and the same thing about, like you said, living in that future, to that fear right Of what's going to happen, that anxiety that comes on with that If you don't live that present moment, if you don't realize that this moment, right now, is the best moment you have in your life and, like you said, you're you're a bit asleep to it.
27:40 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, and you're, and you're, you're uh, a lot of people don't know willfully put myself to sleep to. That is doing a disservice to the entire universe, because I am a fractal piece of that greater thing that is experiencing itself, and so if this node of the universe is not awake to the reality of what's going on, then I'm shutting down part of the computer that is alive and awake everywhere. That is everything.
28:31 - Cesar (Guest)
That's so true, that's so true.
28:33
And so it's really a magical moment, like when you say when you're present to everything, right, when you're present to the moment, when you're present to your loved ones, when you're present to your spouse, when you're present to your kids, when you're present to your coworkers, when you're present to your neighbor, that's where the magic happens. Like, the magic happens right now. It doesn't happen in the past, the magic doesn't happen in the future, but you got to get there. So it's right now that the magic happens and it's it's. It's once we really realize that it's these moments that we have, that once we make the best of them, then life is so much easier. And it's crazy because, like I said before, I was asleep to that. And I was asleep to it partly because, again, the the addiction to the cannabis, right, but partly also because I just wasn't awake and it was the mushrooms that really said be present, be present, look, and it's funny, mushrooms are taking over my life. I mean, it's a crazy thing. Fungus spreads you know, yeah, yeah.
29:32 - Aaron (Host)
You know what an impact they've made in my life the culture that we live in is, uh, designed in such a way as to keep us chasing those future things and thinking about the past. It's a it the culture.
29:47
Like terence mckenna says, culture is not our friend, and it is designed to keep us on the treadmill of whatever rat race that we're running yeah and yeah I think that I know, for for me, I I've been taking psychedelics since I was a teenager, recreationally, you know, obviously back then in the 80s, um, but I know, for me they have been the most, um, impactful and experiential thing in life. I can't imagine my life without them at this point and what they've done for me. I this whole podcast started just simply me talking about going to my first grateful dead show, and obviously that's a recreational use of psychedelics. But what happened there was not that. It was an awakening to self, an awakening to community, an awakening to the thing that's outside and inside of myself, that's bigger than me.
30:51
That's what happened and so it started my journey on this road. You know what I'm saying, and I'm really curious, though at over 50, 50, your personality, your life is very set. You know what I'm saying yeah you are, your identity is firmly enmeshed and, and after that first experience that you had, were you scared afterward?
31:28 - Cesar (Guest)
That's a great question. That's a great question because a lot of people have these trepidations right. The fact that for me it was a recreational curiosity, right, I went in. I went in wanting to get high and the crazy thing is that that awakening was awesome, but I had already had that chocolate bar for a week. And it was funny because the first time I tried psilocybin, I had just a piece of the chocolate bar.
31:50
I don't know, I have no clue. I don't know anything about dosage. I don't know anything about how much you need to take up. To me it was like, look, it's like weed. You smoke a little bit, you get high. You have to smoke the whole joint, right. Right, smoke a little bit, you have to eat the whole chocolate bar, right. So it was that. So there was no fear.
32:10
And once it did happen, once that awakening happened, the the sense of wait a minute, I can do so much with this. The fact that this could potentially help me, really help me, to be a better person, is incredible. And there's something crazy about what you said about you know what would have been without? People have asked me, cesar, what would have been of your life? You get laid off from CNN. After you've been there for 25 years, I mean this is pretty much what identifies me. I mean this is what you've done for half of your adult life and it's taken away. If psychedelics hadn't come into your world, what would have happened? And that scares me. That scares me. That makes sense Because I go.
32:46
You know what, what would have been? I would have fallen down that maybe road of just being. There's a difference, like I tell people, there's a difference between using a substance to get high and to get enlightened Right, and both, depending on what your intentions are, you're going to get the outcome that you want right. But it's that enlightenment that psychedelics gave me right, that helped me to sort of move forward. Because if not, listen, there's nobody hiring 55 year old producers unless you're a senior executive, vice president of programming. And let's also be honest, tv news is dying. Nobody's watching news anymore, they get it on their phone. So that would have been scary, that would have been petrifying.
33:27
And again, the medicine knows, like I tell people, I, the medicine came to me like it looked for me, it wasn't like I was looking for whatever. You know, someone told me about the experience they had. Then another person told me about the experience. That and that's what opened up the curiosity and that's what sort of drove me to try new substances. Because, again, before it wasn't that I feared them, it was the. I had been programmed so much that they were bad, that they were untouchable. They weren't something that you know. I mean I wanted to go down oh, I'm curious too.
33:59 - Apple (Host)
I want to back up for a second to the cannabis use. I'm in the cannabis industry and I work for a vape cartridge company and. I'm out every day at dispensaries kind of promoting vape carts and, like you said, it's like anything, it's a double-edged sword. One side can you know the abuse of and it sounds like you did mostly cartridges you know the abuse of, and it sounds like you did mostly cartridges.
34:26 - Cesar (Guest)
I was, I was, I was doing flower, I was, yeah, obviously it worked because it was easier.
34:27 - Apple (Host)
Yeah, yeah, and it's funny because every day when I promote car I hear a lot of people have quit cartridges because of the convenience. It's so easy just to hit it anywhere, like you know in the bathroom, at work, anywhere, and that's why people use it for concealing it.
34:43
And I always say one of the things I always tell people when they're like I don't do cartridges, just flour. It's like mother nature got it right, you know. But as humans we want to make everything stronger, a quicker delivery system, and I I see a lot of that as my point of that. A lot of people using cartridges are just smoking all the time in the car, like everywhere, and when you're not doing the flour, that kind of takes the. You know there's more of a ritual and magic in using flour and grinding and loading a bowl and taking your time. And it's been done with lots of things now.
35:20
You know dmt and cartridges, all kinds of stuff I that's. One thing I love about mushrooms is it's the closest to mother nature as far as an experience that you're going to have and connects you to yourself and you know the world. Mother nature, like you said, slows you down so you can enjoy everything that's going on around you when we live in such a fast paced world. It's awesome to hear your story.
35:48 - Aaron (Host)
And I think too, cesar, people would benefit from hearing a little bit about how you integrated that experience into your life afterwards, because those are watershed moments that happen when you have a awakening from a plant, medicine or a mushroom or whatever. That it's not like the next day you wake up and everything's better and off. I go into the, into a brand new life and it's solved unicorns and rainbows everywhere, like you're still in it how do you marry those two?
