Thank you . Medicines and the impact they've made among the countless psychonauts exploring the last true frontier . Buy a ticket and take the ride with me as we get true first-hand accounts of the experiences , benefits , risks and transformations taking place within the ever-expanding world of psychedelic medicines .
On this One Time , on Psychedelics Sometimes in life I meet people that just feel like a breath of fresh air throughout the entirety of my life . It's hard to put in the words what I mean by that , but for those of you who have experienced this notion , I imagine you know exactly what I mean .
And today's guest is a woman who I can confidently say has done that each time I've connected with her . She is a trauma-informed psychedelic advocate and medicine worker , is a bioenergetic somatic coach and is a woman dedicated to helping her clients liberate their inner power through the work she does with them .
And in this episode we dive deep into her journey , her experience of surviving Hurricane Helene , how the tools and methodologies she has learned supported her through that process and much , much more . So please help me in welcoming my dear friend , shauna Pelton onto the show . Shauna , my dear , I am so excited to have you here with me today .
You know , as I mentioned in the intro to everyone tuning in . Shauna and I met a little while back and immediately I resonated with her . You know we were just talking off record about how just we really vibe well together and as a result of that , I'm really excited to see where the divine takes us in this conversation .
So first of all , shauna , how are you doing today ? What's ?
going on . Oh , my goodness , how am I ? I am actually good . I'm recovering from Hurricane Helene still , but I'm actually I'm feeling so aligned . I really am . I'm feeling good , aligned and happy to be here .
You know , I really appreciate your positivity through a very challenging situation because in Boston , you know , in many places in the world we heard about what happened with Helene . But you were right there . I mean literally , we were talking before we hit record about how , like , your backyard got pretty much wiped out from tornadoes , your road got washed away .
You didn't have electricity for what pretty much wiped out from tornadoes , your road got washed away . You didn't have electricity for what ? Two weeks , three weeks , three weeks yeah , that's a big wave to surf .
You know , and I think a lot of us , it's hard to imagine what it would be like going back to like , okay , now we need to focus again on survival needs . I think all of us have had the privilege of like not having to worry about that for the most part , hopefully , anyway .
Yeah .
And so , like it's really wild , that happened and I have a lot of questions . I don't know the answers , but I have a lot of questions around what that was , you know . Was it just a natural super storm ? That's a possibility , but being as how I'm a conspiracy realist here , I have questions , you know .
Same , same same . I actually appreciate the conspiracy realist piece because one of the things that I found what was happening after the storm once I did have like we went down to our neighbors in order to get Starlink .
He had Starlink , so we were able to use the internet on occasion to be able to make the phone calls that we needed to make , which were literally to tell our family day to day what was going on . It was survival mode . I mean , they were planning to drop us food with the helicopter , like that was the stage that we were in at the beginning .
It was really a touch and go , but one of the things that was happening was people started with the conspiracy of what they thought it was going on and I and you know what's funny I I'm like I'm usually right there and go oh , that's curious , and I dive in . I found it very unhelpful , and it was unhelpful because I didn't want to blame .
There was no blame . It was literally survive . I had to get myself to the next day . Every single day was a survival day . So to be in that place of whodunit wasn't actually helpful . It wasn't helpful for me . I agree with that . So , anyway , but now I'm going . Huh , now's the time .
Yeah , that's the thing , right , Like I think there is a time where you know , physically and actually , or figuratively and literally , there's a time and place , right , like when the fires were happening in California , like California is still burning , right , and people were like , oh , it's this , it's that , and I'm like , guys , I get it .
You know , people care , they don't want people to get screwed over , but , like right now , there are still people fighting for their life . Let's like make sure they're taken care of . Let's put our focus and our energy instead of going online and posting about conspiracies .
That's it . You know , there'll be time for that , you know , when everyone's safe and , like you know , they're rebuilding or whatever . But again , like right now , if we have any energy we can expend , let's just put it into helping people survive right now . That is the most important piece to it .
Where our energy goes , you know , or where our attention goes , energy flows going to the loving , kindness and service-based thoughts and behaviors , versus trying to , you know , blame someone or trying to get justice at that stage . So it is important where you put your energy matters for collectively as well as individually .
Yeah , one thing I'm really curious on for you , shauna , you know , is being , as how I know we both have benefited greatly from psychedelic medicines and whatnot . What do you think , if any , the role was in which psychedelics and the experiences you've had there played with you handling this otherwise very much survival situation ?
Like , how do you think those experiences , or do you think they prepared you for this at all ?
A hundred percent and I did contemplate that a lot during this recovery stage . A lot I've been . Well , let's just start by saying I have been a dabbler in psychedelics since I was most like most normal teens , growing up in a big city , in Boston .
But when I started working with the medicine as an actual guide , a teacher , a facilitator and being intentional about its use , one of the things that I recognize is a value of doing not just taking medicine and having a random experience not that there's anything wrong with that , those are fun but like taking the medicine and going in and having an intentional ,
like objective and so working with it on a level of body for trauma release . It actually trained me to be , to widen my window of tolerance and to be able to handle stress at like a boss level . And it was I'm not saying it wasn't stressful , but I wasn't panicky . I didn't even cry for the devastation all around me , I cried for the love .
I actually said that to a neighbor just yesterday . I said I wasn't crying tears of sadness , I was seeing the outpouring of love and my heart was touched and I just couldn't believe how much divinity , divine presence was with us . And I actually remember saying to Tom , my partner I said I don't wish this upon anyone , I really don't .
But at the same time I kind of wish everyone would go through it , because now I can say I lived through an apocalypse and guess what ? You're going to be okay , nothing to fear .
And I told you before the recording I I started contemplating okay , well , I've got running water because we have , we have a river , the river that washed out our road , and we're at the top of the , the mountain , so we had no pollution behind us .
So that meant our water was actually clean and we also have uh , fruit growing all around us , so , like the apple trees , pear trees and plum trees and I contemplated that and I said , I'll be fine , I can eat fruit and drink water . I'm going to go on a fast . This is going to be great . People do it all the time on purpose .
You're just forced into it , it's okay . I'm just forced into it , it's okay . So it's an attitude that's real , like it wasn't a false spiritual bypassing at all . There was nothing false about it .