36:21 - Mel (Host)
right, all that stuff that you were thinking beforehand? Like you know, like psychedelics are bad, whatever those dare taught you, whatever your parents taught you, whatever the church taught you about, and, like you said, we have these preconceived notions of, like the hippies, so staying away from that kind of culture. So how did you marry those two, integrate that?
36:44 - Cesar (Guest)
I think the one. I immediately saw the hope. Right, the change, the change comes during time, right, you don't change overnight, right, but it was. It was that hope that it gave me. And it was funny because you know, when people ask me, well, you know what protocol should I use, and I'm like, well, you know what it's sort of this is, citizen science. Like, my protocol might not work for you, right? So the protocol that I did use was the Fadiman protocol, which costs for one day on two days off.
37:10
And it was really interesting because that first dosage day, obviously it's like, wait a minute, hold on a second, life is amazing, life is beautiful, I have everything I need. And the cannabis was like an afterthought, it wasn't even I didn't even think about it. That second day, that transition day, was like, oh, you know what, maybe, but not you know what, maybe not the yesterday, I didn't need it, you know why, why today. And then that third day, that integration day, which is what you guys were talking about, how I integrated all of this together. It was that sense of like, wait a minute, I don't need that right now. And what was I sleeping to? Like what was I? And the integration now has become being able to talk about it, like for me, being able to talk to people, especially people in my generation, about how I've changed, about how I've been able to sort of look at things differently, how I've been able to have a different relationship with the substance that before was literally like gripped me, like it had me around the neck and, like Apple said, because it's so easy, because it's so easy to sort of you know what you know, I tell people look, when we grew up, right, if you wanted to smoke cannabis, like in your house, like you had to go upstairs and you had that window and everything. It wasn't easy and you're like like blow it out, whatever. And it's like nowadays these kids are like smoking the back of their kids, the parents car, the parents don't even know. It's like it's so for me that integration, that marrying, has been okay. Let's have honest conversations like I get it, I understand, and like I tell people look, I'm going to talk to five people, right, right, about what I'm doing. Two of them are going to say there's no way, ever, ever, I would try.
38:45
Psychedelics, are you crazy? I've heard the stories, I've read about them. I know people who are in the loony bin because of psychedelics, bullshit. You don't know anybody in the loony bin, to be honest, you know you curiosity and they're going to go wait a minute. Hold on a second. What like medicine, really? And psychedelics and people like no, and there's, there's like educational institutions that are studying it, yes, but you're gonna have that one person, that one person that's gonna go wait a minute. That's what I need, that's what I've been looking for.
39:16
So for me, the integration or part of the biggest part for me of integration, is being able to openly talk about this right, openly, without fear, without fear of judgment, without fear of what people are going to think, without fear of you know, whatever. That I can honestly have these discussions. And then the other beautiful part for me of integration is seeing people's change right, seeing someone say, hey, cesar, thank you, I appreciate that. You talked to me about that. And it's about that connection to humans where you give them that little power of them to try something different and it changes your mind. That completely fills your heart. So that's been a big part of the integration for me, especially with psychedelics, is to be able to talk to them about them openly and honestly. What about with your family. That's a great story, mel, and I'm glad you asked that. Yeah, because we have.
40:09 - Mel (Host)
Aaron and I. We have children and grandkids. And a grandchild, and they're adult children. You know, and we've had to be honest with our psychedelics, use at well we didn't have to, well we were we chose we chose to be.
40:26
let me say that we chose to be honest with them for um a long time because we didn't want to lie. No, we didn't want to lie about it and we were living it. So how can we lie about something we're living? So it was always a space that we talked about and when it was um, you know, when it was hard, it was hard but it still made sense to do. And I'm so grateful that we did that, because what has caused our children to have a super healthy relationship with psychedelics? They've both tried it and they both self-regulate and they both don't need it all the time and they're I love that about them.
41:05
But I know that it was not, um, the easy choice, because they had friends and family that you know, other family and other like their friends, that their parents and all that that they. It was unconventional, so we gave them something that they also kind of either had to hide or not be 100 percent honest with, or figure out how to, you know, walk around. But like we decided, no, we're going to tell them about this. So, like I know, it doesn't always go over easy, how did that I was just on top of that too.
41:35 - Apple (Host)
I saw you have one of your children served in the military, so it's close to home like treating veterans and stuff also.
41:44 - Cesar (Guest)
Yeah. So I'm going to talk about two generations, right. One, obviously, let's start my children right. My children, my children are grown right. My, my, my oldest, is 28.
41:53
My, the one that's in the military. He's serving right now. He's 24. Hats off to him. He's an army ranger school, so that's. And then my daughter is now a freshman at college.
42:06
So for them, the older one, you know he's lived, he's lived a life. He lived in Paris, he lived in New York, he's, he's, he's, he's a traveled man. So for him, having this honest discussion was like okay, dad, you know what, I get a sense that you're doing this responsibly. I get a sense that you've educated yourself. I get a sense that you're in a better place. I understand. Obviously, the one that's in the military is like okay, well, you know, I'm in the military, so I'm not going to wear your gear. I can't wear your gear, but thank you, thank you for what you're doing, or thank you that that that there's so many people trying to get veterans help with psychedelics. So he gets it, he sees it, he sort of sees it. You know what? There's a lot of people who have served, like he has or he's doing right now, that afterwards have been able to sort of get out and find a different way than before. Because, again, it's the fact that 22 service men or women veterans take their lives every day is something that's just unacceptable. Whatever we can do to help them out is is paramount. So so for him it was interesting, my daughter was a harder sell.
43:09
My daughter was a harder sell because she, she was like wait a minute, what? What are you doing? Like, you're doing like psychedelics, like that's, that's illegal. And then you're going to create a company for people to manifest that they're doing something illegal. That's so for her it was a lot harder sell and I was like, look, I'm not doing anything, that's, and there's so many things that are illegal. And I was like, look, once in a while, you know you're, you're in college, you're not of age to drink, kid drink or two right at a party, right, is that illegal? So it's not. You know, I mean don't, don't cast a stone yet, but sort of see the difference. And she's sort of now she's like dad, I'm so proud of what you're doing, like it's good for you and good that you're. You know, you're just such a much better centered, authentic person that that that it's amazing. So for my kids, and again because they're older, like I couldn't imagine the discussion with my child, who's 10 years old, you know, telling him what I'm doing, but that honesty is incredibly important.