It was go time , it was game time , and so all of the training that I did over the years has literally put me in a really good position to be able to face these crises in a way that allows me to step into what I need , the role , the archetype that I need to embody in order to navigate the terrain that I was faced with and still am to this day faced
with . And I think that's it , that's what this is about being prepared , taking the medicine so to heal that's great so to develop yourself and so to reach those heights of your greatest potential , whatever that is . I think people need to find that for themselves . And , um , yeah , good question .
I'm glad that you brought it up because it's the essential aspect . I credit my my psychedelic use for my capacity to handle the apocalypse .
Yeah , I mean , that is a statement right there , right , because it's so accurate , and that's why any of these kind of things , right , even just exercise , right , any of these things that get you okay with dealing with thoughts in your mind that are very uncomfortable , and surviving through them anyway , and finding like the center , the eye of the storm , if you
will , right , like that , is to me , the best part of these experiences Because , you know , not only do they remind you of divinity , not only do they remind you of whom , what you truly are , but they also can allow you to create what I call relentless resilience-ness you know , and that's one of my core values .
You know that I have , as you know , kind of what I stand for , you know , and the reason for that is that I find that people that you know enjoy the psychedelic space , right , and by enjoy I don't mean sometimes we aren't white-knuckling as fuck , right , but for some reason we like hitting that button .
You know , I think that there's something in us that wants us to find out what we're made of . You know , it's almost like a curiosity cause and effect type thing where it's like , hey , this is going to be really challenging , like combo , for instance . Right , combo is not a psychedelic , traditionally right and it's not a long experience , but it's hellish .
I mean , it's uncomfortable . But there's a part of me that kind of likes , that feeling of like how well can I sit up straight while everything in my guts wants me to die , and how well can I even crack a smile or crack a joke , as I'm like getting frog face and everything swelling up ?
There's a part of me that likes that , because I know , if I can handle that , then the next time that , you know , maybe I get triggered over something Rachel says , or I get cut off and I want to flip out on someone or whatever , that I'm going to be able to remember my training and just be like hey , if you can get through combo and breathe through it ,
you can get through this . Brother , you know you'll be okay .
Now we have a new focus we're training people .
Resilience training . You know , that's really what , like it's so true , because , really like . I mean , if you want to boil down life , right , like what is , you know , life's ultimate mission , survive , right , like , that's like , and you got to actually experience that right .
For many of us , we haven't got to experience the fact of that , and that's why I think a lot of us create these kinds of scenarios like combo or psychedelics or rites of passage , fasting , because I think that the beauty of today's world is , for a lot of us , we don't have to worry about our survival needs , you know .
So we kind of get to move up a little bit and as a result , you know , I think we're starting to find that it's great that we don't have to focus on survival needs , but some of the things that happen as a result of you focusing on that are very beneficial to the human experience .
You know , yes , so it's amazing that we can't change the fact you went through it . Right , we can't change the fact that Hurricane Helene hit . What we can do is find the gold within it , and that's what I see you saying when you're saying , like my heart was outpouring not from sadness but from joy and from love .
Right , you were able to find the needle in the haystack , if you will , when it comes to the love in an otherwise very challenging situation .
Truly , and you know it wasn't , it wasn't hard to do , it was just it was right there and every time . So one of the benefits of where I live I live in a very small town . It's a rural town in the mountains , I think there's like a total of 500 people in my town and we had a .
We have a small old elementary school that was used as the community center , so they were feeding us every day and they had supplies , and so we would go down to the community center and share stories with people and we'd also go okay , how are you doing , what do you need ? And everybody had the story of love .
Everyone talked about how much joy it brought them to come together in community to meet their neighbors and to be able to be in service this way and to be able to be on the receiving end of such love , and so it was quite the experience indeed , Wow .
That is beautiful For me , like the golden goose within the otherwise destruction . I mean , california was similar , right , like the stories of all these firefighters coming from different areas . You know , I have a person I follow on Instagram . I've never met her in person . She does great body work Like she's a roofer and I love roofer .
It's like they're all just very unique . You know , it's not like a . You know , if you go to get a lymph drainage massage , like you know , they're kind of similar but like roofer is just all over the place and they're very spiritual usually .
And she actually went out to California with her partner and they were giving out free massages to all the firemen and fire workers and police officers and things like that the first responders that were like sleeping in their truck for days on end , you know , and it's just like .
Those are the things that , you know , I think , really allow humanity to see like , hey , this is a horrible thing that just happened . We wish it didn't happen , but look at how much everyone all of a sudden realized our similarities are way stronger than our differences , you know , and I think we need that in society right now .
Exactly and again , focus on what's right . And there's a lot of people who and this might be part of the benefit again of using psychedelics intentionally as you you know what's the objective and it's not to say you have to do that always . I I'm I'm not a rigid person . I do believe in balance .
But one of the things about the mind is it's similar to what we were talking about resilience training for the nervous system and the psyche . The mind , in a similar way , needs conditioning . We need to train it to be able to focus on what's right .
And that's a challenge for a lot of people , especially because the you know the looping obsessive thoughts that people can get stuck on when they are focused on their survival needs , when they are hyper-focused on feeling deficient in love or deficient in good self-esteem , which is that feeling they're not good enough and their behaviors reflect that unconscious deficiency .
And so if we can actually identify where those core wounds are and be able to condition the mind to be able to stay in its lane , don't go outside of that window where you get stuck in that loop , there's even an electromagnetic field that gets created when we're consistently repeating those same obtrusive thoughts or looping thoughts and it's like a runaway train
hard to be able to pull back , get back into the station , kind of thing .
but oh , 100 , I think I . I think of them as mind viruses , right , like you know , again , I have a lot of friends that don't even believe viruses exist and I'm kind of in that . You know , camp I . You know a buddy of mine , uh , adam shell , who I've had on the show . He said something really funny . Someone asked him why do you believe in flat earth ?
He said well , because the powers that be tell us it's round . So I start as far away from what they tell me and I work my way back , you know , and so like it's the same kind of thing what I was just mentioning .
It's like , you know , I I kind of do that now where I'm like if they say viruses are real , then they got to be not real and I'll work my way back from there . Maybe I find they are real . But I'm going to start with the polar opposite of whatever the mainstream says and work my way back from there .
But again , like , if we think about this idea of , like Paul Levy calls it what , tico you know it's been called a lot of different things throughout antiquity but this idea that is very honestly easy to understand , like it's I don't really think it's that far out of a concept you know any of us that have been in self development , coaching , whatever we know
this stuff like the back of our hand . It's like what happens when someone gets stuck in a program , like a programmed you know pattern . You know they're not really themselves in that , like they are , but like their subconscious , which has been distorted to believe maybe something that's detrimental or something that isn't useful for a high quality life .
Their subconscious , which is 95 to 98 percent of our waking state of reality , like what we express as , takes over . And if they don't have a meditation practice or they don't connect with psychedelics , so they don't do something , walk in the woods to give them time and space to be silent . It's so easy to let that 98% overwhelm the 2% you know .
And until you can actually become consciously aware of like oh shit , something is going on here , now I got to figure out what's in the operating system that's doing that . You know . It's no wonder why a lot of people have challenged with that , because we've been trained like just go to school , produce , you know .
Go to college , get a job , get a family , like all these things . Like these things before you even know who you are . Like I'm 33 and I feel like I'm just starting to figure out who I am .
You know , and all of my friends have kids and I'm like I just I mean again , whatever strokes someone's perfect , you know life is great , but I know , for me I'm like damn , that's crazy . You have kids already .
I love that you brought that up . So I was a mom at 19 . Wow , and now my son's 28 . He's almost 29 . And so , like you're talking about 33 . And I keep saying to my son and my daughter-in-law I'm like , look , you're still babies .
Okay , your brain is still growing , you're developing , and how you think today and who you think you are is not even close to the continuous evolutionary journey that unfolds as you develop more and more and more awareness of who you are and how you operate , or your .
Your operating is about your level of consciousness , by the way , just in terms of like , how to look at this . So we grow through stages of development we grow through the the stages of getting our most basic primary needs met for our physiological well-being . We go through stages of relational well-being , that social , emotional need .
It gets developed during our childhood and then we grow through the stage of development for our self-esteem , which is that feeling of like I'm smart at something right , like I'm talented . There's got to be something in there there's got to be something I like and I'm good at and I want to continue to pursue .
And then from there you integrate and you transform into the next stage of development for your soul . So you start with the ego's journey and those stages of development are natural for all of us .
Level of consciousness , the way that we think and how we behave is a reflection of what stage of consciousness you're coming from , as it relates to whatever thing you're engaged with . And here's how I'll break it down .
And this is something we do in the psychedelic therapy as well , because it's really important to use that medicine to go into a core wound to identify that stage of development where you feel like you might've had a deficiency . A deficiency need could be from a drama like just conflict in the house .
It wasn't bad , but it was not conducive for a healthy , stable nervous system . Let's say versus trauma , and there's various levels of trauma , but everyone who's had an experience that they can look back on and realize that changed them , we all know there's difficult experiences that everyone goes through .
So what ends up happening is it impresses upon us this distortion about who we are and what life is . It changes our worldview , which then , in turns , causes us to put on a mask . And that mask is for survival . It's actually intended to keep us in a place of operating smoothly so we can get our needs met or , to a degree , get our needs met .
So when we reach that stage of maturity in life where we're pursuing more , where we think I want more in life , I want to have more abundance , I want to have more joy , I want to fulfill my purpose here and literally follow a path of selfless service , what does that even mean ? What am I going to do here ? Psychedelics are the best way .
In my personal experience , this is take , of course . It's not it's relative but the best way to go in to those places that the unconscious is holding on , to those distortions , and to be able to then access .
But you're building up and reconstructing new patterns by design , and those new patterns are in alignment with who you really are as your soul's expression of self , most authentic expression of self self .
A lot of people don't even know what that means , but this journey helps you to tease it out and get closer and closer and closer to feeling aligned with what that is .
And one of the funny things that happens is I've recognized that even people who will say and I've probably been there before myself like I don't know who I am , I don't even know who is my authentic self . What does being authentic know who I am ? I don't even know who is my authentic self . What does being authentic actually even look like ?
I don't even know . I've been wearing a mask for so long . I didn't know I was wearing a mask , I just thought this was me . Now , all of a sudden , it's like oh , my life just blew up and I found out I was hiding behind this mask all along , hiding behind this mask all along . And so it's it . Come to find out .
Your higher self , your innermost , sentient , sovereign self , has been there all along . And then , when you do a little bit of the work , you start to tease out all of those encounters in life where you realize , oh , I was there , I was there , I didn't know I was there .
I was there and it's like this blossoming of consciousness and then , once you get to those higher levels of like I said , you grow in stages and you operate on levels . So you get to these levels of consciousness where you operate from your soul's agenda versus your ego's defenses , and that , to me , is the best journey . It's exciting . I love doing this work .
Oh my God , shauna , that's amazing . Thank you for taking us through those different stages and I agree with you . You know , I know that this is subjective , but I really think that psychedelics are the best and fastest and most efficient way , when done consciously , responsibly . All the things right , you know .
Again , it's kind of like this right , if you have options , right ? You're like do I want to walk to California , do I want to drive or do I want to take a plane ? There's obviously different risks associated with taking a plane or driving a car than walking , but walking is not without risk either .
Right , and the risk overall is that time is the most valuable resource . So how long is it going to take you to walk to california when otherwise you could be there in two days or , you know , five days if you drive , or six hours if you fly , right ?
So again , like this whole argument , people say around like , like , I just want a danny morel's podcast and you . I was looking at the comments and people were like Jesus is the only way , and I so wanted to just comment and be like do you believe Jesus is God ? Yes , of course . Do you believe we are God ? Yes , of course .
So who created cannabis , you know , like , like it's just walking them back to realize like this is , it's all the same thing , guys , it really doesn't matter . This whole like duality of like this is the way and this isn't , it's just so silly , like , at the end of the day , the way is whatever way resonates with you , that's it right .
And in my experience there's been nothing that has helped me rapidly evolve more than consciously connecting with psychedelic medicines . There's probably a reason , you know .
I think people forget the fact that with this new psychedelic renaissance that's going on , that is being compared a little bit more conscious , I think , than the 60s and 70s , but kind of that same kind of resurgence type thing .
I think people are thirst trapping themselves into thinking these things are new or like oh , I don't know what's going to happen if you keep doing these . It's like , guys , there is nothing .
Like we know .
This has been around for over 10,000 years . I'm pretty sure I'm going to be fine . You know what hasn't been around 10,000 years Going to a nine to five taking pharmaceuticals . I was going to say SSRIs . And also when you look into Chris Bennett's work , for instance , cannabis and many other medicines are mentioned throughout the Bible .