44:06
Now my mother was a different story. Yeah, I bet. When I tell my 80-year-old mother I said, mom, do you know that cannabis dependency that I deal with? She said I'm your mother, of course I do. That I deal with. She said I'm your mother, of course I do. I said well, mom, I'm going to start using psychedelics to get over my cannabis dependency. She was like are you fucking?
44:30 - Aaron (Host)
nuts, you're using gasoline to put out your fire.
44:34 - Cesar (Guest)
What is wrong with you? Are you crazy, seriously, what is wrong with you? Have you seen how old you crazy? Like, seriously, what?
44:43 - Mel (Host)
is wrong with you, Like. Have you seen how old you are? But it's valid right In her perspective totally a thousand percent.
44:50 - Cesar (Guest)
A thousand percent. Like, are you serious? Like have you seen that you have three children? How are you going to explain this to them? Like, what is wrong with you? And I said, mom, look, I'm going to be honest with you. Like, right now I have two options I continue down the cannabis path and see where that leads me, or I try something different.
45:09
And she was like you know what? I don't even know, I don't even know what to say, I don't even know what to say. And she hung up on me, she called my wife and she said what happened to him, like, what? Like did he just do so much drugs? Now he's just gone crazy. And she said, look, I'm going to be honest with you. Before he was escaping, he was escaping life, he was escaping himself, he was escaping his problems, he was escaping everything. Now he's more present, now he's here. Now he's like there, 24%. So that's what I see. A month later, later, as my mom is in columbia, she sees this necklace, she sees this pendant which is a crystal mushroom, and she brings it to me and she goes I'm so proud of what you're doing. My parents are proud of the fact that I use psychedelics. That's not an endorsement. I don't know what it is. And now my mom makes me.
46:08 - Aaron (Host)
What was?
46:08 - Mel (Host)
her change of heart in Columbia. What was? What did she see, or what did she?
46:12 - Cesar (Guest)
experience. So the crazy thing is, you know, my mom my mom, you know, came to this country, emigrated here, you know, after I was born with one hand in the front, one hand in the back, very, you know, very minimal education. She realized what business was because she worked at her uncle's gas station and went okay, this is how you run a business. And she came to this country, she made it for herself, right, without an education. She started a business and she had a little empire of a beauty salon and a beauty supply and she was able to give employment to her, her siblings and to her daughter and create this.
46:42
So for her, the way to go is start your own business. And she'd always say that to me like, start your own business, stop being dependent on someone else. Right, you're making money for them, you're not making money for yourself. So when she sees holy cow, he's talking differently. He started his own business. I'm just busting his chops to be doing this, like, finally he's done it. I'm so proud of you, I'm so proud of what you're doing. And it's not. It's funny, because she's my number one fan and if ever there's a couple of days that I don't post something, she's the first one going why haven't you posted anything?
47:16 - Ben (Caller)
You know what it?
47:17 - Aaron (Host)
is. It's the. The proof is in the pudding. It's in the people that you love, that are in your life, seeing the change that happens in you and through you and around you. That makes them realize that this isn't something crazy. You know what I mean?
47:36
Look, man, or even if it is something crazy they're accepting of it because they see what it's doing for you, the reality of of the time that we live in, there's a couple of things that are really great. One is cognitive liberty is coming to the forefront of consciousness. In the country that we live in, a lot of states are allowing use of psychedelics or decriminalizing the use of psychedelics.
48:08
So, like I said before, the this, the culture that we live in, stigmatized and didn't allow for us to explore our own consciousness and our own realities. It was demonized and and illegal. Also. I firmly believe that we're in the midst of an awakening. Oh, definitely, and I always thought that, like years ago, I would hear talk of, like you know, native prophecies and all this stuff about an awakening happening and I thought it would be this like one day again you wake up and everything's different kind of thing. But what it really looks like is exactly what you're talking about individual people waking up to the truth of who they are in the moment and then spreading that message through living their life in a different way that other people can see, and through that the vibration of the planet is being raised, totally.
49:09 - Cesar (Guest)
Yeah totally, and it's incredibly important like that. We have these platforms, like you guys have. Right that we can have these open, honest discussions. Right that people can say you know what? Look, these are normal, everyday people, right? These are fathers, these are husbands, these are husbands, these are sons, these are mothers, these are daughters, these are, you know, athletes, these are entrepreneurs, these are lawyers who are using psychedelics as life performance enhancers. They're not using it to go trip out in the woods and whatever. They're using it because it really enhances their life and that's the awakening.
49:43
And that's why it's paramount that platforms like the ones we both have, that we have these honest discussions, that we have these honest talks, that we really highlight people who are doing better, who are doing great things through psychedelics, especially because, look, I worked in mass media for a long time. I know that bitch is itching. It's just biting at the chomp for one story, for one story that's bad about psychedelics. So they can see, see, I told you so, I told you, so it's bad. So that's why, the more we show these stories, the more we show.
50:14
Look at these, look at this couple they're incredibly thriving and they're doing awesome and they're having these wonderful discussions. Look at this guy that's going to work at CNN and he turned his life around and now he's a better person. All these talks about positive changes through psychedelics are incredibly important incredibly important right now because of the stigma the stigma that exists because we're one headline away from like a couple of days ago I would take shrooms, try to down plane. No, hold on a second back up. That's not what happened Right. That's not what happened Right. So it's these wonderful, open, positive discussion about changes through psychedelics that we need to have and we need to have often.
50:56 - Mel (Host)
I want to ask about spirituality and religion because I'm sure that you know, probably growing up in a Spanish household, you know you Catholic or Christian or something of that nature. Did psychedelics change your ideas or thoughts about God or spirit or spirituality and how you relate to the higher tiers, the higher world that we can't see?
51:25 - Cesar (Guest)
Yeah, so obviously, like you said, I grew up Catholic. I grew up in a very Catholic home. As I went through life and then became a journalist, right, really digging deep, I saw what religion does, right, that the same way that religion can unify people, it can really destroy and break people apart, right, and start wars. So I became very skeptical, right, very skeptical in the sense of, like, like I believe in the universe. Right, I believe in the universe. I believe that there's a higher power that's called the universe that puts things in our way right. And it was crazy because if people ask me, do you believe in god? My answer is I don't know. I, honestly, I I don't know. I don't know if he exists. He hasn't talked to me, I haven't seen him, I haven't been in front of him, so I don't know. Now, I do know that the universe is magical and that the universe puts things in our life. Sometimes, it challenges, sometimes to make us better.