You know there's so many mentions of cannabis throughout all these different sacred texts and other medicines too . Right , like we look at these tribes down in the Amazon that have been working with ayahuasca for five to 10,000 years , it's like , don't you think if it was that dangerous , they would have been wiped out already ?
Like guys , can we not just use some logic here and see , like if this has been around 10,000 years and human beings have actually had their best times when these medicines were not being stamped out , like during the Roman times and these kind of darker times where they were trying to go after these medicines and the only reason they were trying to go after is
because it got in their , got in the way of their business model of being like , well , you can't talk to God , but this guy here in the white robes he can . And oh , by the way , he needs money and he needs you to do an animal sacrifice , right ?
So , like you know again , like when you really look at this and and for anyone who's taken psychedelics , when you break through that feeling is everything . That feeling is straight god and you're connected with jesus . You're connected with any deity you want to , because they're just you , they're part of the infinite .
You know , like we don't need to obsess over any one thing , and that's what I like about psychedelics is they don't ask you to worship them . They ask for respect and reverence . They're like hey , we have a lot of power .
You might want to be aware of what you're doing , but I don't need to go pray for them every Sunday or doing any of these things , because they just give me the direct experience of it . Some days are much better than others . Right , I'm not fully there every day by any means , but because I had that direct experience and I reunited with Christ .
Consciousness or kundalini wake , any of these terms that really speak to the same idea . You know because I've experienced that . Now I have it . But I think the challenge with religion and these kind of things , they expect people to just have faith in an experience they've never had , you know .
So it's like believe in whatever you want , but just like , don't forget that you can write . Think about apples , right , you have apples around you . It's like , at what point are people going to realize . Yeah , right , like at what point are people going to realize that you can go to school and learn about apples ?
You can learn about pectin , you can learn about the different varieties , you can learn about their growing season , but none of that matters if you haven't actually eaten an apple , right ? And I think , yeah , I think what people forget is like , in my way or in my life , the way that I found is most efficient .
I won't say right or wrong , because that implies duality , but the way I found it most efficient is like go have an experience and then , when you're like , how did that happen ? Now you go learn all the intellectual knowledge to back up the direct experience . Don't go learn all the intellectual knowledge and be like well , cannabis is bad .
It's like how many times you smoked ? Never . It's like then why are you talking to me ? Like , why are you acting ? Like you get what this ?
is Right , or I smoked one time when I was 15 and I had a panic attack and I had a panic attack .
Yeah , exactly Sounds like it worked , you know .
And you know what this is such a great point about , what you're saying about . Like , well , first you brought up the fast path and you know , don't knock it until you try it kind of thing . And I so I had , because I was introduced to all kinds of drugs at a very young age .
I just I ended up doing a bit of a different spin once I hit , once I hit 33 . I ended up going I think was it 33 ? When did I start ? I pursued the spiritual path , the clean path , and I did that as my .
That was my psychedelic experience , right , having walking this life with no substances and just prayer and meditation and using the ancient technology that we were taught in the mystery schools , we were taught how to make use of this temple of light , so to have the experiences of connecting with our inner divine .
And one of the things that I noticed about that well , actually , there's a couple of things One thing was about how much substances were demonized on that path , in the circle that I was surrounded by , and I think that it's fair to say that maybe some of these people were demonizing it because they had their own bad experience , or maybe they had their own
unhealthy relationship with substances , as did I . I'm not going to lie , I did too , and or they didn't , like you said , they never tried it , and so they were sincerely in belief that this path that they were on was the right path for everybody .
And so I bought into that and I fully applied myself as a devotee of the way and um , in this clean state , seeking to know myself , seeking to know the divine , seeking to understand and awaken my purpose , and one of the things that I realized was it doesn't matter how spiritual you are , if you don't get to the trauma in your body , you're not going to be
well , and after years and years and years , I think it was like a seven-year intensive that I did on that particular journey and I mean intensive , it was daily rituals .
I know exactly what you're talking about . I thought I remember having this conversation . We don't have to mention any names , but I get exactly what you're talking about .
Yeah , and daily rituals . And so I ? I had to come to terms with the fact that the spiritual path wasn't healing my PTSD , CPTSD . It didn't even help me understand my psyche , funny enough , because I didn't know the stages of development that we go through as a physical being with an ego .
We were taught to essentially dismiss the ego's needs at all , and that approach ended up causing harm . Not only did it cause harm to me , because I felt like I wasn't good enough . Here I am , doing all the things and I still have trauma . What the- .
Spending a lot of money trying to heal all that .
And lots and lots of money attempting to heal trauma from a spiritual quest , and maybe people have done it . Well done you people .
Wasn't my story and it wasn't the story of those who came into this community that I was a part of , who I witnessed with mental illness from their own personal traumas and lots of reasons why mental illness might be a thing for people .
But that opened me up to realize there's something more that I need to understand , and my background happens to be in natural medicine . I did study holistic healing and worked in clinical settings for a long time , and so it was kind of going back to my roots of the clinical approach .
But because I'm holistic minded , I was looking at things holistically and it came to me , I think , the psychedelic medicine , that Renaissance that you talked about .
One of the things that changed was when , before I started my spiritual quest , it was a bit of a free for all , and even though shamans were doing this medicine with people to heal their soul's wounds in the forest , let's say or I even did a shamanic retreat in Arizona , right Like so I attempted that route , I really did , and it was eye-opening , more than
not really eye-opening , but spiritually awakening , for sure , but what happens is this you have this awakening , you touch the divine , you get a taste of what's possible , but if you don't know how to bring it down through the worlds , the world of your thinking , the world of your feeling , the world of your being , if you don't know how to integrate it into your
life and it become the embodiment or the expression of everything that you tapped into , then it's going to shift back into your old pattern , your old reroute , or whatever your nervous system was routed subconsciously and routed to be , so that spiritual experience doesn't necessarily lend to a physiological change for everybody .
Maybe there's an occasional random experience . I've yet to find that . I've yet to find that , however . So this is what I've learned since coming back to medicine as a path for healing on a physical level , there are three types or three tiers Of psychedelics . Have you ever heard this ?
I think you and I might have breezed over , but I would love for you to share this because I want to hear it and I Know everyone listening is going to want to hear it too .