52:29
Now, I did have a five m e o dnt I was good, that was my question yeah, in jamaica, um, and that made me realize that, micah, and that made me realize that I'm God and you're God, and she's God and he's God. We're all God. Right, it's how we portray ourselves. Right, it's how we? Not in the way that we're the arrogant God or the hateful God or the God that if you, only you, me, and that's the way you're going to be saved.
53:01
No, the God, that loving God, that loving spirit, that loving that everything around us is beautiful. Right that my path in life is my own God is to love, is to forgive and is to move forward. That's the way that a God should walk. Right, because if you don't love and anger and animosity towards whatever, it's a horrible feeling. Forgiveness, you have to forgive, and not for the other person but for oneself, because then you don't carry that. And moving forward. Why do you sort of live in that path of holding stuff against people? No, it's about loving, living and moving forward. That makes us feel empowered. And if you, you feel that you're God, then you can believe in another God. Not that there's anything wrong with it. Every person has their own opinion. But if you don't believe in yourself as a true walking God, then how can you really believe in anything else?
53:56 - Aaron (Host)
That's well said.
54:00 - Mel (Host)
I love that because when you awaken, especially like Aaron was saying, you're so fixed. You know with who you are at those ages, and when you have this new awakening of sorts, there's a lot of different pieces the family aspect, your personal self, like how you relate to the world, your friends, like having to explain this to your friends. And then that spiritual aspect, like where do I go from now? How do I've been praying to you know, god or Jesus this whole time? And now I don't know if it's like that, but it's not. You know, like there's so many different relationships that alter because of these experiences that we have, you know, and so I just like getting other people's thoughts and how they've dealt with it, because you know, going forward, we still have, you know, maybe somebody in their 60s is going to come out and be like, oh my God, I tried it for the first time. Now they're relating to their generation and above them, to try to not help or save but enlighten other people about Educate.
55:06
Yeah, educate, educate.
55:07 - Cesar (Guest)
Educate. Look, I'm not. I'm not. I share my story. I share my story of transformation and I hope that that's what pokes at people's childhood curiosity. And I back that up with science, with studies that are being done, with the fact that there's, you know, besides, hospitals and educational institutions that are studying how these can better us. That's how I move forward in this space, right, but it is. It's that awakening and it's awesome because everyone's got their story and everyone's story is beautiful. Like everyone I've met who has a story of awakening, it's just, it's a heart filling of how they are and how they change and how they smile and how they've become just who they are, and it's and it's and it's crazy. That sort of again, part, part of the reason is that connection, right, that being able to speak about it and it's and it's through.
55:56
Sometimes, for me it was through that apparel, because when you know when, when my life changes, right, and I'm like, wait a minute, hold on a second. I was able to get over this dependency. I'm like, wait a minute, what am I going to do after cnn? Like let's, let's think about this. Like let's, let's sort of be open where before it might have been. Like oh, my god, I'm gonna lose my job at cnn. What am I gonna do? And nobody's gonna hire me? And you know what I mean. Let me just you know what? Let me just slice my wrist, I don't know, horrible. No, it was like wait a minute. Yes, you can do this, you can do whatever you want.
56:25
And that's where that sort of desire to say hey, you know what, let me offer up something. Right, that we can have these conversations, and that's where the apparel brand was born, and it's through these conversations. I mean, how many times have I worn this shirt that says microdosing? And someone come up to me, says and says you microdose, and I go yeah, I do. They go. I've been reading about that, I've been hearing about this, but I have nobody to talk to. I don't know who to ask. And, yes, I hear something on the internet, I hear something here, but finally I see someone. So you open up this community or you have situations like I had a couple of months ago. I was in the supermarket and Timon comes up to me. She goes you microdust, and I went yes, how can you tell?
57:02
Because of my smile, she said no because of your shirt dumbass, and I went okay, and she shares this story with me that before she used to drink a bottle of wine every day. She'd get home, the kids work, you know what, let me have a glass. And then you know what? Let me have a glass. And then you know what? Whatever, just another glass. And then I'm not going to leave that little bit that's left in the bottle. And by the end of the night she's just like I was a wreck.
57:30
I wasn't present for anything. She was now in microdose every three days. I'm more present for my husband. I'm more present for my child. I'm more present for work. So it's right, mel, it's awesome If the lawyer goes and talks to his other lawyer friends or people in his law firm about what he's doing. Awesome If a 60 year old talks to her 60 year old or his 60 year old friend and says look at how I've been able to change my life. I've been able to get some off of these, some of these medicines that the doctors have given me, not taking a little bit of mushrooms. That's what it's about, about sharing these discussions about this community, right, and what Aaron had talked about earlier, that culture, right. We want to be part of this culture. No, what we should thrive to be is part of a community, part of people. That's what we should thrive to be.
58:19 - Apple (Host)
Yes, one thing I love is you talking about your mother, at first kind of freaking out, and then she comes around to it and is one of your biggest supporters. Similar thing with my parents. We're similar age. My dad turned 81 yesterday.
58:40 - Cesar (Guest)
Beautiful yeah, yeah.
58:41 - Apple (Host)
Yeah, and he is sharp. You know he's still, he's one of our biggest supporters. But when we moved up here to portland in 2016 and he knew, you know he's don't know in my whole life that I'm in cannabis same with my mom but they've always uh, he's a lawyer, so he always looked at it from that legality side of it and was, like you know, doing that, dope, this and that.
59:05
And one thing I love that we've had a conversation about. You know, the old skits on saturday night live, the whole propaganda thing of of can't you know weed and pot is a gateway drug to all the other bad things and everything. And and now him and my mom, both very conservative never, you know, never gave me a real hard time but didn't like it, they let us now.
59:27 - Speaker 7 (Host)
Now they're the ones that are like, you know, I'm, I'm low on that lotion.
59:30 - Apple (Host)
I love seeing older people. Cannabis opened up a whole new world to them, to where now they have tried it, not smoking it, but in tinctures and lotions and I've gotten which I didn't expect. But I got apologies from both of them that were like wow, now I understand why you did this because, especially with my mother uh, antidepressants and stuff. She got off of so many medications and I see this daily working in the industry of people getting off medications, medicating themselves through cannabis, which is now leading to what we're talking about. It's opening the discussion for the next thing, which is the psychedelic therapy with ketamine and MDMA and mushrooms and so many avenues. Get DMT and now and like what you're doing, I love it. Like, like, like, like, like I. We have a bunch of tie-dyes, we're dead heads and stuff like that. Yeah, and that does that. That's what. That's the old school, that's like what they used to see and be like oh, they're just going out burnouts, they're going out in the woods and getting naked, and we were.
01:00:37 - Cesar (Guest)
They're listening to those eight track tapes of the Grateful Dead.
01:00:40 - Mel (Host)
Yeah but like, is there an apology that needs to happen to that sect of people? Because that's kind of messed up.
01:00:48 - Aaron (Host)
Everybody can just say thank you.
01:00:51 - Mel (Host)
Yes thank you. Thank you, we were wrong. We're late to the party.
01:00:59 - Apple (Host)
Now it opens it up wherever. There is no apology needed on either side. I didn't need that from my parents. What I wanted was open discussion.
01:01:06 - Speaker 7 (Host)
Yes, to be able to say yes. I do this daily, I'm responsible, I go to work.
01:01:11 - Apple (Host)
I do what I got to do and I'm a good person that puts out love and kindness every day.
01:01:16 - Cesar (Guest)
And that's where we're at. It's amazing. Correct, that's yeah, I mean that's where we're at. Yeah, correct, and it's recognition because, yes, you know, is there, were they wrong? They were wrong because that's where they were programmed right, yeah that.
01:01:29
So. So to them, they weren't wrong. Yeah, right, yeah, they were right. Because this is what we're being fed. The government, the people who are supposed to protect us, the people who we look up to to make sure we're fine, they're telling us no, this is bad, don't go there. It's like, wait a minute. So it's not that they were wrong, it's maybe, again, they weren't educated. And that's what's paramount in all of this education. Yep, right, then we do educate other people. That's where, that's where we move this forward. Education is going to be the most important part of psychedelic medicine or the psychedelic renaissance moving forward. It has to be because, again, people, people are, they're just they're. They were educated that this is bad. Yep, now we have to deprogram, we have to show them. But again, like mel said, we show them through the transformation. That's right. We show them through them. Transformation, that's right. We show them through them saying look how much better they are, look how much better they act, look how authentic they feel. That's how we educate them.
01:02:34 - Apple (Host)
Well, now people are educating themselves. Like you said, cnn, my mom and dad everything they learned was from the news, growing up with the news and everything. And my dad, my mom and dad, everything they learned was from the news Growing up with the news and everything. And my dad, I love it. And then, like the last couple years, my dad was like he'd get upset at me, he'd want to talk to me about politics. I was like I don't pay attention to that dad. That doesn't you know you're letting that affect you. He quit watching the news now and he was diehard, diehard cnn. He turns it on once in a while when there's something going on to see what there?
01:03:04
but now he'll watch like fox and like he'll watch.
01:03:08 - Apple (Host)
He'll watch the different viewpoints instead of just stuck to one and I love that.
01:03:12 - Apple (Host)
Like you, you get now the cnn it. It was what was supposed to happen for you how do you relate to politics?
01:03:17 - Cesar (Guest)
now, caesar, because cnn is heavy political, I mean not exclusively, but heavy, heavy and so no heavy I mean, I was, I, I was and and it's crazy I my last years at cnn. I worked in sports. I was working for cnn international, so we're producing sports shows, but still I would get the oh, you work for cnn fake news and I'd be like that wait a minute, five. No matter what, I'm sorry, there's no fake news in that Right and the first person over the finish line always wins. You can't fake that Right. But I get it because I was in there, I was in editorial meetings, I was in, you know, conference calls where it was very political and it's very, I'm not going to say, one-sided, because CNN, from what I went through, I mean to get a script for sports on some team beating five over three. It had to go through two or three rows of copy editing. So I know that there's facts in it, but I do sense or I do feel that there was an agenda an agenda to make sure that whatever happened was highlighted.
01:04:24
But it was also breaking news. Trump just took a shit. How is that breaking news? Who cares?
01:04:32
So the moment that I was able to leave that building, I said I don't need that. In other words, the only thing that I can do to affect change is to vote, and to vote for the candidate who I feel is going to have the best change for me, by the fact that, even working in sports, that it's like oh, what did this? What did they do next and what did he do next and what happened next and what did he do next? And let me wake up and let me go on twitter and let me but wait a minute. What, like?
01:05:10
Why it's so much yeah, everything else is going on in life that for me to be able to turn that off, to be able to turn that off a bit and go you know what not that I don't want to know what's going on in the world, but there's so many other things going on in my world, in my world, that I can change for my neighbors right, for the person across the street, for my kids, for myself, for the people I work with. That other peripheral stuff can just sometimes be noise and the moment we can sort of you know what. Let me put that down for a little bit and let me sort of dedicate on me and the things around me. It's such a better feeling.
01:05:52 - Aaron (Host)
You know, going back to the spirituality thing, when, especially later in life, when our spiritual beliefs have been fixed in us through programming of our parents or the world around us or even ourselves, and we have an experience that shakes us up.
01:06:18
What you're saying about community is the key to that experience being able to be integrated. If I don't have a forum and a group of people around me that I can talk to honestly about the experience that I just had, then the programming that is in me is going to take back over more than likely because I don't have validation and I don't have support. And so when I can honestly talk about the experience that I've had to someone else, whether it be a peer, an elder, even somebody younger, and say, hey look, I've believed, believed this, whatever my whole life. I had this experience through plant medicine, mushrooms or whatever, now everything looks different. What do I do, having a forum to be able to honestly ask those questions? That's why I asked you about being afraid earlier after your first experience, because stepping into that new understanding is really difficult solo. So having the ability to have a conversation with somebody outside of yourself to say this happened, and then hearing their feedback and and realizing that it's part of the trip part of the journey.
01:07:46
And then yeah, now I'm able to confidently take on whatever that information is and move forward and integrate it into who I am. Wouldn't you, would you agree?