Okay , so most people are familiar with tier three , because tier three is the transpersonal experience that we have when we take , say , psilocybin or ayahuasca or gosh . There's so many , there's a lot of things . Even cannabis has brought me to tier three states , but it's usually those more like bigger , bigger medicines that people will have .
This like I saw the face of God moment or I touched something that took me out of my body . So that's tier three . That's what people tend to gravitate towards and they think , yeah , tier three . But like I said , if you don't know how to bring it through the worlds , through your body , through the psyche , it's not going to stabilize .
If your body has a lot of trauma , is wired for trauma , it's not going to stabilize . So , tier one , let's go back a little bit . I'll come to tier two in a minute . So tier one is the body . Tier one is primary consciousness . Is the body ? Tier one is primary consciousness .
If tier three is transpersonal , primary consciousness has everything to do with your basic needs to survive . It is your nervous system . And if you can get into the nervous system with a medicine like cannabis , which is the best number one tier one medicine , people can use ketamine to access tier one states .
That's not to say it's impossible , but usually you dissociate . Most people tend to dissociate on ketamine . Maybe someone has a magic way , a method of preventing dissociation for people . I haven't found that magic way , but maybe some people can . But essentially you don't necessarily want to dissociate too much during the session .
You want to go into the pain and there's benefit there .
And when you're able to go into the body and be with the pain and actually access that part of you in pain , you're actually with yourself in a new way and then you can walk yourself home , you can bring yourself up , you can literally mature yourself , reparent yourself , rewire yourself for safety for success .
So starting at tier one is the best approach body up , foundation up .
Then the secondary consciousness that's tier two is when we can actually use our rational mind as a way to reframe things from a different attitude , from a different worldview , from a different worldview because you're no longer in defense mode , protecting your dysregulated nervous system or your core wounds .
Instead , you're rational and you're able to rationally approach things . I personally love MDMA for a tier two experience . I do know that ketamine can be also a tier two experience for some people some of the time . But a tier two experience is also really beneficial for couples therapy or for healing in like family relations or something .
Taking a medicine to allow yourself to open up , to be receptive to another person's words and then be able to feel safe to say what's really on your mind , what you really need to say .
Sometimes people didn't even know what they needed to say until they had that experience of opening up this way and so this journey , and then you're able to then go to that transpersonal space because you stabilized your nervous system , you corrected your imbalances in your mind and now you're like all right , bring it , show me what I didn't know before , that I
need to know now in order to walk the highest path of my destiny . So that's the journey through that is amazing .
Shauna , thank you for laying that out because I , based on personal experience , definitely understand what you just said to be true . You know the reason I've been so drawn to cannabis , or there's many reasons , but one of the main reasons was exactly due to what you said .
I had trauma in my body and I feel like , overall , that's where most people are at , like , yes , can people experience God and have an amazing experience ? Yeah , sure , but , like you're saying , I think everyone's trying to read the back of the book or read the last page of the book and it's like , listen , guys , I get it .
What if , by starting with cannabis and on tier one , by the time you get to tier three , that can become your waking , sober state of reality , no medicine necessary . Like , what if ? That's the trajectory ?
And so sure , if you want to go have a level three experience right now or a tier three experience and you think that's positive for you , I'm not going to tell you you can't , but also understand that , like , if you try to jump levels , like think about it this way , right , it's kind of like if you don't work out and you try to clean and snatch a 300
pound , clean and snatch , like you're gonna get injured , you know yeah like , or the potential to get injured , goes up a lot .
And so , like you know how this kind of plays out , is like what happens if someone that has a lot of trauma just goes and like rips 5meo dmt with someone they met at burning man , like yikes , like that could be a psychic break , you know .
So like and it has happened and that's why a dirty secret in the psychedelic world , especially before the . Renaissance , Well before the Renaissance , you'd hear like even a shaman I worked with .
She said the same thing to me about how people come to the jungle for these transpersonal experiences and have mental breakdowns because they're not primed for transpersonal , Not to mention .
They're probably like not eating healthy . You know , they probably are showering in tap water . Like .
You know , all these other things that create toxic load in the body , that then impact your body's energy or vitality , your vibrancy , like all of that stuff matters , and the reason why I love talking about this stuff is not only because it's important , but because let's look at what's really happening .
Right , like I was a part of the same place that you were . Right , we'll talk in code . I don't want to , you know , say anything , but we were part of the same place and you know we connected on that . And you know , again , like I learned a lot of great things that place . You know there are a lot of great things that place .
You know , there are a lot of topics that I enjoyed learning from . I learned from some great teachers in there , but the thing that really just soured my brain was how they talked about plant medicine , because what was their thing ? They're like , oh , you know , uh , that's gonna mess you up .
You know all these things when in reality , it's like no human actions are what led to those undesirable results . Right , like , why are you blaming these medicines ? Like they're just growing in the ground , not asking of anything . Where are the ones going over there and going ? Let me see what happens .
If I take this so again like , if we want to look at why things are getting messed up , let's look at the fact that we've never been given a user manual for some of the most powerful tools in existence and we don't even like most of us don't have a background because we're so disconnected from God as a collective .
It'd be one thing if we were trained to meditate and God is good and all these things . And then we were like , oh , let's just go see what happens . At least then we'd have some kind of foundation . But you're thinking like people watching reality TV and like so in the matrix , and then they're going to like , do 5meo , dmt or ayahuasca ?
Like , yeah , of course that's not going to lead to any good results . And then when people say , oh , it's because the medicines are just silly , they're going to traumatize you more .
It's like no , guys , you're essentially saying the same thing as if someone said don't drive a dragster , they're all terrible , they're just going to put you in a wall to know how to drive a dragster . That doesn't mean the dragster is bad .
It means can we look at the person that had never driven a dragster that decided to get in there , their actions to do that . You know , let's actually put the blame there and figure out how to make it better .
Yeah .
It's so silly , you know .
Really , really silly and well said . There's a book called the Immortality Key .
Yes , have you heard of ? Yes , I have .
Yeah , and I think , if I'm not mistaken , because I read it a long time ago when it first came up , but I believe that man who was the author sorry I forget his name , If you remember , I showed it out and I believe Google so I believe he said when he was researching it was for education or , excuse me , he wanted to do clean research .