01:07:59 - Cesar (Guest)
Oh, incredibly, incredibly on on point, like, incredibly on point, and I tell people find your people. Yeah, man, find your people, find your people. And and again, I, I get it. I get that not everyone can wear this shirt. I know that there's guys that can't wear this. It works, because they're boston to be like, oh, microdosing, is that drugs? Like, are you on drugs right now? Yep, I, I get that, but that doesn't mean that you can't have a beer with your buddies and go. You know what I found microdosing and my life has completely changed. Like my life has completely changed. Or again, finding your people, finding your groups. Atlanta's got a wonderful psychedelic association. There's a whole bunch of really good psychedelic associations. There's a whole bunch of really good psychedelic associations. There's great clubhouses on Instagram that have I mean on on on the internet that have psychedelic talk. So, find your people right, find your people and, again, educate yourself. I tell people please, please, don't microdose. Because I'm microdosing, microdose because I posted your childhood curiosity and because you've done some research, you've done some homework, you realize, oh, wait, wait a minute, these are the intentions. I have to take these medicines. I have intentions. Now. This isn't just like, oh, you know what, hopefully, this will make me know what are your intentions to take these medicines and then, once you do that, then be able to sort of share that experience and share that knowledge and share that wisdom. You know, cultivate that wisdom with other people is where the real magic happens, and it's that community thing I mean.
01:09:26
In this year and a half, I've had six hello doses. Right, I've had six big doses. I've had one which was my birthday 2022, which I tell people the podium of my life, the birth of my children, no matter what. That's number one. That's on top of everything. Number two, meeting the love of my life after the age of 50. You know someone who I know is going to be there wholeheartedly, who supports me through thick and thin, even in the worst moments. And then, number three, that first heroic journey, which was really profound and incredible.
01:09:59
Now I've also had journeys that have been incredibly challenging. That's been like Holy cow and to all of this it's been able to talk to it afterwards. But the last experience I had was in a group setting, was in a group healing setting, and it was beautiful because it was two days. The first day was let's all talk, let's be community. What are our intentions? What are we looking for? What's hurting, what's not hurting? And we're sitting there having honest discussions with other humans that before we went in that door we didn't know who we were Right. And then afterwards sharing that ceremony with them and being present and being there, and then afterwards being able to integrate and talk about what we felt and talk about you know what we went through. That community part, that sharing part, is so beautiful.
01:10:51
And that ceremony, in particular, in the midst of it, in the thick of it, the medicine was crazy. It was funny to me. You know, I've had these journeys where the intention is like, ok, where does this go next? Where does this, where does this business go next? What do I do next? Like, what, like, where is this going? What do I have to see? Why is it that sometimes people see things that I might not see? Right, people see the potential of me doing something that even I don't see. So that intention were that for that journey. And so that intention were that for that journey. And it was funny because the first thing I hear the medicine says are you seriously going to ask us that again? Come on, man, don't we got past that? Don't we got these dispensers already and it was crazy because it's like all of a sudden I'm getting led down this route, down this pathway, and it's like, okay, is this what you want to see? And I sort of get this sense of a hand that's opening this door. And as the door opens, there's nothing there and I hear we have nothing else to show you. We've shown you it all, like look at where you are, look at what you've done, look at where people think about you, just be there. But what I do want you to see is what's going on around you.
01:12:06
And I take my blindfold off and I was at the East Institute, which is this beautiful healing space here in Atlanta, which is just amazing. The people there are incredible, middle of this ancient, you know indigenous healing ceremony, with these three shamanic queens just literally floating around the people that are there, and it took me back to our ancestors. That's how they healed. Yeah, they would have these ceremonies with people using plant medicine to be better and come together and be part of it. That's community and that's much more better than culture, that community aspect of the plant medicine, whether it's we're in community together having a ceremony, whether it's community together because we're sharing experiences, whether it's community together because I'm saying, hey, you know what. Whether it's community together because I'm saying, hey, you know what. I've been using this medicine Ibogaine or BMP or ketamine or whatever it is and it's helped me, it might help you. That's what it's about.
01:13:12 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, I couldn't agree more I just wonder, like, okay, going forward, people like yourself with these platforms, us, you know, charles Paddy, people of these maps organization, all these types of things, as, as these organizations and these platforms begin to grow and educate more and more, what do you see happening in the next five years, ten years even, and it does. Of course, this is just speculation, but, like, based on on what you know of the past, what you know of of what you're living right at this moment, and your feelings, and just kind of a projection, what do you feel?
01:13:52 - Cesar (Guest)
so it's funny because a lot of people right in in the people who have been awakened right, wait a minute. How is this possible? Why isn't this legal? Why, you know, why is it that I can't get this regularly available and why aren't we up here, like, why aren't we up here? The reason why we're not up here is because we're right here and 12 months ago we were down here, right. So it's like we're taking these steps. Now, what I do ask people is that we take these steps and we take a deep breath and we integrate and we figure out what's going on, because I would hope that. And apple, I'm not sure if you see, this part of me sees that the cannabis industry really went full gas. Yeah, let's go and let's get it everywhere. And now it's in gas stations. And now it's like wait a minute, hold on a second bicarb. And mushrooms are a little bit more complicated yes this isn't you know what?
01:14:52
let me go to a gas station, let me get a little bag that looks like starburst, but really it's got to a five minute, and let me sort of whatever and let me go no. So I think moving forward, the most important part is education. It's education, right, honest conversations, that the genie is out of the bottle. The genie is out of the bottle, that it's going back. It's no way.
01:15:12 - Aaron (Host)
No, you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube.
01:15:14 - Cesar (Guest)
No, the fact that the fact that mdma mdma is now legally in, legally in Australia to be able to be prescribed, that's just again. They're there. They were here, they're there. Where else are we going to go right? Where else are we going to go? So, education, more talk about it, more open conversations um, it's a roller coaster. It is a roller coaster and again, because of the stigma that exists, right? So my hope is that we don't all go out and say you know what? This is all great, yes, it could potentially help save the world, but let's bring down the hyperbole a little bit. Let's have honest discussions. Let's sort of sit down and have these.
01:16:02
It was funny, my first big journey, right as the medicine starts to kick in, all I hear is go lie on the dining room table. I was like what, what the Go lie on the dining room table? And I'm like, yeah, I guess. And I'm sitting there lying on the dining room table and I start cracking up like a child. All I hear is go, set buffet tables of wisdom to cultivate a better future. And I truly believe, mel, if we do that, if we sit down at tables and we cultivate wisdom about plant medicine to people who know and people who don't know, that we're going to be in a better place because it is, it is.