He's never done drugs , so he wanted to have an impartial objective you know , an impartial opinion by doing the research .
And I actually appreciated that because he was able to actually go into the history and saw where the line got broken , where we went from using medicine as a way to connect with each other and connect with our divinity in ceremony to then being told by the church that we couldn't because that wasn't the right way to access divinity and we had to go through them
in order to speak with our creator . And anyone who was using those medicines was probably killed or something . Yeah .
I mean , think about this , right , Like there's a great way that I've found to navigate life . Cause again , these days we have social media , we have all these things . You never know if someone's telling the truth , right , it's so easy for someone to seem one way and actually be totally different .
But you know the only thing , Shauna , that I found that doesn't lie in today's world Results right . So when I look at religion and I see wars , I see molestation , pedophilia , all that stuff . And then I look over to psychedelics and sure , nothing is perfect , right , there are shamans that have negative intent and whatever .
But I think about the times I've gone to church and the energy I felt there and the times where I've connected with medicine and the energy I felt there . I like the results more on the medicine side . That's the only reason I choose it . If tomorrow I stopped getting those kinds of results , I would look elsewhere .
But over time I have found that the things that really can just boom , give me the thing , are in the medicine realm . Otherwise I have to have faith and then pay people money and go through all these rituals and pay for all these healings when in reality that's not how Jesus talked about healing .
That's not how any of these deities talked about it , Because , again , like even to believe like .
have you ever read a disappearance of the universe before ? You know what ? I heard you reference it once and I got it on my my audible , I think .
I've mentioned on literally every episode now . So I promise you guys , I'm not an affiliate . I'm not affiliated with him . I just love this book . But when . I read that book . That book did what medicine does for me , and I'll tell you why .
Because , especially in that organization we were in , you know , I like to think of life in two ways simplicity or complexity . Simplicity is a language of God , complexity is a language of the ego .
So when you hear about like I'm really good friends with Aaron Abkey , who we both know , and he , in my opinion , is the world leader of what Jesus was actually teaching not just believing in him , but actually following what he said to do . Right , and what was his thing ? He said follow the 10 commandments .
But , honestly , you can just love your neighbor and love your God . That's it . That is simple . Anyone can do that , right , you don't need any money , you don't need to be any certain age , anyone can do that . That is simplicity . You know what's not simple ?
Hey , you have to come , spend a shit ton of money , you have to do all these rituals and if you don't , your negative ego is going to take you over . And then you have to meditate four hours a day . That's ego . Creating that , that's complexity . That's falling more into the dream , you know .
And when you read disappearance , you'll see what I mean by that , cause it's just that's what they talk about . It's crazy .
And if , if I could be honest , I'll tell you what it ended up causing in me because , yes , it was many , many hours a day that I would be doing ritual work . I had guilt , I had a lot of guilt and I carried that guilt with me for years . And even after trying and I was present with it it wasn't like it was .
I'm sure a part of it was underneath the iceberg , right . You only see the tip of the iceberg , kind of thing .
But I was present with a lot of that guilt for many years and I realized just how much damage having you know those kind of complex like you said , complexity , actually , what's interesting ? You're familiar with Richard .
Rudd . Yeah , gene Keys , richard Rudd and the Gene Keys . Ah , so amazing . I love his work so much that changed me .
Same that was , I think , 10 years ago , when I picked up that that book that's it's , and I've never put it down .
It really was like I have a right over there , my other .
But he talked about yeah he talked about simplicity , I think the like . Was it him that talked about complexity being the way in which we evolve in like , like it ? Oh , it wasn't him . Sorry , I'm confusing , I apologize , I'm going to . Regardless of Richard . Complexity is the . It's almost as if a geometry changes shape and evolves over time .
So if you ever watched like a flower of life pattern getting made , first it starts with a circle , then all of a sudden you have the vesica , pisces , and then it unfolds and folds and folds , and so they say it unfolds in more complex ways .
But then he it said that it's when it we complicate things , in that , in that model we can complicate things in that model , and by complicating it is when we collapse our system , is when we , when we don't , when we lose ourselves , we don't know our way , we feel lost on our path , we feel doubt . And we , what do we do when we're in doubt ?
We seek to an authority . We're going to ask someone else who knows better than us , as if that's the solution outside of us . And so that's the risk of being complicated , and that complexity that you described is losing your inner guidance and giving your power over to something or someone outside of yourself .
And the truth is , even cannabis or other psychedelics can be that right . We can lose ourselves assuming that that's the only way in which we can access that divinity within us . And it's not the truth .
It is a way , and once it opens up that pathway and the more and more and more interactions you have with the medicine in that regard , in that specific way , that protocol of using it intentionally , I find it's easier for me to access those sweet zones in my waking consciousness , ordinary states of consciousness , ordinary states of consciousness .
It's almost as if I have memories that flood me . I have revelations that come to me in my waking state . So it's as if it's like the medicine is still working , even after a session , to reduce that , that complexity , if you , to reduce that complicated mental construct and to just breathe into this moment in a simple way , navigating your path .
I know it made perfect sense . That was amazing . We could have like mic drop right there . You know , and you know it's so true .
Because , again , right Like the challenge with medicine and it's not really a challenge of medicine at all , it's a challenge with the human psyche , right , which is like what I want these organizations to realize You're blaming plants and fungus , right Like they didn't do anything . They're just sitting there growing on God's green earth .
What we choose to go do with them is our responsibility to take accountability on right . So the challenge there is that you know it happened with me , right Like because I wasn't raised in a environment of monks or a course of miracles workers or anything like that . My parents are absolutely amazing . Love them to death . They did an amazing job .
But because of that , I grew up in a world that I just thought this was what there is right and I believed in some kind of afterlife . You know , I never really knew what to call God , but I wasn't traumatized by it , by like other people that I know .
You know , like Aaron grew up in the church , like , had a lot of programming and things like that and that led to his beautiful kundalini awakening everything he does now , but I was talking to him when I was in Austin last week now , but I was talking to him when I was in austin last week and I was like dude I I'm just starting to really appreciate the
fact my parents never pushed god on me , because once I decided to be like all right , cool , I'm in , like there was nothing to heal . You know , it was just like this guy's always been cool . I just kind of , like , you know , left it off there , whatever .
But you know , what happened to me was that when I connected with medicine and I felt divinity for the first time first of all I didn't know what that was , I didn't know to call it divinity , I just knew whoa , that felt way cooler than I usually feel . That's all I knew .
So because I didn't get a user manual in school for what to eat , how to take care of yourself , who we are as a spiritual being , having a human experience , any of this stuff I just found something that made me feel better than I was normally feeling and so because of that , I was like I should have more of that all the time .
And I think that's where a lot of people get stuck , because they haven't realized that all these plants and medicines are showing them is an image of themselves , with less nonsense on the table .
You know , like , think about it this way , right , like say , you have a dinner table and you make memories there , and then life gets crazy and you start putting one paper on it and before you know it , there's not even a dinner table anymore . It's just a bunch of piles of paper , right ?
And so you actually forget that underneath all that is a beautiful dinner table that you get to create memories at . Right , that's how most of us are . You know , like , we're a beautiful dinner table . It's always been there . It just got clotted over by junk , right . And what medicine does is they give you an opportunity .
They almost show you a picture of before it was filled with stuff , right , they're like , remember .
But if you don't realize , oh yeah , I can clear all that stuff away and work through my trauma and things like that , and this just gives me a glimpse of what's possible , Then you're going to be like , no , I just need to be reminded of that picture over and over again .
And that's where I got into it , right , with cannabis is that I ended up realizing I like when the table was clean a lot more , but I didn't know that you could clean it at all . I just thought it was . I didn't even know that it was messy , right , I just knew like my table sucks . This image makes me feel better , yeah .
And that's it . And I think that's the place that people get stuck in is like , well , this is just the way it is . This is just my life and it's like that's not . That's not the way it is . People are confusing normal with natural . Just because one way of operating is normal for you , that doesn't mean that's who you are naturally .
It just means it's a really well-traveled path that you've been on and it's going to take a bit of effort . By the way , the structure that you people are , we're all age-takers , aren't we ?
People are funny on that , they so people are phony on that , like they just want to go the fast path , like we talked about , and they just want to go out and have the blast off out of body experience and think that's their , that's their salvation .
The journey of healing , that hero's journey that we are walking , and what unfolds as a result of pursuing that , and what unfolds as a result of pursuing that innermost essence , pursuing wisdom , pursuing betterment , what happens to you as a result of that pursuit , who you become as a result of walking that path , is what it's about .
And having been on this path for a very long time myself , I can understand that feeling of just wanting to fix what's what feels wrong . Um , and going to the end of the book , like you said , just go to the last page , see what the last chapter tells you to do and just do that . It's like you're missing the , the , the ABCs , and one , two , threes .
Before you get to you know how to construct those base elements into something like language , for example , or a beautiful math equation .
So , yeah .
So it's important for us to do the work to walk that that path .
That's difficult and I think that if people are having a hard time which a lot of people do have a hard time on their own at first anyway they might it's important to identify the right type of guide , the right type of practitioner , the right type of person for whatever stage you're in on that journey and make sure that you feel this you get the support that
you need to go through the process that you need to go through of again undoing and rebuilding at different stages and aligning with what's best for you on this path I think is everyone's destiny this path . I think is everyone's destiny , but where people are as unique and what people need is unique , and meeting people where they need is .
I think that is my , uh , that's my favorite , that's my . I totally agree .
I totally agree . And you know it was funny because one of my favorite quotes of all time , which I think perfectly summarizes what we've talked about , is there are many paths to reach the same destination . The only one that is quote , unquote wrong is the one that tells you there's only one way to get there . And so what are we saying ?
This is one of infinite different paths , right . If you like it , great . If you don't , great right . Be true to yourself . But what we're also saying is don't let anyone convince you there's only one way to get somewhere , because there just isn't . And when you read Disappearance one of the things I love so much and all four of this guy's books are amazing .
His fourth one is probably my favorite . It's the Lifetimes when Jesus and Buddha Knew Each Other , and it's just like it's a powerful , powerful book because he talks about how . You know , if you look at Buddhism , for instance , right , buddhism of today is like , no one talks against . They're very strict on that .
Right , don't ever put anything that can alter your consciousness into your body . But what Gary or the Ascended Masters that talk to him share with him is that you know they're like Gary . People today don't get it because these are non-dualistic .
You know ways of living , right , what Jesus was teaching , what Buddha was teaching , what Lao Tzu was teaching , what Plato was teaching . These are non-dualistic individuals . So , first of all , they never would have made a religion , because that would be in the dream . That's not real and that would get people farther into the dream .
Right , reading all this scripture , you know , forgetting to have the direct experience of God , forgetting to walk in the forest and feel him all around you . No , I got to study the scripture , right . So , like he would have never done that . And also , when you think about this dream not truly being reality , it's not useless .
The point is to have the best dream possible and you do that by waking up to who and what you truly are and helping your fellow brothers and sisters who are also . You do the same thing .
But he mentioned in that that Jesus and Buddha would never have said you can't do something , because to say that would imply that somehow it's negative , and negative implies duality , and that then makes it real , right . So what they would have said is the middle way , right ? So is cannabis good or bad ? Should you do plant medicine or not ?
I don't know how do you feel about it , right ? That's what a non-dualist would say . They would never say do it or don't do it , because that implies duality , that implies there's a right and wrong .
And that's where I really started to see through a lot of stuff in the world when I started with that book , because I had always known that when people tried to push stuff on me , I was like , oh , it's so icky , right . Like if I'm excited about it , then I ask you about it . Yeah , sure , tell me about it .
But these people are like there's only one way . You know , I'm like that is such an ego thing . It is insane ego trip you know , it really is .
It really is . I appreciate you talking about that on the middle way , and that's my that is my life's work teach in those like in the .
Kabbalion , on breaking down these principles , you realize that it's the practical way to be walking that path so that you don't polarize yourself in duality , Because as soon as you polarize yourself to one end , then you create opposition , and when you create opposition you have resistance , you create friction and you end up creating drama from that place of
consciousness or the outcome of that friction . And then they end up continuing to dig themselves even deeper because they anchor into their patterns of behaviors that end up polarizing them even more . And then they wonder why do they continuously attract ? the same people and problems in their life .
So , yeah , the middle way to me is the best way to walk this life . However , I also recognize it's an interesting thing this year for me . This year , my theme is unity consciousness .
I pick themes every year .