01:16:46
It is a big daunting. It is a big daunting because again, one day you're going to get, you know, a headline that says, uh, fda approves mdma, veterans, right, and then the next day we might get guys take shrooms, does cartwheels on highway, crashes 10 cars. So we're in that sense and I wish I could sort of see the future and say, five years from now, this is what's going to go on. What I want from five years from now is that hopefully my son can take off his uniform and find a place where they can say, son, come here, come, let's give you a hug. First, let's thank you for your service, let's put you on some somatic healing, right, and then from there let's maybe see if we can put you on a microdosing protocol so you don't have to rely on a whole bunch of medicines that might warp you even more, and then maybe let's sort of have a bigger journey so that maybe you can really empty out your cup.
01:17:44
So hopefully I see that in the future and I also hopefully see you know, being Latino, being Hispanic, I know the lack of information that exists for that community and for me, being Hispanic, I feel that responsibility a bit, that you know what. Let me also open up my platform to that part of it and my hope is that maybe, you know, five years down the road, I can create something. I can create a container where we can find people of diverse communities, where we can find people of lower-reserved communities. We can find people of marginalized communities and teach them how to use these medicines. The people have been called to use these medicines. Teach them how to use these medicines. The people have been called to use these medicines, to teach them how to use these medicines properly, medicines that their ancestors have used for thousands of years, for millennials, so that they can take it and help heal their community. That's hopefully what I see in the future, that's what I'm hoping that we can create those types of containment.
01:18:39 - Apple (Host)
And just to answer at at the beginning that you said, I completely agree 100 cannabis once a bit and it's still happening. There was not much intention into it, other than most people thought it was the next get rich, get into cannabis which is not the case and there was not as much intention as into the healing and medicine.
01:19:01
It was like more recreational, like we can smoke out like party. Now, years later, there's more education and stuff being pushed as a lot of companies fail like the cream's rising to the top and also I believe that's another great thing cannabis has done is shown. Now there's a model for it, correct, and that is being brought over into the psychedelic world, because everything we're seeing with the psychedelic world is much more intention, the education intention, everything like what you're doing. It's coming first now, before, and most people say that we're not pushing you to do this. This is a personal choice you need to make for yourself and everything. It was not like that with cannabis. That came later, but I think it was a reaction in the whole world of like I can't believe I still wake up and it's like I can't believe.
01:19:55
Cannabis is legal and I go into these stores every day and it has laid the groundwork for a much better world for the psychedelics to now come into it and be accepted.
01:20:05 - Aaron (Host)
Well, I think too, man, that we were really fortunate in how we were brought into psychedelic space because, being around the grateful dead community, I was born into a community it's like in psychedelics like when I had my experience.
01:20:26
I had an entire city around me that was very well versed in psychedelic space and being there, the beauty of right now and and in the next five years, is that there's platforms like yours, ours and others, where communities exist where, when someone awakens to whatever that reality is, they have a place to go and and find the others, and that and that's it. And so, going forward in the next five years, I think it's incumbent on folks like you and us to cultivate those communities to the best of our ability and to make sure that the people that are around us feel supported, heard, loved and fed. You know what I mean. And then, beyond that, we just have to trust that love wins and that the universe is perfect in every way and everything is part of the dharma, and that's it and that's how we go forward from here um and to trust the medicine, yeah, and, but before we go, I want to ask you a weird question, can I?
01:21:38 - Speaker 7 (Host)
this is our favorite part when a does the weird questions.
01:21:41 - Aaron (Host)
Yes, please. So when you get into doing psychedelics, there's a lot of talk about extraterrestrials and aliens and whatever, and especially with psilocybin, I've heard and thought myself about extraterrestrial technology. I think that as human beings we are rooted in the material and we see things like our computer or a microphone or a camera and we think that's how things manifest into the world. So we imagine that if we were contacted by alien life, it's going to be this giant spaceship and they're going to come out of it and there's going to be a being that's walking, because we're rooted in the material world and that's where our perspective is. But I've heard it posited that things like psilocybin and dmt could actually be a technology that is seeded on this planet for extraterrestrials to communicate with human brains on another level. What do you think about that?
01:22:54 - Cesar (Guest)
Look, that's a great argument. That's actually a really great argument because, think about it, there's nothing else that really awakens our consciousness, anything, anything that awakens our consciousness like psychedelics do, right, it's just there's nothing there. I or at least in my lifetime, I've never tried anything sort of it's put me in that scope. And the fact that they come most of these psychedelics come from the earth, right, they come from the ground, they come from mother nature or whatever you want to believe in buddha, allah, god, whatever put these on here, right. But again, how were they manifested to get here? Like, what was it that did that? To sort of say, you know what, we're going to put these substances here so that you can be enlightened, so that you can be awakened. And then who was it that said, no, you know what, those are bad, those are horrible, you can't use those. That's not there. So it is. It is a really interesting argument. It's an incredibly interesting argument that that you know what. Again, what else awakens us for that?
01:23:55 - Aaron (Host)
way. Nothing I've had a. I've had a couple of one ketamine experience and one DMT experience, in particular that while, I was in in the midst of it for sure. Like I got these downloads of like, did you think it was going to be spaceships? Dumb, dumb Like this is.
01:24:17 - Apple (Host)
This is how it's happening.
01:24:18 - Aaron (Host)
You, you are experiencing first contact right now. This is us talking to you here. Here you go you, you wanted it, there it is, so that's why I asked Cause I've I've actually had that thought it's a great question, it's a great question.
01:24:33 - Cesar (Guest)
And again it's sort of it's a great argument, it's a really good argument, it's a good topic to talk about. I think it's smart and you know, um again, enlightenment.
01:24:43 - Mel (Host)
Enlightenment is where it's at so what's one on on the, on the outtake, or on on the last bit, what's one bit of wisdom that you've cultivated that you want to share with everyone listening today?
01:24:56 - Cesar (Guest)
there's, there's two things, uh, one, um, I've learned that the way to live life is to manifest love you wealth. And I don't just mean wealth in the sense of money, because time is wealth, right, being with your family is wealth. So when you manifest love you wealth instead of manifesting F you wealth, life is so much more easier. And what that love you wealth is is you know what? I get some, but you get some because I'm going to invest in you, because I believe in you, because I care about you, because that's going to bring me back, because that F you wealth that evaporates really quickly and that doesn't make you any friends. That just makes you enemies. So to me it's you know. One go out in the world and manifest love you. Well, right, that's number one. If you do that, it's much easier. Number two go out and spread mush love, because that's what it's about, right? Is that what the mushrooms do?