So unity consciousness is this year , and also understanding and studying the law of one and recognizing these polarized states and their purposes . These polarized states and their purposes . I've actually come to appreciate those who are born in a polarized , negatively polarized frequency , because they force us to wake up , and that was my revelation with my own sibling .
I had a very difficult living and working relationship with my sister . We still can't function together , but she literally was that polarized person for me and when I was healing from complex trauma I realized she was my greatest spiritual teacher . And then I realized , wow , what a gift she gave me .
She came into this world so that I could wake up , so that I could be polarized by her negativity and literally choose that middle way , choose unity , choose non-duality to the degree that I want . Yeah .
Cause we're not meant to be perfect Right , like if we were , we would have never left . Wherever there is right , we're here right to essentially like we forget , we're gone you know like , and so it's supposed to be a little messy . It's supposed to be color outside lines , but that's the beauty of it .
And I love what you said , because if you go back to tier two , what you just said is really like my amalgamation of what I believe tier two to be right the ability .
Ability to look at a situation happening in life , whether you perceive it positive or negative , right dualistically , and be able to find an architect of that story and architect that story rather in a way that serves you for your highest good . So , like that right , there is what I believe like the term mindset kind of speaks to right , the ability to go .
Well , you know , like for me , like my dad died when I was 23 , cancer , pretty shitty , but also it woke me up to a lot of stuff .
It woke me up to my mortality , it woke me up to the fact that like , hey , I'm here , I got to do something right , I get to do something with my life and it also gave me a beautiful story that helps me connect with millions of people across the world .
So , you know , again , like I've witnessed family members and friends that don't have that ability to create a powerful story or a positive one over something otherwise challenging , and , yeah , it can eat you alive , you know .
And again , like you know , I'm very grateful to psychedelics and things like that , because they kind of gave me my first glimpse of that , because when you're going through a bad trip and you end up thinking it's a bad trip .
you got to commit yourself real quick and find a story that's going to be this helping you or you're going to have a psychic break .
So yes , exactly it's the fastest path to a breakthrough or a breakdown Exactly , exactly .
Yeah , and I appreciate you even like acknowledging your experience with your , your father's passing question would you even be doing what ? You're doing today , had you not had that experience with your father . Do you think ?
I don't think so . I mean , I don't know like it's . It's it's impossible to say . But you know , like I've talked to my dad a lot of times and I've gone to plant medicine states and whatnot , and that was , like you know , actually one of my first real spiritual experiences with with psilocybin was when my dad got sick .
I didn't realize I was healing , but what ended up ? Because I didn't have the words for it at that age . But what I was doing was every weekend my friends from childhood would come over , because my parents house is always the hangout house and my dad was their second dad and we'd all just do mushrooms every weekend .
We didn't realize we were all processing grief together , you know . And so , like I remember there was one night where taking mushrooms back then was so funny . Sometimes you take them and your body feels weird . Sometimes you're just gone like we didn't understand strains back then .
Back then the kind of thing was , ah , they're all the same and I was like I don't think that's true . But but , like you know , there must have been a time we got penis envy or something and we just went to this .
I , I was just completely encompassed into this golden light and it felt like the womb and I was there and I could talk to my grandmother , my nana , any past relative pets . I was just there with him and from that experience after that I feel like it lessened the blow of my dad dying because I knew like , wow , I know exactly where he's going .
It's fucking awesome and I , I can get there . Maybe I don't know if , like , I can get to this place every time , but I know there's a way that I can get there . Maybe I have to go learn , whatever . But you know , I realized in that moment I had the experience , which , again , is so much better for me than just having faith in it .
Like , faith is a is a catch , all you know it's like a , it's like a tricky thing , right , because we get it . It's so important . But why are they asking you to have blind faith if there's a lot of parts of you that don't believe that ?
Once I had that experience , I never had to convince myself that my dad was going to die and that was going to be the end of it . I never had to convince myself away from that again Once I had that experience . It was hard .
I wish he could still be here with me , but it's not the end of the story , you know , and that is really , I think , the reason I could talk about it so freely , you know . So it's very interesting . I can't go back and try it the other way , but that's my best guess , you know . So , yeah , it's cool , yeah . Thank you for receiving .
We could talk about this stuff , I know .
Sean , it's been amazing . I can't believe we've already gone through an hour . I'm going to have to get you back on . Hopefully we can do one in person when I come down to North Carolina .
We meet up in person somewhere in the world , but I want to make sure I give you ample opportunity to tell people where they can find you , where they can find out about working with you and all the amazing things you have coming down the pipeline .
Thank you for asking , so I think that right now , the best place is just my name , shaunapeltoncom , even though I'm currently building a new site that will take you there eventually anyway , so that's the best route to learn about those the different ways in which I facilitate people on their quest for self-actualization beautiful through non-ordinary states of consciousness
, with or without medicine , because that's important for people to be able to have choice and recognize that there's different stages and different levels of medicine Sometimes , it's no different strokes different folks .
right , there's no right or wrong answer , right ? That's what we're saying . You know , it's like guys , just tune into your heart and if you're like I don't want to do medicine , don't do it . It's not right for you . Maybe at some point it will be , but until that happens , don't let anyone convince you the medicine's a path .
Or , on the other side , if you really feel deep down in your core like no , these medicines are helping me , do not let anyone tell you they're not you know , because they don't know . They're not you , you know , and there is no objective reality . Everything here is subjective . So you know , sean , I like to ask everyone a last question . You ready ?
I am All right . Let's say someone listens to this episode and they are beyond excited to explore psychedelic medicines in their own life . What is the one piece of advice you would offer them to allow them to use the proper discernment in choosing whether or not these medicines are right for them right now in their life ?
I would say , first and foremost , context matters , whatever's going on in the nervous system . Are you destabilized already ? Because if you are , it's going to be difficult to do a journey . So start with body , listen to your body , and your body is going to be the one to dictate the direction you go 100% .
It's kind of like the body is driver's ed . You know driver's school . You got to do that before you can drive the car and you got to drive it around a block before you can put it on the highway , you know . So I love that , Shauna . This has been a blast , guys , thanks so much for tuning in . Make sure you go check out Shauna's website .
We're going to put everything in the show notes , but make sure you follow her . She's amazing , one of my dear friends , and I can't wait to have her back on . If you loved the episode , go give us a five-star review , if you haven't already . I'm looking at you and until next time may the source be with you to infinity and beyond Peace . For now ,