01:25:52 - Mel (Host)
Is that not what the mushrooms do?
01:25:53 - Cesar (Guest)
Yes, baby, it's all about spreading mush love, right, peace, mushrooms and love that's what life is about. If you can do that, that's awesome, like. I said always cultivate your wisdom.
01:26:07
Yes, cultivate your wisdom right. That's what it's about. Also, show off the molecules you're using. Yeah, if people know, people know right and then just know that these things are beautiful. Oh, the mushrooms are so beautiful, they connect us in so many ways. It's just we were all scared of mushrooms. You know what? You know what I remember in a yard, seeing a mushroom come out, I mean, I kicked this mushroom. It was horrible.
01:26:40
I was like oh my God, look how beautiful the mushroom is. It could be the ugliest, most hideous piece of fungi that's coming out of the ground. Yeah, for me now it's like oh my god, look how beautiful it is. In fact, we have in the front yard. We have a gnome. It's a mushroom gnome. Whenever I go and walk the dog and the mushrooms right for picking, I'll pick the mushroom and I'll put it at the feet of our mushroom gnome.
01:27:04 - Aaron (Host)
We have a gnome in the studio. He sits next to me. Cesar, where can folks go to find out more and get your products and all that stuff?
01:27:14 - Cesar (Guest)
Definitely so. Of course, cultivatingwisdomnet is where the apparel brand is, where you know what I mean. You can find more about what we're doing with vets. I'm actually going to put a NSR 20 discount, a 20% discount, for anybody who listens, who wants to get some apparel. Part of the proceeds go to Vet Solutions, which is an organization that helps vets, and then, of course, on Instagram, cultivatingwisdom.
01:27:43
Cultivatingwisdom that's usually where you'll find me. You know sharing my goofiness and sharing my wisdom and just you know offering up great places to listen to podcasts and you know wonderful things to do. So you know, the more the merrier. Like I said, I'm here to hopefully educate people, show people the transformation and reinvention of life is possible at any, any time. We're now going to move into a little bit of, like I said, my generation a little bit more. We're going to put together a little coaching course on helping people over 50 create safe and affecting micro dosing practice. So we're going to start doing that because I think it's that education, it's that bridge that we need between generation extras. We're so programmed. You know that they were bad and people like us who were smiling and happy because psychedelics have become such a wonderful part of our lives.
01:28:33 - Aaron (Host)
So we're, we're, we're poking at people's childhood curiosity well, caesar, I I appreciate you spending time with us today. Man, man, this was a beautiful conversation. I know that the people that listen to the show are going to love this, especially our friend Matthew.
01:28:48 - Apple (Host)
Yeah, you're very inspiring. This was great to meet you.
01:28:52 - Mel (Host)
And I also appreciate the whole Latino aspect. That's really awesome. That is close to near and dear to my heart. I got my Latin Dead shirt on today, you know.
01:29:01 - Speaker 7 (Host)
Very nice, that's right.
01:29:11 - Mel (Host)
And and it's necessary. It's necessary for my, for my mom and for my aunts and uncles, and and and and so forth, for the people who, you know, don't know anything about this, but we're are, are somehow connected culturally and and don't realize it. And so I really look forward to the work that you're doing and, in the short time that you've done, so much work, thank you.
01:29:29 - Aaron (Host)
And I'm sure this isn't the last time we're going to talk.
01:29:31 - Mel (Host)
Oh, I feel like there's a part two. There's a part two that needs to happen.
01:29:35 - Cesar (Guest)
No, for sure. And then once I'm bringing back my podcast this year.
01:29:40
I'm going to have you guys on. For sure, we'd love to have you guys on. Let's do it. You know what? The more we can help each other grow. That's what it's about. We're like the mycelium we connect to each other and then we grow out of it. That's what we want to do. So thank you guys for what you do. I'm really proud of what you guys are doing to be the honest voices about people's change. And again, I know how much you guys love music and how beautiful music is. You know how Mary would talk about it. So thank you guys, so so much for what you're doing. You know it's an honor, like I said, and a privilege to be here with you guys. I'm ecstatic for the invitation and again, much love to you guys, much love to everyone that follows you guys and listens to you guys. And you know, let's be better people.
01:30:21 - Apple (Host)
Let's spread my love Right on. I look forward to the day that we get to give you a hug in person. Yes, yes and no Simple. World. I was going to say no, Simple World. We'd like to take you to a fish show in the future.
01:30:34 - Cesar (Guest)
Yes, oh, yes, yes, yes, that would be amazing, that would be amazing. That would be amazing. Now I am going to be on your guys' side of the country Memorial Day weekend. I'm not sure if you guys have plans, but in Hollywood it's going to be the Enchanted Mushroom Festival. Okay, emfla, I'll be getting a chat there, but they want to take mushrooms and psychedelics in Hollywood. Okay, the En. The enchanted mushroom festival was this underground mushroom festival and this year they said no, let's go let's go, yeah, yeah yeah, that'd be awesome
01:31:10
if you guys could be down there again. It's just down the road, right, yeah, just out of the three coast highway. Um, you know what? I can't wait to see you guys in person, give you guys a hug, share this love that's there and continue to grow we'll talk to you soon, cesar you have a wonderful Saturday, much love.
01:31:30 - Aaron (Host)
Thank you guys wow, amazing human being right there, everybody go follow him see the work he's doing.
01:31:40
If you're around the Atlanta area, they're doing all kinds of meetups. So if you're like worried about like safe access and that kind of stuff or just somewhere to go ask questions, find the psychedelic group in your city, go see, seek the others out and, even if you don't know what I'm talking about, go go sit at one of those meetings and just soak it up and listen with an open mind and see what's going on and um, yeah, man, we love y'all and if you need help, if you need have questions, you can always dm us here at no simple road or shoot us an email at info at no simple roadcom. Apple, mel or I are happy to answer any questions you may have um, we've been in this world.
01:32:17
I've been in this world for 30 years and and have known know about it a little bit, I think a little bit kind of I know some stuff. So, yeah, we love y'all and we'll see you next week. Until then, take care of each other. Smile at a stranger take care of yourself and you know what. Go find out about something you didn't know about before with an open mind. Love y'all, peace.